Illicit tobacco: undoing the good work

Author and presenter:
Ailsa Rutter
Director, FRESH – Smoke Free North East, Chester-le-Street, UK

Abstract
Illicit tobacco (smuggled, bootlegged, counterfeit, cheap white) is a scourge in our communities and the ready availability of illegal cigarettes and hand rolled tobacco is undermining efforts to reduce smoking rates and address health inequalities. In the North of England, around one in five smokers has admitted to buying illegal tobacco, but amongst 14 to 17 year old smokers the figure is one in three and it is making up 49% of their total consumption. Nearly two thirds (64%) of smokers who buy illicit tobacco have said that it made it possible for them to smoke when they could not afford to. Partners across the North of England including health, police, local government and Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs came together in late 2007 to develop a world first pilot of programme (North of England Tackling Illicit Tobacco for Better Health Programme illicittobacconorth.org.uk) to reduce the demand for and supply of illicit tobacco and to reinforce the positive impact of higher priced tobacco products to prompt quitting, help prevent relapse and discourage initiation. The presentation will provide an overview to the eight key elements of the programme ranging from generating and sharing intelligence and delivering increased enforcement to developing new messages and marketing. In-depth consumer insight gained over the last two years will be shared including ideas around the engagement of smoking cessation professionals to help counter some of the ‘robin hood’ mythology – these will be explored in more detail at the workshop ‘Illicit tobacco – exploring the role of the NHS stop smoking services’.

Source of funding: DH and PCT funding.

Declaration of interest: none

About the presenter
Ailsa originally trained as a nurse at London University and worked in the cardiac care field for five years. She has worked in tobacco control since 1998 after studying for an MSc in Health Promotion in Brisbane and her first tobacco post was heading up the Queensland Quit Campaign from 1998 – 2000. On her return to the UK in 2000, she was the Manager of the Gateshead and South Tyneside NHS Stop Smoking Service from 2000 – 2004 before taking up the post of Regional Tobacco Policy Manager for the North East of England, and in 2005 launched the UK’s first dedicated regional office and programme for tobacco control – FRESH Smoke Free North East – and has been its Director since 2006. In 2009, the FRESH programme won the Gold Medal at
the Chief Medical Officer inaugural awards for public health. She is passionate about this work, having lost her father to emphysema at the age of 61 and is proud to be working in partnership with many agencies to help to deliver social norm change and ensure that all work together to successfully tackle the greatest cause of health inequalities.