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More than 50 young people and representatives from Youth Support Services who feel strongly about the negative practices of the Tobacco industry met at the DW Stadium in March for a campaign event.

This event focused on our youth advocacy pledges and, through partnership work with ASH and campaign group 38 Degrees, provided more interactive opportunities for participants to learn about child labour, and campaigning. The afternoon focussed on media training, banner making, flyer design and chanting workshops

A number of participants went on to campaign at the British American Tobacco AGM in April.

Visit Smoke and Mirrors to learn more.

Dr Janet Atherton, chair of Smokefree North West, has written to the region’s MPs and to key ministers briefing them on the continued public health challenge posed by tobacco and to highlight the work being to combat it.

The briefing reminds the politicians that smoking continues to kill more people in England than alcohol, obesity, illegal drugs and road accidents combined and costs the NHS alone £2.7 billion each year.  It argues that with 35 people in the North West dying from smoking related illnesses each year, reducing smoking rates must remain a top public health priority and that tobacco control measures must be sustained to stop prevalence from rising again.

Emphasising the collaborative and targeted nature of Smokefree North West’s work, the briefing explains the focus on children and young people, tobacco control, tackling illicit tobacco and protecting children from tobacco marketing.

The Smokefree Campaign arrives in Carlisle with Percy Penguin and Olga, The Carlisle United FC team mascot.

A year blighted by flooding and snow did not prevent NHS Cumbria’s Stop Smoking Service beating its stretch targets in dramatic style thanks to an energetic campaign that saw the service come from behind with weeks to spare.

Tobacco delivery lead Su Sear has identified four strands to this success; committed and energetic leadership from the NHS Cumbria senior management team, significant and far reaching changes to services that won the support of staff, effective data management and intelligence gathering and enhanced quitter recruitment thanks to effective marketing.

When NHS Cumbria ended the third quarter of the year behind on its Local Area Agreement targets, senior management led by chief executive Sue Page swiftly moved smoking cessation right up the PCT’s agenda. This high profile hands on approach saw the chief executive taking a detailed interest in the challenge, attending meetings and receiving frequent progress updates. This level of support made it easier to remove barriers to progress, initiate and activate change and to deliver the Stop Smoking Service the people of Cumbria deserved.

Stakeholders responded positively and rallied. Pharmacists, GPs, mental health services, hospital trusts and others were all pulled together to enable Stop Smoking Services to deliver.

As a predominantly rural county, Cumbria faces particular geographic challenges that prevent it from enjoying many of the IT advantages others take for granted. While the service had a single telephone number, it was not possible to make appointments there and then. Rather than wait for long term solutions to present themselves, Stop Smoking Services created their own interim solutions, including initiatives like a networked electronic diary.

‘Working practices changed dramatically,’ says Su. ‘Opening hours were extended to better suit clients and services offered in workplaces. Staff saw the benefits of change and embraced it. Many were inspired and kept chasing for progress.’

That ability to track progress was fundamental to success. Not only were regular updates used to motivate and excite staff and stakeholders, enhanced intelligence gathering enabled Cumbria to allocate resources in the most effective manner. Particular attention was paid to tracking did not attends (DNAs), those who had made appointments with Stop Smoking Services in the past but, for whatever reason, had not made their appointments. Better understanding and working with this group reduced DNA rates from 25 to 16 percent.

With help from the Department of Health, key areas for smoker recruitment were identified and mapped. This ensured that initiatives like face-to-face recruitment always took place where they would be most successful and that resources where balanced. However, some elements of the intelligence gathering process, while worthwhile, were labour intensive and so Cumbria is now fully engaged with the development of the region wide database.

All this work was complemented by a significant quitter recruitment drive which saw Cumbria’s Stop Smoking Service contact 500 more prospective quitters than in the same quarter of the previous year. Local initiatives included radio advertising and face-to-face recruitment. Crucially, the team set about catching up with all those who had been in contact with the service in the last year, including quitters who had since returned to smoking.

‘Many people didn’t realise that they could back to us if they had they had help in the past, but had later returned to smoking,’ explains Su. ‘But many did come back and with renewed determination to quit. They just needed that little extra push.”

Local activities were also linked to national initiatives including No Smoking Day, which saw Percy the Smokefree Penguin meet mascots from teams including Carlisle United, Whitehaven RLFC and Workington Town RLFC.

Having celebrated its success, the team is now working to embed change and learn. Su insists they will not rest on their laurels, but ensure the Stop Smoking Service continues to deliver.

This summer will see the public launch of Smokefree North West’s secondhand smoke campaign. This aims to drive attitude and behaviour change over the next five years with the aim of reducing health impacts of secondhand smoke on children and young people and ultimately reduce youth smoking uptake; reducing the 30,000 primary and secondary care episodes linked with secondhand smoke; and de-normalising tobacco use in key audiences and reducing health inequalities.

Prior to the campaign launch in July, Smokefree North West will host a series of five workshops in June at venues across the region looking at how we can work together to protect children from the harm caused by secondhand smoke.

Speakers will include Dr Jude Robinson, deputy director of the Health and Community Care Research Unit at Liverpool University and Mary Bell assistant director, Maternity & Early Years at NHS North West.

The campaign builds on extensive research that has provided a detailed insight of the North West population’s awareness of, attitude and behaviour towards secondhand smoke. This will be augmented by a region-wide survey of public attitudes to be carried out in June.

Obtain further details and book a place on a workshop near you.