To hate the idea of the new smoking bribe?

[CharleyFarleyy]

What do people who dont smoke anyway get? seems like they are going to miss out un-fairly.

Also if quitting for your and your babys health isnt incentive enough will shopping vouchers help anyway?

Yep, but people do. 10-20%.

So, what? You're willing to sacrifice the nurses who could be hired through the savings made on health care for the child and potentially for the mother, because the woman shouldn't need the incentive?

That's rational.

Be realistic. It wouldn't happen unless it was going to result in a net financial saving, due to better health outcomes. So occupying the moral high ground = costing the NHS money.

sally, if this voucher idea gets a higher proportion of pregnant smokers to quit, even if it's just for the duration of the pregnancy, then the NHS will be spending less money on the babies of those (now ex) smokers, because the babies will be more likely to be healthy when they're born.

If the women manage to stay off the cigarettes long term or permanently, then the benefit to the NHS is further increased, because the women and their children will be less likely to develop costly health conditions that can be caused or exacerbated by smoking. So this, potentially, could be the very opposite of wasting NHS money.

And I'm with Jassy.

Yes, smoking in pregnancy is bad for babies. Yes, women shouldn't do it. I don't approve of it.

But the key thing is getting them to stop, and I don't believe that shouting about how smoking makes them terrible human beings who don't deserve a baby or whatever is an effective way of making this happen. If that worked, there wouldn't be a single pregnant smoker left out there.

This voucher scheme has been shown to get results - better results than other methods - and it shouldn't be dismissed because women "shouldn't need" any extra incentive to quit.

It is still creating a society where we do things because we are led like children rather than educated appropriately. If you still need a sticker chart to behave then you are not ready to parent.

So what's your solution, MrsC? Remove 10% of babies at birth? 20% in Scotland? Current methods clearly aren't working well enough. So which is it - accept poor health outcomes for mother and child, or look at alternative solutions?

You may want to do some reading on the psychology of both addiction and behaviour. You might find it slightlt more complex (and interesting) than your 'sticker chart'. Though, if tabloids have taught us anything, actual facts don't make nearly so pithy a line, so should be avoided.

(In reality, one of the interesting behavioural aspects to quitting in pregnancy is that the existence of a strong but time-limited motivation -pregnancy - coupled with an extra incentive (pick your unpalatable poison) could lead to longer term quitting as psychologically 'a year' is a lot less daunting than 'forever'. The other interesting bit is how the 'might' (child may be low birth weight, I may get cancer) operates differently as a motivator to 'will' (I will definitely get vouchers, I will definitely have my child removed because the women of MN think I'm an unfit mother). Brains are interesting)

Jassy, she was suggesting alternative solutions - better education. Maybe we need harder hitting campaigns that highlight what smoking can actually do to your baby. Maybe having a mental image of what damage is being done would help. I suppose it might be easy to keep smoking when you can't actually see what it's doing at the time.

Chunder, the punctuation is there because I'm quoting you. It can stay in :) Just so you know, I haven't said anywhere that I think women should be punished for smoking but I do disagree with "the woman's right to dominion over her own body is more important than anything else". I will not agree with you that a foetus has no importance right up until they are born.

Bumbley, you're ignoring the evidence that whacking people over the head with negative messages doesn't appear to change their behaviour. Everyone's educated up the wazoo about the dangers of smoking and of smoking in pregnancy. Pregnant women who smoke are social pariahs. Hitting them with more messages doesn't work. That is what those of us who've actually looked at what makes people change their health behaviours are saying.

So we have to think about other options.

Oh and I think it's repellent to start talking about which of us 'deserve' and don't 'deserve' to parent.

I'm sure that paying people money to stop smoking is cost effective. I'm just wondering if by that reasoning, we should also pay people to stop overeating - I would guess obesity costs the NHS more than smoking (I might be wrong).

Yes, they're told about them but I'm just wondering if actually seeing the effects would have more of an impact. In a real life scenario, someone actually knowing a baby who was damaged by smoking during pregnancy might have a very different view than someone who has been given the exact same information but doesn't have any personal experience of it and instead knows that her friend/aunt/granny/woman down the street smoked 40 day throughout pregnancy and her baby was fine.

I haven't said anything about people not deserving to be parents was that directed at me?

The thing is that it's not like foetal alcohol syndrome - you can't point at a baby and say "look, it does this".

My comment was directed at the various posts on this thread to that effect. From a variety of people.

Premature babies in NICU?

I'm not sure if you're answering me, motherinferior? The consequences of smoking while pregnancy seem directly analogous to obesity. You can look at a child who has low birth weight and respiratory issues and posit that it's a result of her mother smoking while pregnant, just like you could consider that an obese person has high blood pressure and diabetes because of their weight.

It seems like some people on this thread who are quick with the Daily Mail barbs to anyone who disagrees with the idea of the state bribing its citizens into "good" behavior.

Brilliant post by SaltySeaBird on page 10.

All of these arguments could be applied to gestational diabetes. "For the sake of the baby" you should be able to manage your blood sugars. And you know what- being pregannt and diabetic is so stressful that your blood suagrs don't do what you want them to. To an outsider what is so difficult about a healthy diet. Well it's very difficult if your diet is healthy but not the right healthy for diabetes.

I have never smoked (I don't like it) but I do now have a lot of compassion for pregnant women that smoke. I imagine they would need a lot of support in the same way i did to manage gestational diabetes. Some pregnancies are difficult, anxious times. Just what you'd need a cigarette for I imagine.

Going back to read the rest now. All the best for anyone that wants to give up.

Cigarette packets used to have little warnings on. Then they had big warnings. Now they have pictures of what damage smoking can do. If these measures really had such a drastic effect, nobody would smoke.

But it's an addiction, and implying that smokers don't understand what damage it can do is insulting, IMO. All smokers know that it is bad for them, but I think they choose not to think about it.

And as bubalou wants us to disclose our smoker status, I'm an ex smoker, quit numerous times, including in pregnancy. Apart from when, whilst 6 months pregnant, my much loved Gran died and I felt the need to smoke (and have a drink) at her funeral. You know, because I was an addict. I also didn't find out I was pregnant until I was 13 weeks, and had smoked plenty up till then. I had enough guilt over that from myself, I didn't need people telling me how selfish I was and that I didn't deserve children. What I needed was a sympathetic MW who offered me help to quit, rather than shouting abuse at me. I didn't need to be shown pictures, or told that I should have my child taken away from me.

And look, incentives have been shown to help pregnant women stop smoking. And that's the opposite of calling them selfish and whatever other stuff you've been saying. So which method do you think is the most effective?

And I don't like the idea of stop smoking incentives, as I feel it belittles addiction and makes it seem like something that you can just choose to stop, rather than it being an addiction.

But it seems that it was the extra push these women needed, so maybe it's a good thing.

Chunder you made a very good point about women's rights here.

I find it very strange that as a society we put the women's choice of what she does with her own body over the rights of the foetus, but for some reason smoking is different.

We're not running around telling women over 40 that they are awful for putting unborn babies at risk of down syndrome, the same goes for obese women. And not forgetting we put the mothers wishes over the health of an unborn child every day in that abortion is legal (and quite rightly so).

Jassy actually I think the measures we have in at the moment are working. The rates of young people starting smoking are at their lowest, the smoking ban led to a massive reduction in smoking as well. Huge amounts of funding has been poured into this area and it is working impressively over time. We don't need to hand out well done money as well. If this money were to be directed elsewhere I'd say either into cancer research for people who were impacted before everyone was so aware of the risks or into Sure Starts which have suffered huge losses and risk further alienation for parents who depend on them.

Chunderella you seem to assume that feminist arguments would 100% back up your arguments, same arrogance I'm afraid. Also it is possible to look at what suffragettes were fighting for, if you head to your local library and look at a history book you might find it very informative.

This idea of a 'dominion of your own body' bloody irritates me. The wonder of today's entitlement and 'I know my rights!!' culture!! People love to drop the accompanying sense of RESPONSIBILITY! Being able to create life is a privilege, not just something we should take for granted. I am happy as a woman to hand over my right to drink, smoke, eat unhealthily and happy to agree with any medical intervention recommended for my child to allow them the best start in life. I believe my unborn child has rights even if the law doesn't. If that makes me disadvantaged as a woman then that is something I am happy to take for the incomparable joy of bringing life into the world.

I find it repugnant that the 'right' to harm your child is even considered under the same umbrella of fight as people fighting for women to be protected from such horror as child marriage. If your version of feminism means seeing those as part and parcel then count me out!

There was a discussion on this the other night on Scotland Tonight. They had someone involved in the study and a mother of 3 who smoked all the way through all her pregnancies.
This woman really did not believe that smoking had harmed her children in any way. Babies all good birthweights (one was 9lb 2, others over 8lbs), no health probs now. Oh and someone she knows with 5 children gave up during her 1st pregnancy but not subsequent ones and her eldest child is the only one with health problems. Therefore smoking in pregnancy isnt that harmful is it . She then went on to mention that she had several miscarriages but failed to see any link between them & her smoking.

I live near the area of the trial, smoking is sadly very prevalent in my area and I have known loads of people with this attitude "my mum smoked 60 a day & I'm healthy or my gran lived to 100 on 20 a day blah blah blah" The cognitive dissonance around smoking is very strong. Despite education many people continue to smoke & believe kid themselves that it's not that bad.
That's because they are addicted, find it difficult to quit so try to justify to themselves that smoking isn't that bad. Many pregnant smokers fall into this category, I don't think they are all just selfish bitches who don't give a toss about their babies . Some do genuinely think that it is not that bad for baby and continue to do it because they know loads of others who have and have healthy babies.

I don't know what the answer is but I don't think all the moral outrage and talk of fining/removing babies adds anything to the debate. Education doesnt seem to work for some, sadly i have had 2 relatives smoke during pregnancy in recent years. Both knew the risks but chose to ignore as they know loads of pregnant smokers who went on to have healthy babies ( it's a bit of the old ' won't happen to me' mindset, I think.
If a financial incentive helps some women quit then I'm all for it. Maybe the ones who succeed due to the vouchers are part of the group who dismiss the risks of smoking. And believe me, ther are still a significant number of people who think the risks of smoking highly exaggerated, I am related to a few!

Studyingmummy I phoned into question time last night and pretty much said word for word your post

I smoked during pregnancy. That pregnancy triggered off a severe mental illness, it was all I could do to function. I did cut down a lot but never fully quit and with the mental state I was in that was a huge achievement. I don't mind admitting it here because no one can make me feel as bad as I felt. Thankfully he is a very healthy teen now.
I still deserved to be a parent though. I also managed to care about his diet and not smoke around him ;)

Smoking in pregnancy is horrible but I completely disagree that smokers will go on to be terrible parents etc. I certainly was not and I am pretty sure my teen was very glad no one took him from me because of it.

I think if the idea has been proven to work then it works and anything that helps pregnant women quit will only be a good thing.

So there you go bubalo. You got an honest answer to your question.

'It's unfair to those who don't smoke.'
In all seriousness, lets look at that.

Smokers pay a vast amount in taxes over time, which non-smokers do not as they do not buy cigarettes. That money is then re-invested to try to make them quit. At what point is that unfair to those who do not smoke? They pay for themselves.

Also, 'unfair' - a lot of smokers would love to be in the position of anyone who has never smoked. I know as I used to be one. I stupidly started at 16 and finally stopped at 34. The majority of smokers hate what society has made them, they are embarrassed and feel weak and are scared of the health implications that the addiction has given them whether they have stopped or not. Unfair? I don't think so.

u2 Thankyou for being frank and open. I think you've actually changed my mind on where I stand with this.

There's another thread on here from a poster with Celiac Disease who is asking whether she should get 'assistance' i.e. discounts for buying 'bread, cakes and pasta' that is gluten free as it is a bit pricey. Give me strength.

ben have you seen the prices? Gluten free foods are hideously expensive, and it isn't a choice to eat them or not for a coeliac - it's a choice between eating gluten free, eating normally and being incredibly ill, or eating nothing.