Balloons and party hats at the ready - it’s ASH’s 50th anniversary

It's ASH's 50th anniversary next week.

I know this because we've just received an email from a radio station that intends to mark the 'occasion' with a handful of interviews with the great and the good.

For a millisecond I thought they were going to ask Forest for an interview too but instead they wanted a certain VIP's contact details.

Actually it would have surprised me had they invited us to take part because since the station was launched last year we haven't been interviewed or invited on a single programme once.

To put this in perspective, during the same period we have been quoted several times by every national newspaper and interviewed many times by the BBC, Talk Radio, LBC and GB News.

Naturally I pointed this out in my reply before adding:

Btw, I would gladly speak to you on ASH's 50th anniversary. As it happens, Forest marked its own 40th anniversary in 2019 and we will continue to oppose the grim "smoke-free" utopia ASH would have us inhabit in the next 50 years.

I don’t know who is orchestrating events to mark the milestone but expect a parliamentary 'question' inviting some minister to congratulate ASH on their heroic ‘achievements’ over the past half century.

I imagine there will also be some joyless event with speeches from the usual suspects demanding that the Government goes further, faster when it announces its new tobacco control plan.

Should be fun. Balloons and party hats at the ready!

Update: According to ASH’s own website, ‘ASH was established in January 1971 by the Royal College of Physicians’.

Why, then, is the 50th anniversary being marked in December?

Could this in fact be more to do with creating a media event to lobby government ahead of the tobacco control plan?

Update: The Lancet (November 27) writes …

This month Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), the prominent UK anti-smoking organisation, marks its 50th anniversary …

Smoking prevalence in the UK has declined faster than other global leaders in tobacco control, such as Australia, and far faster than the average for Europe.

None of these achievements would have been possible without advocacy by organisations such as ASH, whose approach provides a playbook for others.

Not sure I’ll be able to stomach much of this!