Doctors’ leaders called on film censors last night to give an adults-only classification to all films that portray positive images of smoking. The British Medical Association (BMA) said millions of children and young people were encouraged to become addicted to tobacco by the glamorisation of smoking in the cinema and on television.At the start of its annual conference in Edinburgh, the association said tough action by the censors could save thousands of lives.
The Department of Health point out they are currently consulting on the future of tobacco control (the consultation ends on 8 September this year).
Consultation on the future of tobacco control
That document says:
Over the past decade, the Government has taken action to reduce smoking uptake by young people, and to support young people who want to quit. Specific youth-targeted action complements the wider population measures to reduce smoking prevalence and the impact of smoking on others, such as smoking education and marketing campaigns, the introduction of pictorial health warnings on tobacco packs from October 2008 and smokefree legislation. [page 27]
The consultation also talks about the role of Healthy Schools and the National Curriculum:
Focusing the National Healthy Schools Programme on smoking: This year the programme, which engages with 94% of schools, will seek to do more to promote local initiatives that have been shown to work in preventing smoking take-up and in encouraging smoking reduction among school-age young people. The aim will be to raise awareness of different approaches and to encourage schools to give higher priority to smoking within their health-education provision.
National Curriculum: Much has already been done to warn children and young people of the dangers of smoking through personal, social and health education in the school curriculum – from Key Stage 2 onwards. There will be consideration of whether this needs to be strengthened following the advice of the Drugs and Alcohol Advisory Group’s review of drug education, which will cover smoking.
Specifically the government want views on what should be done to a) reduce demand for tobaaco by young people and b) reduce availability of the drug.
Filed under: Government, tobacco , BMA, tobacco control consultation
[...] paper from the BMA about tobacco marketing and young people. I’d caught the way the Guardian reported it but somehow not seen the report when it came out in [...]