Agenda item

The Board is asked to consider and approve the B&NES Tobacco Control Strategy 2019 – 2024.

12:05pm – 20 minutes - Joanna McLaughlin

The Chair invited Joanna McLaughlin from B&NES Public Health Team to give a presentation.

Joanna McLaughlin gave a presentation (attached as Appendix to these minutes) where she highlighted the following points:

• Smoking prevalence in adults in B&NES
• The Vision – Towards a Smoke Free Generation
• Key messages from the strategy
• Attempts and success in quitting
• Message – ‘Don’t give up giving up’
• Vaping – is it risky?
• The NHS Long Term Plan for SmokeFree
• The Health and Wellbeing Board could provide support for the strategy by adopting some key actions

The Chair thanked Joanna McLaughlin for her presentation and said that this would be interesting opportunity for the Board to engage in which tied-in with Health Inequalities item that was on the agenda for this meeting, although it would be quite a challenging subject overall.

Joanna McLaughlin commented that some of key issues and actions outlined in the strategy have been already in use.  This strategy would follow to build on the progress resulting from the previous 2014-2018 strategy by defining how the Local Authority and its partners would seek to act in evidence and needs based way across the next 5 years.

Kate Morton commented that a number of young people (who to Bath Mind for information, advice and support) were smokers and that those numbers had gone up. 

Joanna McLaughlin commented that results of schools’ surveys, conducted every two years, have suggested that the numbers of young people smoking had gone down.

Jo Scammell acknowledged that vaping was far less dangerous than smoking.  However, she expressed her concerns on the rise in vaping and asked if there were any ways on stopping that trend, in particular with young people.

Bruce Laurence replied that there were many uncertainties on why vaping has risen over the last few years, whether because a number of people stopped smoking or because people enjoy vaping different flavours.  The risk of vaping flavours with higher dosage of nicotine would be in developing an addiction.  Although nicotine was not a significant health hazard for people without heart conditions, it would raise heart rate which could create problems to people with heart conditions. 

Paul Harris commented that he spoke to Curo residents about smoking, and some residents felt that ‘smoking was the only pleasure in life and it made them happy’.  Paul Harris asked the Board how to address such misleading opinions/views as there was a population of 30,000 housing residents in B&NES, with many of them likely to smoke.

Joanna McLaughlin replied that it would be very useful to work with representatives every organisation and body around this table by speaking to and offering support for people to stop smoking.

Councillor Rob Appleyard welcomed the report and thanked the officers for their great work on making B&NES smoke free.  Councillor Appleyard said that some of the recommendations in the report may be difficult to achieve, stopping pension funds to invest in tobacco companies (as they provide high returns).  Nevertheless, Councillor Appleyard informed the Board that the Council would be looking to divest from non-ethical companies over the period of time.

It was RESOLVED that:

1)  The Health and Wellbeing Board noted the contents of this report and the full strategy document

2)  The Health and Wellbeing Board approved the contents of this report and the full strategy document

3)  The Health and Wellbeing Board provided support for the strategy by undertaking the following key actions:

  I.  Build on the success of Smokefree NHS by promoting smokefree environments across all partner organisations

  II.  Respond to the Government’s consultation on the green paper for prevention 'Advancing our health: prevention in the 2020s' by endorsing the following:

·  a levy on tobacco companies to raise funds for smoking cessation and prevention activities

·  a requirement for manufacturers and importers of cigarettes to include Government mandated pack inserts to support quitting

·  a change in the legal age of sale for tobacco from 18 to 21.