Public health campaigners must want smokers to die

You've all seen the news reports about the Welsh government's proposed ban on using e-cigs in enclosed public places - the same places where smoking is banned. This proposal is another small piece in the seemingly relentless barrage of misleading - downright lies in many cases - misleading messages from people who claim concern about public health. On the Welsh ban, Chris Snowdon sums it all up:

The last few years have seen an extraordinarily dishonest campaign of misinformation against e-cigarettes that is as bad as anything I have seen from the ‘public health’ lobby. There has been a concerted effort to portray e-cigarettes as a ‘gateway’ to tobacco, despite all the evidence showing that they are a gateway from tobacco. They have been accused of ‘renormalising’ smoking without a scintilla of evidence. Misleading research has led to numerous unfounded scare stories in the press. Newspaper columnists have written ridiculous articles without doing the most basic fact-checking. Senior medics have explicitly told the public that e-cigarettes are no safer than real cigarettes. At the same time, ordinary vapers who never had any intention of becoming campaigners – and, indeed, are not campaigners – have been accused of being shills for e-cigarette and/or tobacco companies for doing no more than trying to put the record straight.

I have seen this attitude live - Bradford Council enacted a ban on new fast food takeaways close to schools despite there being no evidence to support their proposed ban and despite the Director of Public Health telling the Executive that the proposals would not make any difference. And I have seen other organisations - from the Association of Conservative Clubs and Wetherspoons through to just about every transport provider - using the British Medical Association's anti-vaping position as justification for their own ban.

These organisations - many of them funded by the producers of pharmaceutical nicotine - have set about denormalising vaping, telling people who quit smoking or cut down smoking through using e-cigs that they are just as bad as the smokers and must stand outside in the rain, wind and traffic pollution. Quit or die is the message - and this means that die is the choice made, for all sorts of reasons, by the smoker.

“This is not an area in which you should wait for proof that harm has conclusively happened. We need to take action now to prevent the possibility of harm.”

Read that statement from the Welsh health minister. Read it again - he's saying that he wants the ban because there might be the possibility of harm. The possibility of harm from water vapour. This isn't a public health argument, it's a "we hate you because you're a smoker" argument. Just as the passing of rules to ban fast food is the result of a squeamish "eurggh, all that greasy, smelly food that common people eat" attitude. Plus the argument for 'minimum unit pricing' for booze - "we won't pay extra for our nice New Zealand sauvignon blanc but that smelly man in the Tesco Express will pay more for his disgusting cheap cider."

Today's public health campaigns aren't about health, they're about values. The imposition of a New Puritan attitude to pleasure - an attitude wrapped up in fake science about dopamine and addiction - where only approved pleasures are allowed. And the assertion that everything in our lives must have a purpose, no longer the glorification of god but rather the search for eternal life here on earth. The option of choosing a pleasure now knowing it may have a health consequence is not to be allowed. Above all the loud, brash, public consumption of pleasure - especially the booze, fags and burgers regular folk like to consume - is to be discouraged if not actually banned.

Vaping is a harmless pastime. Better still it's getting people to stop smoking or cut down smoking. But public health folk don't like vaping because it's not promoted by smart men from a pharma company but by a bloke with tattoos and a beer gut in a cheap shop on Yorkshire Street in Oldham.These public health people are commissioning 'smoking cessation' activities, holding meetings to discuss anti-smoking strategies - and pretending that e-cigs don't exist or worse that they're the latest evil plot from Big Tobacco.

When I started to look at public health, I believed that it was a force for good and that the people could be persuaded by evidence and the realities of life for people (especially people in our poorest communities). Sadly I've not seen this but rather an ideological commitment to undermining the freely made choices people make simply because they might be "unhealthy". And the attack on vaping encapsulates the problem - there is no evidence, no justification for the ban but they proceed with it because they disapprove of vaping.

I can only conclude, as many others have done, that public health campaigners must want smokers to die.
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Plain packs, e-cig bans and the triumph of ignorance

Today marks the publication of the Chantler Review into standardised packaging for cigarettes, which follows the proposal from the Welsh government to ban the use of electronic cigarettes in enclosed public spaces. I haven't read the whole of Chantler's review but it's summary contains the observation that:

There is very strong evidence that exposure to tobacco advertising and promotion increases the likelihood of children taking up smoking. 

We know that advertising does not act to raise demand both generally and specifically for products such as cigarettes. So I have to assume that the 'evidence' relied on by Chantler is primarily the qualitative studies undertaken by tobacco control researchers that essentially show how children prefer pretty colours to drab colours. This may be true but there's a leap from 'I like pink' to 'I'll start smoking because I like the pink pack' that simply doesn't have evidential support.

Chris Snowden points out that Chantler finds only a 'moderate' impact on uptake - something that would be very difficult to prove one way or another especially since advertising (even where it is still permitted) has only a marginal impact on the decision of a person to experiment with smoking. More importantly Chantler says that this impact will only be realised 'over time' creating more vagueness and imprecision. I remain unconvinced that this is the best option for public intervention if our aim is either (or both) to reduce levels of smoking adoption or increase rates of smoking cessation.

Indeed, if the evidence is right that it is the person's environment (do parents, other family members and peers smoke) that plays the dominant role in the decision to experiment with smoking then the emphasis should be on smoking cessation rather than smoking adoption. And this brings us to the proposal in Wales to apply the same restrictions to using electronic cigarettes as apply to smoking tobacco.

The Welsh health minister, Mark Drakeford, said officials were considering a ban amid concerns that the products could "re-normalise" the use of conventional cigarettes.

He said there were also concerns that their spread could undermine the ban on tobacco smoking in enclosed public spaces, making it more difficult to enforce.

This is a truly egregious proposal since we know that electronic cigarettes are widely adopted by smokers to either quit or reduce their use of tobacco and that they eliminate nearly all the personal as well as all the environmental risks associated with smoking tobacco. Worse still, the argument made here contradicts the rationale for the smoking ban - protecting the health of others in the smoking environment.

Since we want fewer smokers then we should be supporting the adoption of electronic cigarettes by current smokers. Not just to benefit the health of those smokers but to reduce the probability of their children, brothers, sisters and friends taking up the habit. By seeking to denormalise electronic cigarettes, the Welsh government is describing the devices as no different from tobacco with the result that children are as likely to adopt the latter as the former. Plus, of course, increasing the likelihood that the vaper will switch back to tobacco - a point succinctly put by Tim Stanley:

Force me to stand outside and I’ll calculate that I may as well go back to the Marlboro Lights.

Although these proposals are filled with analysis and wrapped up in stuff that looks like science, they are at best selective and at worst simply ignorant. In the case of packaging, the review relies on studies by non-marketers working in tobacco control research and completely ignores the substantial body of research evidence on the role and effectiveness of brand advertising. And for electronic cigarettes, the assumption is that they will act as some sort of gateway for tobacco rather than (as the evidence suggests) quite the reverse.

It does seem that what we have here isn't an example of good evidence-based policy but rather a victory for anti-smoking obsession and a triumph of ignorance.

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No Platform for Smokers!

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You know you're a pariah when you can't go on a platform to make your case - so it is with smokers' rights champion, Simon Clark:

However, a number of our speakers, some of whom are directly linked to the Welsh Government have stated that they are no longer able to speak at the seminar if you were to participate. As I stated it is usual for the Forum to include a range of divergent opinions amongst speakers, however on this occasion we feel that in fairness to delegates that have registered to attend based on a programme that includes these speakers it would be unfair and impractical to continue the seminar without their involvement.

Simply because Simon was on the same bill these speakers - or enough of them to worry the organisers - refuse to participate and the smokers; rights case (whatever we make think of it) isn't heard.

So speakers at the conference in question are free to exclude smokers, to treat them as filthy pariahs and to denigrate their choice while denying anyone the opportunity to defend their choice.

As I said - No Platform for Smokers!

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So we make providing homes to rent more expensive - that will help the housing crisis!

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The Welsh government (and plenty of English councils) are keen on the idea of "accrediting" private landlords.

The government will set out plans to improve the private rented sector and will expect landlords to register on an accreditation scheme.

It all seems like a great idea - we'll have a scheme that improves the quality of homes and management in the "sector". But the problem is that these schemes involve (this is from a voluntary one in Leeds):

Payment of a non-returnable application and membership fee.

And while this is fine if it's only a few quid, will it stay that way? If you inherit mum's terraced house and rent it out rather than sell, you'll end up losing a month's rent in accreditation to add to the month's rent in agent fees and the month's rent in costs. So you either sell or put the rent up.

This isn't simply a registration scheme but a means by which the sort of provisions under section 82 of the Housing Act 2004 become common-place.

In a selective licensing area the landlord must comply with the fit and proper person test included within the Housing Act 2004 to obtain a licence. His rented properties must be let within the terms of the licence conditions to ensure that the properties are safe and that the landlord can, and will, deal with anti-social tenants.

Accreditation is about exercising state-control over the private rental sector - it isn't about improving stock quality or housing management. It is expensive and the expectation is that the landlord will be picking up the cost - an act that simply makes housing more expensive.

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Just when Welsh Rugby was starting to look good again!

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Salary caps are a daft idea – especially when you’re the only ones signing up to them.

The four Welsh regions have revealed they will operate under a salary cap from next season in order to give long-term sustainability in the game.

Cardiff Blues, the Scarlets, Ospreys and Dragons have all united under a landmark legal agreement that is supported by the Welsh Rugby Union.

Just as Welsh Rugby is beginning – on the back of the Celtic League, the regional structures and European competition – to recover some of the passion and excitement of times past, the lords and masters of the country’s national game saddle them with this salary cap.

Any bets on the best players all being in France or England  within five years?

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Alcohol Concern Cymru - the most ignorant of nannying fussbuckets

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Although BBC Wales does its best to make Alcohol Concern Cymru not seem like a bunch of idiots even they can't quite manage it with this story:

An alcohol charity claims there a "silent epidemic" of heavy drinking among elderly people in Wales

But Alcohol Concern Cymru's (AAC) report quotes statistics that have been challenged by drinks industry body The Portman Group. The group argued overall trends showed "a positive and continuing decline in the rates of excessive drinking".

Andrew Misell of AAC said there was anecdotal evidence from elderly support workers to back their claim.

All your typical row until you get to look at why AAC issued their scary press release:

The paper compares figures from Welsh Government-commissioned Health Surveys of 2003/4 and 2009 as "evidence that the proportion of older people drinking more than the recommended amount is rising".


AAC said the number of over 65s who said they had drunk more than the recommended maximum in the previous week rose from 22% (men) and 7% (women) in 2003/4 to 34% (men) and 17% (women) in 2009.

See scary - a huge increase in wrinkly boozing is evidenced from the surveys. Except that - as the BBC eventually explain:
 

However, BBC Wales understands that as a result of changes in methodology adopted by the compilers of the Welsh Health Survey in 2006 the two sets of statistics are not comparable.

Ah, there you are you see! No increase in drinking. However AAC keep wriggling:

When challenged on the paper's use of statistics Mr Misell said: "Those statistics were taken as an illustration. It's certainly the case that more work needs to be done in terms of finding out what exactly is the pattern of drinking among older people.


"The point of the paper is that it's a hidden problem. If you talk to people working with older people they will say there's quite a lot of anecdotal evidence to support the fact that alcohol is a problem."

The problem is so hidden that the statistics can't pick it up and are showing old folk drinking less rather than more. Something must be done!

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