SmokeFree London News

A new TV advert launches today as part of the NHS Smokefree campaign, which urges parents: 'Smoking. Don't keep it in the family'. This campaign highlights the danger that by smoking, parents are trebling the chances of their child becoming a smoker .

Two-thirds of smokers say that they do not smoke in the presence of children and three-quarters do not allow smoking in the home or restrict it to certain times and places . The new advert, set to the Shirley Temple song 'On account'a I love you', is filmed from a child's perspective to show just how difficult it really is for parents to hide smoking from their children. The advert concludes with the child standing in front of a mirror, pretending to smoke using a crayon as a cigarette.

Research by Dartmouth Medical College in the United States illustrated this point quite clearly, through a role-playing shopping game with children from two to six years of age. A six-year-old boy in the study was able to identify his parents' preferred brand of cigarettes but could not identify the brand of his own favourite cereal. Overall, the children were nearly four times as likely to buy cigarettes if their parents smoked.

The advert will be aired on TV alongside another which is already running showing the different ways children copy their parents, with the final scene showing a little girl picking up a crayon to mimic her mother smoking.

Leading child psychologist and parenting skills expert of www.raisingkids.co.uk, Dr Pat Spungin, said:

""From a very young age children imitate the behaviour of their parents. The way parents act around their children plays a significant role in shaping how their children will behave in the future. The evidence shows that if parents don't smoke, there is a much greater chance that their children will be non-smokers. The good news is that the NHS has a wide range of free support available to help smokers go smokefree - and by quitting now parents could stop their children from starting."

For details of the free NHS support to help smokers go smokefree, call 0800 169 0 169 or visit www.nhs.uk/gosmokefree.

Plain cigarette packets with no branding or logos, minimum pack sizes of 20 and a ban on the advertising of cigarette papers are just some of the ideas up for discussion in a move to reduce the number of people who smoke, Health Secretary, Alan Johnson, announced today.

The new department of health consultation document 'The Future of Tobacco Control', which launches on World No Tobacco Day next Saturday, aims to start a debate around further measures that would stop people smoking and prevent young people starting to smoke.

The ideas and proposals in the consultation include:

• removing branding and logos from all tobacco packaging;
• having a minimum pack size of 20 - to stop young people, who can only afford packs of 10, buying cigarettes;
• restricting access to cigarette vending machines by young people - whether by banning vending machines altogether or through systems that only allow adult purchase;
• restricting the display of tobacco products in shops. which may include putting cigarettes under the counter; and
• banning the advertising of smoking paraphernalia, such as cigarette papers..

The take up of smoking in young people is lower than a decade ago, but over 200,000 of all under 16's start smoking each year. As a result they are 3 times more likely to die of cancer due to smoking than someone who starts in their mid-20s.

Alan Johnson, said:

"Protecting children from smoking is a Government priority and taking away temptation is one way to do this. If banning brightly coloured packets; removing cigarettes from display; and removing the cheap option of a pack of ten helps save lives, then that is what we should do - but we want to hear everyone's views first."

"Smoking related disease kills 87,000 people a year, the equivalent a city the size of Durham. Despite much progress over the past ten years with 1.9 million fewer smokers since 1998, smoking it is still the biggest killer in England. The number of smokers is declining but we must do more if we are to continue to tackle a public health issue that kills six times more people a year than road traffic accidents."

The consultation is published on 31 May 2008 on World No Tobacco Day -for which the theme is 'Tobacco-Free Youth'. The four main consultation themes are:

• protecting children and young people from smoking;
• further reducing smoking rates and health inequalities caused by smoking;
• helping smokers to quit; and
• helping those who cannot quit.

Research has shown that children and young people have been found to be more receptive to tobacco advertising than adults, and that since the ban on tobacco advertising, prominent displays at point of sale have become vital as one of the few remaining means of tobacco promotion. Evidence suggests that this can persuade existing smokers to keep smoking and young non-smokers to start.

Since the ban on tobacco advertising, advertising at the point of sale has become the main route for promoting cigarettes. The large displays and advertising in shops can encourage young people to start and make it more difficult for smokers to kick the habit.

Recent smoking stats show a 2 per cent drop in smokers in Britain (22 per cent down from 24 per cent) and since the introduction of the Smokefree legislation in July 07, an increase of 28 per cent in quit attempts using NHS Stop Smoking Services.

The estimated cost to the NHS of treating smoke related illness is between £1.4 and 1.7 billion per year.

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