Cooperation by health services can help people to give up smoking: NZ expert

[Lite Beer]

Cooperation by health services can help people to give up smoking: NZ expert
Phumpetch Roumjit
The Sunday Nation

Bullen

BANGKOK: -- Cooperation among health-related organisations is the key to success when fighting smoking, according to a New Zealand anti-smoking expert.

Assoc Prof Chris Bullen, director of the National Institute for Health Innovation at Auckland University, said that the Quitline to help people kick the habit in his country managed to reduce the number of smokers by 30 per cent over 10 years.

Bullen said the service aimed to make New Zealand a smoke-free country by 2025.

He said the key contribution to the Quitline's success was every sector in society collaborating in the initiative.

Bullen spoke at the Asean Regional Workshop on Sustainable Funding for Tobacco Control, held in Bangkok on Friday. It was organised by the Thai Health Foundation Promotion and the Southeast Asian Tobacco Control Alliance.

Bullen said the Quitline was working closely with universities and hospitals that provide research and evidence about smoking to help create innovative methods or ideas to help smokers give up cigarettes.

Policy-makers also supported the programme by funding the research, increasing cigarette prices and introducing anti-smoking legislation.

"Smoking is an issue for the whole of society," he said. "We need everybody working together.

"The government makes the policies based on evidence provided by the researchers, who work closely with service providers to understand the real environment of the issue.

"Other sectors like education and social welfare are also important. Everybody has a role to play. And to make progress, we have to work in a cooperative way."

Bullen said that smoking impacted on society as a whole because, among other things, if a lot of people smoke it encourages others to follow suit.

He said the Quitline helped smokers quit by providing both medical and behavioural support, while the government also needed to make it harder for people to smoke by raising cigarette prices and introducing anti-smoking legislation.

Besides a telephone-based counselling service, Quitline also boasts SMS support, a group-based cessation service and other online services such as a calculator that shows how much money smokers can save by quitting smoking.

Bullen said anti-smoking campaigns would also reduce government health expenses in the future and create more employees.

There were 13 million smokers in Thailand, half of whom are expected to die prematurely from smoking-related diseases.

Another speaker at the event, Thailand National Quitline president Assoc Prof Jintana Yunibhand, said the Kingdom's phone-based Quitline had been effective but the body still needed to work more on reaching out to people as not many people knew about the service or had access to it.

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/national/Cooperation-by-health-services-can-help-people-to--30244294.html

-- The Nation 2014-09-28

[chainarong]

Well, like em or hate em the feel good crowd have taken over in the west, you can read the pattern of play , in OZ you are a leper if you smoke , now the programme is clicked up a notch and slowly just like the smoking campaign the alcohol message is now sneaking in , so in fifty years time I will invited everyone at TV to a Xmas drink and you will get a 10 oz pot of water , OZ will end up a nation of wowsers and Thailand will be in the mix also, better get used to it.

[doremifasol]

Sometimes It's Good To Be A Quitter.

Edited September 28, 2014 by doremifasol

[jaltsc]

"Smoking is an issue for the whole of society," he said. "We need everybody working together.

"The government makes the policies based on evidence provided by the researchers, who work closely with service providers to understand the real environment of the issue."

The most glaring thing that pops out is that we are talking about two different societies and cultures. When was the last time everyone in Thailand worked together on anything? Thailand is a nation with many sub cultures, many conflicting with each other.

While New Zealand makes policies based on scientific evidence, many of the policies in Thailand are based on political/monetary gain, old superstitions and appearances only. I would tend to believe that in New Zealand, "No Smoking" statutes in designated areas are enforced. In Thailand, the signs are everywhere including the 2,000 THB fine. However, I have never seen or heard of the statute ever being enforced. Now that Thailand is looking to lure more western tourists here, I doubt that it would be willing to gain a reputation of fining tobacco smoking tourists and risk losing their business.

Finally, Thailand appears ;to have an underlying culture where making gestures appear to be equal to actual behavior. Many people live lives counter to Buddhist teachings. Yet, making merit once or twice a year absolves them of all anti-Buddhist behaviors they demonstrate the rest of the year. I would tend to guess that a one day Smoke Out each year where people say they quit smoking would suffice, and then the smokers would light up again, as soon as no one else was watching them.

I don't want to single out Thailand. Many countries and municipalities around the world have attempted to reduce smoking. However, only the ones that shown any success have implemented education at the earliest ages, and have strictly enforced anti-smoking statutes. Somehow I cannot see a 7 year-old Thai child telling grandpa to stop smoking because it is unhealthy for him and others around him.

Edited September 28, 2014 by jaltsc