Upcoming Events

ENSP Capacity Building and General Assembly in Vienna  12-14th Nov 2018
For all ENSP members with the aim to learn from
each other experience, share best practices and exchange the latest developments on the WHO FCTC and EU TPD implementation.

Irish Thoracic Society Meeting: Belfast, Europa Hotel Nov 23rd - 24th 2018

SRNT (Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco) 25th Annual Meeting February 20-23, 2019. Hilton San Francisco Union Square San Francisco, California.

ECToH 8th European Conference on Tobacco or Health 19th -22nd February 2020 Berlin, Germany.

news

  •  New Irish research shows “Allen Carr”  is successful for smoking  cessation:   New study has just been published in the  BMJ’s Tobacco Control journal  which  shows results of the first published Randomised Clinical trial in the world  demonstrating that Allen Carr ‘s Easyway to stop smoking is a highly effective treatment to help smokers quit. Allen Carr’s Easyway to Stop Smoking has been widely used for over 30 years and is available in 150 centres in over 50 different countries. It consists of a one off 5 hour seminar which does not involve the use of any form of medication. There are numerous celebrity testimonials endorsing its effectiveness and there are claims that it has helped more than 30 million smokers quit.Despite this there has never been a published report from a scientific trial supporting its use in a general population. This trial involved 300 adult smokers equally randomised  to Allen Carr and the online HSE Quit.ie service and followed up for 1 year. Result showed a quit rate of 38% at 1 month, 26% at 3 months, 23% at 6 months and 22%  at 1 Year in the Allen Carr Group.  This was almost twice the quit rate achieved in the Quit.ie  group.  These success rates are similar to those from the best available treatment programmes currently used for smoking cessation. Close to 6000 of our citizens die annually from tobacco related disease, smoking cessation is a very important element of Irelands plan to become Tobacco Free by 2025, In that context Luke Clancy said ‘ That Allen Carr is a hugely under used treatment method which has great potential to help Ireland achieve its ambitious targets in tobacco Control.'     Sheila Keogan said ‘We hope that our study showing the success of Allen Carr’s Easyway method of helping smokers to quit will be of great benefit and may be especially useful for who are reluctant to take any medication for instance pregnant smokers.’   Full Paper   available here.


 
  • Tobacco Free Ireland   (‘TFI’), the report of the Tobacco Policy Review Group, was endorsed by Government and published in October 2013. An Action Plan for TFI was published in March 2015 and one of its actions committed the Department of Health to publish an annual report on the implementation of the Plan.Considerable progress was made in 2017 in implementing the Action Plan as set out in detail in the Annual Report. 
 
  • TOB-g project launched   its e-learning course   November 2017.   The Tob-g e-course constitutes a key part of this important project. This course is based on the structure and material of the Tob-g guidelines. Its aim is to provide an individualised approach to smoking cessation within five clearly distinctive sub-populations of smokers, who obviously cannot continue to be treated as a single entity. Teenagers, cardiovascular patients, pregnant women, patients with diabetes and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) belong to clearly distinct groups and reasonably so require a tailored approach to treatment.  
   
  • The first new building to be constructed on the Dublin Institute of Technology Grangegorman   campus has been opened.The Greenway Hub will be home to the institution’s postgraduate researchers as well as those commercialising their research and growing spin-out companies. The 5-storey €17 million euro building will host DIT’s Environmental Sustainability and Health Institute (ESHI) with researchers working in areas like vision science, food and water quality, energy, bio monitoring and diagnostics, and health policy development. More news:  
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  • ESPAD Ireland 2015 published,  20th September, 2016
    Ireland’s 2015 report on the European Schools Project on Alcohol & other Drugs in Ireland (ESPAD)  finds a dramatic reduction in teenage drinking and smoking but concerns over e-cigarettes, drugs and gambling.
    Smoking and drinking among 15-16 year-old school students are falling dramatically, but challenges posed by illicit drug use remain. In this age group, Ireland has much lower levels of drinking, binge drinking and smoking than the European average, but higher use of cannabis, inhalants and other drugs.  Find out more here.
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  • European Court of Justice upholds Tobacco Products Directive:Great news from the European Court of Justice – all three challenges against the EU Tobacco Products Directive were rejected today May 4th 2016.      The Court rejected the challenge brought by Philip Morris and British American Tobacco which sought to invalidate the TPD as a whole, or alternatively various provisions of the Directive including, inter alia, mandatory large pictorial warnings, the ban on characterising flavours and measures concerning tracking and tracing.
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  • An assessment of the economic costs of smoking in Ireland: Key findings:   It is estimated that smoking causes 5,870 deaths per annum with an additional 92 per annum as a result of exposure to second hand smoke (SHS).  This is an increase from an estimated 5,200 deaths per annum previously calculated, the increase is due to more cancers and respiratory diseases being attributable to smoking than heretofore.
    Healthcare costs
    The estimated cost to the healthcare system as a result of smoking is over a half a billion euro (€506 million) as outlined below:
    ·        Hospital based costs €211 million
    ·        Primary care costs €256 million
    ·        Domiciliary care costs €40 million.
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