So much has changed!

A quick round up whats been happening over the past couple of months with the Bangladeshi Stop Tobacco Project.
We have successfully completed 3 quarters of 2007 – 08 . We have a wonderful new Tobacco Control Team committed to working closely with all its local stop smoking services and are currently working a new tobacco control strategy.

We have already been offered an opportunity for expansion before March, which is excellent! Obviously our targets have gone up slightly we now have the extra hours to really focus on work all over Tower Hamlets and not just within the parameters of the Dental Institute!

After March we hope to get stuck in to the new wave Cancer Research UK mouth cancer screening sessions that will run over ten weeks.

The project will be joined by two new workers and we will be working on ’special projects’ to enhance recruitment and work in prevention work. So we will be trying to stop people taking up tobacco use as well as helping them to stop.

I have noticed over the last couple of months that the most popular tags and articles seem to be about tobacco whether its halal or haram? And about paan cessation. Hopefully I will try and elaborate a bit more on those topics.

The Mosque Project update

We have good news the Mosque project has been a success!  Combined with the mouth cancer screenings we have achieved for the first time a 50/50 recruitment rate with men and women.

The Mosque session have now finished and we are the data input and report writing stage.  We have heard that this project will get the go ahead to extended to other Mosques in the area with addition of extra resource – Watch this space!

Ramadan and Msc

It is now six days since the month of Ramadan has started. I am busy writing up my dissertation and I have to keep telling myself to keep at it, keep going as food used to be a good distraction to study.

I’m doing a desk based health impact assessment on the Bangladeshi Stop Tobacco Project and critiquing the available data published and unpublished (project reports) to highlight what worked and what didn’t. I was astonished by the amount of funds available for work with black and minority ethnic groups one particular one being the NHS cancer plan pledged £1 million to support BME initiatives. I was puzzled as to what was done with that money. I have been going over the mapping study (AGAIN! ) by Crosier and McNiell in 2003 and lo and behold, £750,000 of the Cancer Plan money in to the South Asian and Muslim Tobacco Education campaign. The rest went to fund smaller projects with faith based organizations.

I recommend the Bme Mapping study for anyone to read or reread as it is one of the best reports to base your local initiatives on.

Sunshine and Mouth Cancer screening

What a difference! A few degrees increase in temperature and clear blue skies all round today, meant a big turnout for our last mouth cancer screening session in Tower Hamlets…for now at least.

After two fairly quiet sessions we had 51 people turn up today, all adults and 51 completed questionnaires. This brings our total to 125 people with 5 referrals made to Oral Med.

Its always very difficult to judge how to approach people especially in the community East London Mosque may be busy with people at the weekends but how do we actually engage peoples attention so they come to the screening.

A few factors were against us the fact that it was the summer holidays and the weather being un predictable meant the busy Sunday ladies Quran class was lacking numbers even if observation suggests otherwise.
I enlisted the help of one of the ladies that I know from the Mosque Pilot, she was great! We managed to budge the old ladies in the Gallery and providing a helping hand getting on board the mobile, we found someone who had never been to the dentist and had to be referred.

I have certainly learnt a lot from this experience. Looking out for key community people is a bonus to getting the communication across and emailing the Mosque directors as much as possible to get them on board and promote the idea is important. By the third session I think we had built up enough momentum through advertising and outreach to get good turnout.

Pictures to follow…

A Week of Mouth Cancer Screening

After not writing for a while I realized I missed the oppurtunity to highlight the current campaign we are doing with Cancer Research UK
CRUK Advert

The last session is tomorrow and I will hopefully fill everyone in on the ups and the downs of the last week or so.

Working with the Local Mosque

We have recently started working with East London Mosque to target health inequalities and recruit people from a broader BME background and to enable a sustainable stop smoking project upon exit in three months time. The work started on the 11th May with two sessions for recruiting people in to the drop in sessions starting on the 24th May.

Our wonderful Public Health Advisor is responsible for finally being able to penetrate the ranks within the Mosque and pinning down a couple of people to support this new initiative. In our first meeting with the Mosque we had their full support and enthusiasm. They agreed to have an Imam trained in Level Two and enable staff to have access to basic Level One training also. The idea was to allow the the Imam to work shadow our project workers and then at the end of the pilot BSTP and the PCT will pass the project on to the Mosque to run.

We left the meeting with a feeling that the Mosque had another vision to our own and that the PCT already offered them something that could clash with the Imam taking the pilot project on board. There was no clear session or worker identified for female Mosque goers. And finally, my Manager predicted that the Imam would not attend the Level Two training.

Now….to date Dipul and I are supporting the 3 hour drop in sessions at the mosque with our Public Health colleagues. The Imam didn’t turn up for the Level Two Training and our sessions have been extended due to high demand. Now high demand due to the 76 people being intrested in the sessions.

We have have also had the advantage of using the CR-UK’s ‘Open up to Mouth Cancer’ screening mobile on the 31st May for WNTD to coincide with the sessions. The day proved to be a success and we have learnt a lot.

Working with the Mosque has been rather difficult at times as there are so many things going on and it is difficult to pin people down. When it comes to the crunch they are very helpful and the facility is very accessible.

I have noticed a pattern emerging with regards to accessing women and it was only over the 4 weeks of working at the mosque and asking questions did it confirm for me where and how to access the ladies.

According to one of three female link workers who share a full time post, women are only at the Mosque during funerals and weekends. So, now how do we approach women who are there for a funeral? Plus working over the weekend does not sound appealing over the next six weeks.

I plan to now raise awareness at the Sunday 11-1pm sessions and direct them towards the Thursday drop in sessions (Inshaallah!)

‘Smoking: A Social Poison’

Muhammad al-Jibaly
Copyright © 1996 by Al-Qur’an was-Sunnah Society of North America
All Rights Reserved.

1. Introduction
   1. Discovery of Tobacco
   2. Smoking among Muslims
2. Definintion
3. Evidence for the Prohibition of Smoking
   1. Harm to the Deen
   2. Harm to the Human Body
   3. Harm to the Mind and Will Power
   4. Harm to the Environment
   5. Harm to the Property
   6. Moral Decadence
   7. Evil Substance
   8. Resembling the People of the Fire
   9. Bad Example
   10. Hostility Toward the Good People
   11. Low Self-esteem
   12. Scholars’ Verdict
4. Warnings
5. Treating the Disease of Smoking
6. References
7. Footnotes

Introduction

Discovery Of Tobacco

Tobacco was discovered by the Spanish sailors on the American shores at about 1500 CE (900 AH). Since its discovery, the epidemic of smoking has continued to spread all over the world. In our times, one seldom finds a house not afflicted by it.

As early as the Seventeenth Century, the European countries realized the dangers of smoking and fought against it Laws were ordained in England, Russia, Denmark, Sweden, Austria, and other countries, prohibiting smoking and punishing violators.

Nowadays, the Western countries continue their attempts to protect their peoples from the harms of smoking. They employ media means, ordain laws and regulations, and apply other methods to discourage people from smoking. Because of that, the rate of smokers has declined to a certain degree in those countries.

---

http://qss.org/articles/smoking.html

Levels of Toxins in Tobacco Products Used in the UK

Objective: This study examined the constituents of smokeless

tobacco products available in the UK and compared them

with products available in India, Sweden, and the USA

Methods: Seven UK brands of smokeless tobacco, including

a tooth cleaning powder, and four international brands of

smokeless tobacco were tested for a range of toxins and

known carcinogens, such as tobacco specific N-nitrosamines

(TSNA), as well as nicotine availability.

Results: Ten of the 11 brands tested had detectable levels of

tobacco specific nitrosamines, which are proven carcinogens,

and levels varied 130-fold. All had detectable levels of

benzo(a)pyrene, another proven carcinogen (with around

175-fold variation) and several toxic metals (with nearly

150-fold variation). Nicotine availability varied in the UK

products from 0.1 mg/g to 63.2 mg/g. All the tobacco

products tested are likely to be hazardous to users’ health,

but the data indicate that it should be possible to reduce key

toxins to non-detectable levels.

Conclusions: Smokeless tobacco products should be regulated

and standards set for maximum levels of toxins and

carcinogens. Read more Levels Toxins in Tobacco

Still not as much as the UK…the cost of cigarettes.

I have always been surprised at the cost of a packet of 20 here in the UK. I believe it stands at

Most smokers say 1,000 yen a pack could be deterrent – Japan Times

Tuesday, May 22, 2007

KYOTO (Kyodo) About 90 percent of smokers — including heavy smokers — said
they would consider quitting if the price of a pack of cigarettes reached
as high as 1,000 yen [US$8.25], according to a survey released Monday.

On the other hand, the heavy smokers among the roughly 600 people surveyed
would not be inspired to quit by warnings about health risks or fines for
smoking in public places.

The survey was conducted by a team of researchers led by Takanori Ida, a
professor of applied economics in the Kyoto University graduate school.

A pack of cigarettes generally costs about 300 yen, depending on the
brand.

“Raising cigarette prices by not small but large margins would be
effective to inspire people to quit smoking,” Ida said.

He said the more smokers are dependent on nicotine, the higher the
priority they tend to put on price.

The survey results indicate that raising the alarm about the health risk
is somewhat effective in getting those who are not heavy smokers to
consider quitting.

But heavy smokers were unmoved by health risks or fines.

And yet half of them said they would quit if the price of a pack of
cigarettes were more than 700 yen and 90 percent said they would do so if
it was 1,000 yen.

Higher prices were also found to inspire lighter smokers to quit.

Source: Japan Times’

A copy of a price comparison from the Tobacco Manufacturers Association shows just how much a UK packet of 20 costs. At £5.23 its the highest in Europe and still not deterrent. You could put £5.23 towards your weekly fruit shopping. No?

Betel Nut…not Just for South Asians

BETEL NUT
An Essay by Stephen Fowler

 

Maybe you’re an aging speed freak, too paranoid and out-of-touch to score the hard stuff anymore. Maybe you’re a khaki preppy looking for an alternative to espresso. Maybe you’re the hippie type, optimistically attracted to a multicultural lift. Or maybe you just like to salivate.

However you kick it, betel is the ticket.