Public Health England can't confirm how many smokers took part in Stoptober 2016

A couple of weeks ago I emailed Public Health England:

I would be grateful if you could confirm how many smokers signed up to Stoptober 2016.

Last year an announcement about the number who signed up for Stoptober 2015 was made on 30 October 2015. So far however I have yet to see a similar announcement for this year's event. If the figure is not currently available can you tell us when it will be made public?

In addition, could you please confirm (a) the total sum that was paid to Phil Tufnell, Craig Revel Horwood, Chris Kamara and Natasha Hamilton to promote Stoptober 2016 and (b) how much the total budget was for Stoptober 2016.

The total sum paid to comedian Al Murray and others to promote Stoptober 2015 is in the public domain (it was reported by the Mail on Sunday in February 2016) so I hope you will share with us the total sum you paid to your four celebrities in 2016.

To be fair they responded very quickly and within 24 hours had replied to my query about the four celebrities. (I wrote about it here.)

Thereafter my full enquiry was treated as a Freedom of Information request and although I was advised only this week that a reply might take several weeks, I have today received this response:

1. The strategy for Stoptober 2016 was to focus on overall participation rather than sign ups to PHE tools. As such, the evaluation will focus on quits at a population level. It is expected that all strands of the evaluation will be finalised early February. Therefore, in accordance with the Section 22 – information intended for future publication, exemption, the information you have requested is exempt from disclosure.

2. The celebrities Phil Tufnell, Craig Revel Horwood, Chris Kamara and Natasha Hamilton were paid in total £29,000 for their work on this year’s Stoptober campaign. This represented payment for their time and input in creating content that featured across campaign channels, as well as for any expenses incurred during filming and recording time.

3. The total media spend for Stoptober 2016 is approximately £545,000. This figure is indicative and excludes VAT. Final media costs will be available only after the campaigns 2016/17 financial year spend has been confirmed and completed.

It's bit of a non-story but it's interesting (to me at least) that PHE has abandoned its previous method of judging the success of Stoptober.

In 2014 for example we were told that "over 250,000 smokers stubbed out their cigarettes for Stoptober". In 2015 the figure was "over 215,000", a fall of 15 per cent.

Participants were called 'sign-ups' so I assume people registered to take part.

I'm guessing that PHE has abandoned this measurement of 'success' because they feared an even greater drop in 2016.

To avoid negative publicity and awkward questions about the use of taxpayers' money, PHE is now going to focus on "overall participation" and "quits at a population level", whatever that means.

Clearly they don't have any figures so for "evaluation" read estimates and calculations.

It will be interesting to see how they spin it but I'm sure it will be done in a way that will try to justify more public money being thrown at this event next year.

Good news for celebrities in search of easy money, less so for everyone who has to pay for it.

PS. I'm aware that, in the overall scheme of things, the money spent on Stoptober is relatively small, but it's not just Stoptober is it?

It's the accumulation of public money that is spent on anti-smoking campaigns, including stop smoking services, that grates.

ASH, of course, is currently lobbying the DH to commit spending millions of pounds on mass media anti-smoking campaigns.

Currently there is also a huge lobbying campaign to discourage cutbacks to local stop smoking services, despite the massive drop in the number of smokers using them (51 per cent between 2010 and 2015).

Why should public money be wasted on services that a dwindling number of people want to use?

Meanwhile, if PHE sees the need to evaluate the impact of Stoptober, surely the Government should do the same for a host of other anti-smoking policies and initiatives?

Instead, encouraged by ASH and other taxpayer-funded bodies, ministers stumble from one anti-tobacco measure to another, blissfully ignorant of the impact each one is having.

And even when they have no impact at all (the ban on smoking in cars with children comes to mind) each policy is acclaimed as a 'success'.

Well, we know how it works and Stoptober is evidence of that. When the original measurement of 'success' no longer produces a 'positive' result it's time to ditch it and adopt a different approach.

Having ditched 'sign-ups' as a measurement it will be interesting to see how PHE 'evaluate' the 'success' of Stoptober 2016.

Sadly we'll have to wait until February but whatever method they use I'm sure it will be creative.

Square peg, round hole

If ever there was a square peg in a round hole it was me at the Next Generation Nicotine Delivery conference in London yesterday.

In my previous post I explained that I was a little surprised to be invited to speak, even on a panel entitled 'Gaining valuable insight into consumer needs and consumption of alternative nicotine delivery products'.

I missed the first day of this two-day industry-led event but looking at the programme almost every speaker had a direct, often commercial, interest in next generation products.

Not everyone was an expert in risk reduction. Some presentations were no more than sales pitches for specific products, like the nicotine tablet that dissolves in your mouth.

Nevertheless they all came armed with a phalanx of information and statistics.

My role, in contrast, was to speak in more general terms, holding fast to views that I sense are verging on luddite to some people, including those who are professionally involved in e-cigarettes and other emerging products.

For example, the suggestion that many people enjoy smoking and don't want to quit seems almost heretical, even in the company of tobacco industry representatives, several of whom have switched roles and are now actively engaged in promoting the new generation of harm reduction products.

Anyway my fellow panellists were James Murphy, head of Biosciences at British American Tobacco, and Dr Taman Powell, founder and CEO of Xolo Vape.

We had each been invited to make some opening comments (which I had prepared) but the format changed. Instead we were asked to respond to questions from the chairman, and later the audience, in an attempt to make it more conversational.

Regular readers will be familiar with everything I said, including my little dig at PMI for openly targeting a "smoke free world".

Invited to say a few words about Forest, I stressed that we embraced harm reduction and next generation products because we're pro-choice not pro-smoking.

That said, we represent smokers who, by and large, enjoy smoking and don't want to quit.

"Many have tried e-cigarettes," I said, "but vaping doesn't suit them. It's important to understand this and ask why more smokers haven't switched.

"The debate is not just about health," I added. "It's also about risk-taking and pleasure.

"One of the reasons so many people are prepared to risk their health is because of the pleasure they get from smoking."

Repeating a point I made at the Global Tobacco and Nicotine Forum (GTNF) in Brussels in September I suggested that the reason many smokers haven't switched to e-cigarettes is because the jump to a smokeless product that doesn't contain tobacco is, for many, too big.

That gap, I said, has to be filled with other products, hence our interest in heat not burn (HnB) or what James Murphy called tobacco heating products.

At that point I quoted comments from readers of this blog, posted earlier this week. First, Mark Butcher:

Here in Geneva, where the iQOS has been on sale for more than a year, anecdotal evidence seems to show vapers (former smokers) are giving up vaping and going for the HnB products. That is despite there is no real cost saving over conventional fags as the heat sticks are taxed at the same rate as fags.

And from Pat Nurse:

I believe HnB are the true next generation for smokers. Ecigs are next generation for quitters.

That, I said, might be a bit harsh but it makes an interesting distinction. In the minds of some smokers HnB is an extension of smoking because it remains faithful to tobacco in a way that e-cigarettes do not.

What we need, I said, are more products, more choice, that fill the gap between combustible tobacco and e-cigarettes.

Responding to a question I may have misinterpreted I argued that the evolution from combustible cigarettes to smoke free products must not be rushed.

"Forcing people to quit or switch involves bullying and coercion. Smokers must be given time, decades if necessary, to make their own choices."

Finally, and I can't remember how the subject cropped up, I said I would never trust tobacco control.

"The endgame," I warned, "is not a smoke free world but a nicotine free world. If anyone can't see that they must be living in a parallel universe."

Written down (and heavily edited!) my contribution doesn't sound too bad. At the time however I felt as I often do at these events – an outsider howling at the moon.

The truth is few people want to hear that many people enjoy smoking and don't want to quit. Or that many consumers put pleasure ahead of the health risks. Or that the risks are often exaggerated.

In vaping circles fewer still want to hear that e-cigarettes may not be the panacea many believe them to be.

Don't get me wrong. I felt no hostility from the audience. (This wasn't a public health event!) I think they were just a bit surprised that I wasn't completely on message.

In the current climate, even at an industry event like this, that makes you different - and not in a good way.

PS. When I get a moment I will compare the Next Generation Nicotine Delivery conference with the E-Cigarette Summit that also took place in London yesterday.

The latter is a bigger, far better promoted event but the contrast – and the hidden message – is very interesting.

A tale of two conferences

Well, this is a bit ridiculous.

You wait all year for a conference on e-cigarettes and two come along ... on the same day.

Starting today at the Barbican in London is the third annual Next Generation Nicotine Delivery conference.

It's a two-day event so it will clash with the fourth annual E-Cigarette Summit that takes place at the Royal Society tomorrow.

I asked the organisers of the Next Generation conference why this had happened and they said other people had asked the same question.

And I still didn't get an answer.

I'm not sure if I would have gone to the E-Cigarette Summit (I didn't go last year, or the year before) but I don't have the option because I'm speaking at the Barbican event.

To be honest I was a little surprised to be asked. When I received the invitation to be on a panel entitled 'Gaining valuable insight into consumer needs and consumption of alternative nicotine delivery products', I replied:

I would be happy to take part if you want a slightly alternative viewpoint.

As someone who doesn't smoke or vape I can't bring any direct personal experience to the session so I would have to talk in more general terms, from a Forest perspective.

Although we primarily represent adults who choose to smoke combustible cigarettes, an increasing number of our supporters also use e-cigarettes (for a variety of reasons). Common sense dictates that we embrace and endorse any harm reduction product but most of all we advocate choice, an issue that is sometimes lost in the current debate.

Consequently we are a little uncomfortable with the evangelical nature of many pro-vaping advocates who in their enthusiasm for e-cigarettes are blind to the fact that many smokers don't like or aren't attracted to them.

Likewise at the e-cigarette conferences I've attended there seems to be a general incomprehension that more smokers don't want to switch. This attitude was reflected only last week by Mark Pawsey MP, chairman of the All Party Parliamentary Group on E-Cigarettes, who said he found it "mind-blogglingly incomprehensible" that, knowing the health risks, so many people continue to smoke combustibles.

As part of the session therefore I would like to address the reasons why so many smokers haven't switched to vaping, and why they shouldn't be forced to.

Also, most if not all of the vaping representatives at e-cigarette conferences tend to be ex-smoking vapers which makes them unrepresentative of many vapers, the majority of whom are (I believe) still dual users.

They are also unrepresentative in other ways – notably the type of products they use. We very much hope there is a niche for every product for which there is some consumer demand. Long-term however we believe that if the e-cigarette market is to grow substantially and attract more smokers to switch, the two essential factors will be cost and convenience.

Based on anecdotal evidence we also believe there are some aspects of the current pro-vaping advocacy that are actually driving some smokers away from e-cigarettes.

Overall I would be very positive about e-cigarettes and their role in harm reduction. At the same time however I'd like to raise issues involving current smokers (and potential vapers) that are often overlooked when pro-vaping advocates get together.

Speakers at Next Generation include Beryl Keeley, E-Cigarette Notification Scheme Lead (MHRA); James Murphy, head of Biosciences, British American Tobacco (BAT); Bo Edberg, former Senior Vice President, NJOY Electronic Cigarettes; Liam Humberstone, Technical Director, Totally Wicked; Dr Nveed Chaudhry, Manager Scientific Engagement, Philip Morris International (PMI); and Tom Pruen, Chief Scientific Officer, ECITA.

Chairing the event is John Fitzgerald, an "industry expert". (Declaration of interest: John has attended several Forest events including Smoke On The Water and The Freedom Dinner. I can therefore vouch for the fact that he is extremely open-minded and an all around good guy!)

In contrast the E-Cigarette Summit is full of anti-smoking academics and lobbyists including Robert West, Professor of Health Psychology and Director of Tobacco Studies, University College London; Marcus Munafò, Professor of Biological Psychology, University of Bristol, UK Centre for Tobacco and Alcohol Studies (UKTAS); Martin Dockrell, formerly of ASH now Tobacco Control Programme Lead, Public Health England; Linda Bauld, Professor of Health Policy, University of Stirling, UK Centre for Tobacco and Alcohol Studies (UKTAS) and Cancer Research UK; Deborah Arnott, CEO of ASH; and Anette Addison, Team Leader, Tobacco Control EU, Health and Wellbeing Division, Department of Health.

Tomorrow's event is chaired, again, by Ann McNeill, Professor of Tobacco Addiction, UK Centre for Tobacco and Alcohol Studies (UKCTAS).

Yes, they are generally "pro-vaping" but they are universally anti-smoking as well. The E-Cigarette Summit is to all intents and purposes an anti-tobacco public health event. Unlike the Next Generation conference there's not a single tobacco industry speaker in sight. The companies will be represented in the audience, I'm sure, but it's hardly the same.

To be fair, I enjoyed the first E-Cigarette Summit in 2013 (I wrote about it here) but since then the core speakers have hardly changed and I find it hard to get excited about the thought of listening to Bauld, West, Arnott etc for the umpteenth time.

Whatever happens I shall be well out of my comfort zone at the Barbican. I'll let you know how I get on.

See also: The E-Cigarette Summit – another view (2013) and Why I'm not attending today's E-Cigarette Summit (2015).

Also: One cheer for the E-Cigarette Summit (Action on Consumer Choice, 2015).

Forest shortlisted for public affairs award

Quick bit of news I didn't have time to mention last week.

Forest has been shortlisted for Party Conference Reception of the Year by the organisers of the annual Public Affairs Awards.

And look at the company we're keeping.

There are 18 categories and the list, announced on Thursday, includes Cancer Research UK, Royal Mail, Royal British Legion, Crisis, Save The Children, Transport for London and HMRC.

Shortlisted entries in the Party Conference Reception category include the Government of Bermuda, the Enterprise Forum and Pimlico Plumbers.

Hosted by Sky News' presenter Kay Burley, the awards will be presented in London on December 8.

If, in 2016, a smoker-friendly event called 'Eat, Drink, Smoke, Vape' wins it will be a small miracle but we live in hope.

I'll keep you posted.

Why we need a coalition for choice

This isn't a new story. Nevertheless it's getting a fair bit of coverage today.

The Press Association has done some research and discovered that only one person has been fined for smoking in a car carrying a child since the law banning the practice was introduced last year.

This follows similar research by the BBC earlier in the year that revealed very much the same thing. The only difference is that a bit more time has elapsed.

The story has been reported by the Guardian, Daily Mail, Daily Mirror, The Sun, ITV News and others.

I'm quoted in all these reports.

The issue is that prior to introducing the law the Government didn't commission any observational research that might have revealed the true extent of the 'problem'.

Instead they relied on the comments of 8-15 year-olds and concluded that hundreds of thousands of children were regularly exposed to tobacco smoke in cars.

Now ASH and the Department of Health are claiming that the law has helped change "attitude and behaviour".

No it hasn't. The overwhelming majority of smokers had already changed their behaviour voluntarily without the need for government intervention.

In fact, in my lifetime this is probably one of the most useless laws that has ever passed through Parliament because its impact has been minimal.

There is not a shred of evidence that legislation has made the slightest difference to the number of people smoking in cars with children. The number was small before it was introduced and it's small now.

Tobacco control doesn't see it that way, of course. For them, anything that denormalises smoking and demonises those horrible, selfish smokers is a good thing.

It's also a significant stepping stone to banning smoking in all private vehicles and, eventually, other private spaces.

This is what I meant yesterday when I talked about being "back at the coalface" after a week highlighting the World Health Organisation's tobacco control convention (COP7) in India.

Yesterday it was reported that smokers in Scotland face being fined for smoking outside hospitals. Today ASH is boasting that "by having legislation and penalties" for smoking in cars carrying children it has ensured a "high level of compliance".

No, this so-called "social law" was introduced to further the myth that smokers are indifferent to the sensitivities of others. They are selfish and anti-social, or so the narrative goes.

This is a relatively new phenomenon, by which I mean the past two decades. For years smokers were treated as victims of an evil tobacco industry.

They still are to some extent but with the likes of Forest arguing that many people enjoy smoking, tobacco control campaigners have found that argument quite difficult to sustain.

Hence the suggestion that smokers are "selfish", "anti-social" and, worse, "criminal".

Smokers are forced to put up with this every day, and it's getting worse. Despite that, most of what I read about COP7 last week focussed on the World Health Organisation's hostility to e-cigarettes.

Truth is, e-cigarettes are collateral damage in the war on tobacco and as long as the war continues on its current path even harm reduction products will be vulnerable.

In my view we need to create a genuine Coalition for Choice, a body that will give equal weight and support to consumers of all potentially harmful products (those that are legal anyway).

Complaining that vaping is under threat while remaining mute about the serial debasement of smoking (and smokers) is not only spineless, it's counter-productive.

COP7 – a useful lesson in tobacco control (and the endgame is not tobacco)

I love a well-crafted rant, hence my previous post. (H/T Faith Goldy of The Rebel TV.)

Even more interesting perhaps was this report by Goldy's colleague Lauren Southern who is also at the World Health Organisation's tobacco control convention (COP7) in India.

I don't agree with everything Lauren says. Like many people she seems to embrace the 'vape or die' mantra which is as tedious (and inaccurate) as its 'quit or die' cousin.

In fact it's a common fault among many 'libertarians'. In their enthusiasm for a non state-funded 'solution' to smoking they end up sounding just like tobacco control.

That said, Southern's report is impressive on several levels. In particular she asks simple questions and provokes some extremely revealing responses from a high level tobacco control campaigner.

Patricia Lambert is director of the International Legal Consortium at the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids in Washington DC.

The Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids describes itself as a "leading force in the fight to reduce tobacco use and its deadly toll in the United States and around the world."

Responding to Southern's questions Lambert gave the following replies. My response to those replies is in italics:

"I am not an expert in cessation alternatives."

Why not? Surely that's part of your job? You should be knowledgeable at least.

"As I understand cessation, it is possible to quit without trading down to a less harmful product."

That's absolutely true but why would you ignore the potential of less harmful products to wean people off a product you say is so deadly? But thanks for confirming your contempt for the concept of choice and your ignorance of the pleasure principle.

"As a tobacco control advocate I can't see myself espousing another form of tobacco as a way of moving from one form of tobacco to another form of tobacco. It just doesn't make sense."

E-cigarettes aren't tobacco!!!! How can you be so ignorant?!

When Southern pointed this out Lambert corrected herself:

"Sorry, I've misspoke. It's nicotine. Why would I want to put nicotine into anybody's body?"

Why not? Where's the evidence that nicotine itself is harmful? And you're not putting nicotine into anyone's body – it's their choice. It has nothing to do with you.

Another panellist then added:

"We don't want to shift to a less harmful product. We want to shift to [a] product that doesn't have any harm."

In other words they want smokers to go cold turkey or use Big Pharma products that don't do "any harm". Allegedly.

What is clear from these answers is that one of the high priestesses of tobacco control is determined that if smokers quit tobacco they quit nicotine completely.

That, as I have repeated here until I am blue in the face, is the real endgame.

Southern summed it up thus:

"Like Patricia, the politicians and lobbyists speaking at this conference and forming legislation are not experts, they're bureaucrats toying with people's lives for their own self interests."

Personally I think we should be pretty wary of so-called experts as well but she's right about politicians and lobbyists.

Finally, I'd never heard of The Rebel TV until this week. I guess it qualifies as 'new media', a genre I'm a bit sceptical about.

I'm definitely old school when it comes to journalism and a lot of what passes for 'new media' strikes me as poorly written and executed. Much of it is one step up from student journalism, and that's being kind.

That said, it's probably no more biased than the mainstream media. They just have smaller budgets and that restriction is reflected in a lot of what appears online.

The Rebel TV doesn't hide its bias but Faith Goldy and Laura Southern strike me as proper journalists (if that doesn't sound too patronising).

They sense a story and they go for it.

They're persistent too.

There's a touch of infotainment about what they do but that's no bad thing. It means their reports will appeal to a wider audience.

Anyway, I'm just about done with COP7. I've enjoyed following it from afar.

Some people have been getting a trifle over-wrought and the reaction to rumours that a handful of delegations were reportedly seeking a global ban on e-cigarettes was hysterical in every sense.

Now it's over it's time to take a deep breath and ... keep calm.

"Folks, I travelled all the way to INDIA!!"

This is magnificent.

Enjoy.

The price of Public Health England's advice on vaping

Whenever the use of e-cigarettes in public places is mentioned vaping advocates like to refer to Public Health England guidelines.

In reverential tones they will imply that PHE supports vaping indoors. See Why are councils making it harder to quit smoking? (ConservativeHome).

Up to a point, Lord Copper. While it is true that PHE is not opposed to vaping in enclosed public places, there is no clear recommendation that it should be allowed.

Instead what the PHE advice on e-cigarette use actually states is:

• e-cigarette use is not covered by smokefree legislation and should not routinely [my emphasis] be included in the requirements of an organisation’s smokefree policy

• reasons other than the health risk to bystanders may exist for prohibiting e-cigarette use in all or part of a public place or workplace, such as commercial considerations and professional etiquette

• people with asthma and other respiratory conditions can be sensitive to a range of environmental irritants, which could include e-cigarette vapour. The interests of such individuals should be taken into account when developing policies and adjustments made where necessary

• vaping can in certain circumstances be a nuisance or distraction for people nearby. Where a decision is taken to allow vaping in an enclosed place, policies could consider some simple etiquette guidelines for vapers, such as minimising the production of visible vapour.

So, plenty of things for employers to think about before they allow vaping in the workplace. If I was a disinterested employer looking to err on the side of caution I know what I'd do.

Where children may be present the PHE guidelines are unambiguous:

While it is not recommended [my emphasis] to allow adults who use or work in child and youth settings to vape in view of children, consider ways to make it easier to vape than to smoke.

Approaches might include allowing vaping in a designated adults-only indoor area or allowing vaping but prohibiting smoking in outdoor areas.

Several points:

One, as with smoking PHE doesn't want adults to vape "in view of children". Read into that what you will but it doesn't sound very positive to me.

Two, if vapers are allowed to use e-cigarettes indoors they should be restricted to a "designated adults-only indoor area". Sound familiar?

Three, if vaping is only permitted outside PHE recommends a concurrent ban on smoking "in outdoor areas".

So whenever you hear or read Public Health England congratulated for their pro-vaping stance on the Use of e-cigarettes in public places and workplaces, don't forget that for smokers who don't want to quit it comes at a price because PHE "advice" could mean the smoking ban being extended to outdoor areas.

Vaping advocates are either ignorant of that or they choose to brush it under the carpet in the hope smokers won't notice.