600 teens start smoking every day

The number of teenage smokers is increasing, with research showing that in London the daily tally is 67 new smokers a day.

UK national figures on smoking prevalence are available, but the researchers* wanted to estimate smoking uptake among children, to provide some baseline data to inform efforts for preventive measures, and focus attention and resources on what is "essentially a child protection issue."

This is because taking up smoking at a young age is an even greater risk to health than starting later in life, they say. Smoking at a young age affects lung development and boosts the risk of progressive lung disease (COPD).

And people who start smoking before the age of 15 run a higher risk of developing lung cancer than those who take up the habit later on, even if the cumulative number of cigarettes smoked is smaller, they add.

How the study was done

The researchers based their analysis on data taken from the 2011 'Smoking, drinking and drug use among young people in England' survey, which targets schoolchildren in England between the ages of 11 and 15 every year.

Questionnaires were completed by 6519 children in 219 schools. And by comparing the numbers of current smokers - regular and occasional - with smoking rates among the same age band surveyed the previous year, the researchers were able to estimate the numbers of new 11 to 15 year olds starting to smoke in 2010-11 in the UK.

To calculate the number of new child smokers for each locality, this estimate of 207 000 was then split across geographical areas according to population size and smoking prevalence among adults, on the assumption that there would be more child smokers where the proportion of adult smokers was high. Parental smoking is one of the strongest predictors of smoking among children.

The researchers then used population and adult smoking prevalence data for each of the four UK countries to calculate the number of new child smokers for each locality.

The analysis indicated that among the 3.7 million children aged between 11 and 15 in the UK, an estimated 463 start smoking every day in England, with the equivalent figures for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, 55, 30, and 19, respectively.

Of 74 000 children in this age group in Birmingham, nine take up smoking every day, while the daily tally in London is 67 out of 458 000 children in this age group.

The authors acknowledge that as their figures are calculated from survey data, they can only be approximate, but the fact that they are regional might be more helpful to healthcare professionals and regulators, they say.

Smoking rates among both adults and children are falling in the UK, but the figures are still high, so the pressure needs to be kept up to reduce smoking further, say the authors.

This means increasing taxation, curbing smuggling, and running well-funded anti-smoking media campaigns, as a well as banning smoking in cars and introducing plain packaging to reduce children's exposure to branding, they say.

"Smoking is among the largest causes of preventable deaths worldwide," they write. "The present data should help to raise awareness of childhood smoking and to focus attention on the need to address this important child protection issue," they conclude.

View the original article here

Study of Twins Shows How Smoking Ages the Face

Siblings who smoked had more wrinkles, creases, droops and jowls

A study comparing the faces of identical twins confirms what many smokers fear -- the habit does prematurely age a person's skin, taking a serious toll on looks even after just five years.

Researchers from Case Western Reserve University in Ohio used the annual Twins Day Festival in Twinsburg, Ohio, to identify 79 pairs of twins in which one sibling smoked and the other didn't.

The twins who were smokers showed many more signs of skin aging, the researchers found. Their faces featured more wrinkles, creases, droops and jowls.

"Smoking harms virtually every organ in the body, including your skin," said Danny McGoldrick, vice president for research at the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. "Whether you are doing it for vanity or your health, one of the most important health decisions of your life is not to start smoking, or to quit if you have."

The research team attended the Twins Day Festival every year between 2007 and 2010, eventually finding 79 pairs of twins to compare. The twins filled out questionnaires regarding their smoking and lifestyle, and professional photographers snapped individual pictures of them both.

A panel of three plastic surgeons then analyzed the twin's facial features, grading the amount of aging they saw in each person's face using a standardized assessment tool. The researchers used questionnaire results to control for other factors that might prematurely age skin, including sun damage, alcohol use and work stress.

Twins who smoke, when compared to their nonsmoking siblings, had worse scores for baggy eyes, baggy cheeks, smile lines and wrinkles along their upper and lower lips.

Researchers also compared the faces of twins who both smoke, but one of the pair had been smoking for at least five years longer than his or her sibling. They found more baggy eyes, baggy cheeks and lower-lip wrinkles in twins who had been smoking longer.

The judges identified the smoking twin as appearing older in photographs 57 percent of the time compared with the nonsmoking twin, and the twin who had smoked for a longer period of time was identified as older about 64 percent of the time.

The premature aging caused by smoking seemed to mainly affect the lower two-thirds of a person's face, the authors said. There were no apparent differences between smokers and nonsmokers when it came to forehead wrinkles or crow's feet, for example.

The study was published in the November issue of the journal Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery.

Smoking can affect a person's skin tone by robbing cells of needed oxygen, said Dr. Cheryl Healton, president and CEO of the anti-tobacco advocacy group Legacy.

"It's widely known that tobacco causes cardiac problems and disrupts oxygenation," Healton said. "Getting good oxygenation really affects a person's complexion."

Smoking also might cause wrinkles, folds and droops by damaging connective fibers like collagen and elastin that help maintain skin elasticity, the researchers added.

"A less taut skin envelope cannot counteract the effects of gravity," they said.

Healton said people should heed the findings as yet another reason to quit smoking immediately. As the study found, even five years can make a difference, she said.

"It's really bad to smoke, and it definitely affects your appearance," she said. "Not smoking is good for your looks."

View the original article here

E-Cigarettes May Not Be Gateway to Smoking: Study

It found few teens go on to smoke cigarettes, use other kinds of tobacco after 'vaping'

E-cigarettes don't appear to entice teens to try smoking tobacco, a new study says.

The researchers noted that doesn't mean that e-cigarettes are risk-free, but it should reassure parents that teens who try the devices may simply be doing so for the novelty and aren't necessarily setting themselves up for a lifetime of nicotine addiction.

Last month, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned that "vaping," or inhaling the nicotine vapors from e-cigarettes, might be a dangerous new fad that could set teens up for smoking.

In just one year, the number of kids in grades six through 12 who said they'd ever tried an e-cigarette more than doubled, rising from 3.3 percent to 6.8 percent. Among the 2.1 percent who said they were current e-cigarette users, more than three-quarters said they also smoked regular cigarettes.

Given that overlap, many health experts worried that e-cigarettes might be acting like a gateway drug, sucking kids more deeply into nicotine addiction, and law officials urged the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to regulate e-cigarettes as tobacco products.

The new study suggests that may not be the case.

Researchers surveyed 1,300 college students about their tobacco and nicotine use. The average age of study participants was 19.

"We asked what the first tobacco product they ever tried was and what their current tobacco use looked like," said researcher Theodore Wagener, an assistant professor of general and community pediatrics at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, in Oklahoma City.

Overall, 43 students said their first nicotine product was an e-cigarette. Of that group, only one person said they went on to smoke regular cigarettes. And the vast majority who started with e-cigarettes said they weren't currently using any nicotine or tobacco.

"It didn't seem as though it really proved to be a gateway to anything," said Wagener, who presented his findings at a meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research, in National Harbor, Md.

Study findings presented at medical conferences are considered preliminary since they haven't been carefully reviewed by outside experts for publication in a medical journal.

E-cigarettes, which use a heating element to vaporize a liquid nicotine solution, are relatively easy for teens to purchase.

While federal rules block the sale of regular cigarettes to anyone under age 18, there are currently no such rules for e-cigarettes. About half of states prohibit the sale of e-cigarettes to minors, but they can also be bought online.

The devices are advertised on TV and popular YouTube videos. They come in sweet flavors that appeal to teens like green apple, watermelon and bubble gum.

"The use of these products is increasing dramatically," while little is known about the risks, said Scott Leischow, who co-leads the cancer prevention and control program at the Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale, Ariz.

View the original article here