The Government has announced a consultation adding inserts to tobacco product to 'help' smokers quit.
According to the BBC News website, 'Cigarette packs could carry anti-smoking message inserts', which I think would be wrong.
After all, if you've ignored all the health warnings, including the grotesque images on the outside of the pack, I'm not sure a further anti-smoking message inside the pack will make much difference.
Nor do I think messages about the financial cost of smoking – and what you could do with the £2,000 a year you might save if you quit smoking – are going to change most people's minds.
What might make a difference is some constructive information about alternatives to cigarettes – reduced risk products products such as e-cigarettes, heated tobacco, and nicotine pouches.
The tone however is important. The vast majority of smokers aren't stupid and addressing them like children will almost certainly be counter-productive.
As it is, I think 'insert fatigue' might set in quite quickly once the initial novelty has gone away.
That, after all, is what happened with health warnings on packs and the subsequent grotesque images. Within a few months they're like wallpaper.
Anyway, here's Forest's response to the Government proposal:
Smokers' rights campaigners have given a cautious welcome to a UK government proposal to add pack inserts to tobacco products to encourage more smokers to quit.
Simon Clark, director of the smokers’ group Forest, said:
"If the inserts provide constructive information about quitting there is some merit in the idea.
"For example, inserting information about reduced risk products such as e-cigarettes, heated tobacco and nicotine pouches would make a lot of sense.
"Targeting consumers with more anti-smoking messages, which are on the pack already, risks warning fatigue and won't work."
"One question is, who pays for the inserts?
"If the cost is passed on to consumers, who already pay punitive rates of taxation on tobacco, it may be counter productive because more smokers will switch to illicit tobacco products that won't have inserts added."
As a result of this story I was on the Five Live phone-in this morning with Nicky Campbell who asked the question. 'Is it your duty to quit smoking?'.
What I didn't know is that the first hour of the phone-in is also broadcast on BBC Two. (Thank goodness I shaved and put on a shirt!)
Since then I've been interviewed by GB News (see below), and BBC Radio Hereford and Worcestershire, and this afternoon I'm doing TalkTV and BBC Radio WM.
If you want to have YOUR say, details of the consultation can be found here – Mandating quit information messages inside tobacco packs.
The consultation closes on October 10.
Meanwhile it's worth noting that the press release issued by the Department of Health (New inserts in cigarette packs to help smokers quit) features a quote by the CEO of ASH, Deborah Arnott.
That's quite something, is it not? If nothing else, it shows how embedded ASH is within the DHSC.
