Smoking - Over 65,000 Babies STILL Put At Risk By Expectant Mums Each Year In England

Despite multiple health warnings and advice from the NHS, over 1 in 10 expectant mothers in England admit to smoking whilst pregnant - that’s over 65,000 based on average maternities per year.

Blackpool has the most alarming figures, with 26% or over 1 in 4 women smoking whilst pregnant. Stoke-on-Trent came second, with nearly 1 in 5 women smoking whilst pregnant (19.10%), with Liverpool closely behind at 16%.

However, the capital is setting a great example, with only 4.9% of pregnant mothers smoking. This is less than half of the national target of 11%.

Other low smoking towns include Birmingham and Reading. Research analysed by Vapourlites.com, has found that just over 12% of pregnant women are smokers at their first midwife appointment, with this only dropping by 1.9% to 10.6% at the time of birth.

Despite the health warnings, only a fraction of mums-to-be cut the habit. Amanda Sandford from the Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) said: “Smoking during pregnancy reduces foetal growth and increases the risk of miscarriage, stillbirth and cot deaths. Although there has been significant progress in reducing the rates of smoking during pregnancy it’s vital that work continues to ensure that pregnant women who smoke are offered support to quit.”

And the jury's still out on whether or not vaping carries equal risks to health

A map of pregnant mums-to-be who smoke illustrates the staggering numbers, and difference in some of the UK’s major cities.

Image credit: Vapourlites.com

It's a shame that the rest of the UK was not included in this research to get a fuller picture. I suspect, however, that it would be equally grim reading.

Smokers will argue that smoking is an addiction and it is well documented how difficult it is to quit, but surely, for the sake of your unborn baby's health, you'd try to quit, wouldn't you?  And ideally before you conceived.

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How To Talk To Your Kids About The Risks From Cigarettes, Vaping & Marijuana

You might be a smoker, you may or may not support the legalization of marijuana, but you will never want your kids being involved with any of these things.

With the new trend of e-cigs and related vaping products becoming increasingly popular among teenagers and the ongoing debate on the topic of legalization of weed, a lot of parents find themselves on a shaky ground during an argument about their usage.

To make things worse, you find a lot of celebrities posting their pictures using such products and it leaves you with a question, “Will we be able to raise our kids without them being addicted to any drug or related smoking product?”

The answer is “Yes” but it always pays to have a plan.

You don’t want to sound uncool or strict while dealing with such scenarios.  As parents we know that both of these approaches can be counter-productive.

Below are some of the things that you can do to make your children aware of the pressures placed upon them by the marketing campaigns of regular and electronic cigarette manufacturers, as well as the risks both short, and long-term of marijuana use.

Regular Tobacco Cigarettes

• Tell your kids about the dangers of smoking by showing them the health-related statistics and pictures of the complications that smoking cause. Once they will realize that the consequences aren’t as cool as the act, they will hopefully decide to stay away from smoking by themselves.

 • Explain how addictive nicotine is and how hard it is to get out of its addiction. Your kids should know the physical signs of nicotine addiction and how bad it is for them.

• Make your kids aware of various marketing gimmicks - for example even if a cigarette is menthol or any other flavored, it’s still just as bad for your health as a regular one.

Electronic Cigarettes

• Tell your kids about the latest research on e-cigs and vaporizers that indicate that these vaping products contain carcinogenic chemicals like formaldehyde.  A spokesman at Simply E liquid advised that they are only permitted to sell to the over 18's and that if they are suspicious of any orders then they will contact the buyer to verify their age.

• Tell your kids about the harmful effects of vaping on growing bodies.

• Tell them about the nicotine addiction they can get by using vaporizers and electronic cigarettes.

• Ask your doctor to tell your kids about the various health hazards related to vaping and usage of other related e-cig products.

• Explain to your kids how e-cig sites use celebrities for the sake of their product’s advertisement and make these products look harmless and eco-friendly as compared to regular cigarettes.

Marijuana

• On contrast to the popular belief, teenagers still tend to listen to their parents and look up to them for guidance. You can guide your kids about the importance of a good character, better judgment, and how the promise of a successful future is compromised by an addiction.

• Explain the side-effects of marijuana addiction and how it affects a developing brain.

• In scenarios, where the kids do not respond to a restriction very well, asking them to wait until they’re old enough, and their body and brain has developed, can help you delay this situation as long as possible.

• Look for the factors that influence teenagers to develop a habit like this. Make sure that your kid is not dealing with any social or education-related stress or he/she is not facing any emotional instability.

• No one, especially kids these days, like being tricked or made a fool of. Explain the advertisement strategies of companies and how they tend to use the name of famous celebrities like Bob Marley or Willie Nelson to boost up their marketing campaign for their own benefit.

Smoking is never an easy subject to address but the sooner you do so and the better armed you are with the right information about the dangers to their health, the better chance you stand of stopping these habits in their tracks.

And of course, if you are a smoker yourself and don't want your kids to pick up your bad habits, this may be a very good time to cut back and eventually quit altogether.

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