Luc Joossens announced the results of the revised Tobacco Scale (where each European country is assessed and scored against various tobacco control measures such as price, smoke free laws etc)
Even though we knew the result had to be good for the UK as Luc progressed through all the countries giving a sentence or two summary for each (Austria 30th out of 30) I could not help but feel the tension mounting.
I need not have worried. A round of (almost) spontaneous applause ushered the UK as number 1 (Iceland and Ireland joint second)
BUT a word of warning from Luc. We must not be complacent. This is when the UK is most vulnerable with colleagues and politicians (some of whom should know better) saying that we can afford to disinvsest in tobacco control as it is àll done`
Many countries (e.g Spain) have made dramatic improvements in a short time and others achieved a lot on low budgets. We can learn a lot from delegates here.
I must now chose where to go this afternoon and try to see the posters that many people have spent a long time producing.
I will probably not get chance to see presentations from Elspeth Lee (CRUK) talking about their role in promtion of smoke free and Steve Crone from QUIT on the European Network of Quitlines.
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