British Heart Foundation speaks out in support of paper

Editor—The paper by Bush et al on understanding the influences on smoking in Bangladeshi and Pakistani adults raises a number of interesting points and identifies solutions whose efficacy the British Heart Foundation recognises.¹

For the past five years we have funded “Asian Quitline,” a free telephone helpline that provides culturally appropriate smoking cessation advice in five Asian languages. We have also funded smoking cessation programmes that have been run during the month of Ramadan. This campaign specifically addresses the needs of people from the Pakistani and Bangladeshi communities. Moreover at that time of the year we have also run smoking cessation training programmes aimed at religious leaders, who have been encouraged to deliver sermons addressing the issue of smoking in Islam and to provide basic information on quitting smoking. They are also encouraged to refer members of their congregation to existing smoking helplines and cessation services.

Compared with the indigenous population these ethnic communities have a higher incidence of heart disease, so quitting smoking is particularly important.