Scottish Government 'running out of puff' after missing smoking target

dailyrecord.co.uk:

The Scottish Government has been accused of “running out of puff” in efforts to tackle smoking as figures show a target for the number of Scots quitting was missed last year.

While there was a target of having 7,026 people quit in 2022-23, data from Public Health Scotland showed that NHS Scotland achieved 69 per cent of this total, with 4,877 smokers giving up their habit.

Only two out of Scotland’s 14 regional health boards – NHS Dumfries and Galloway and NHS Western Isles – achieved their targets for the number of people helped to stop smoking.NHS Shetland however only achieved 36.8 per cent of the target number of smokers quitting, with NHS Lothian and NHS Grampian achieving 44.2 per cent and 52.1 per cent respectively.Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Alex Cole-Hamilton said the figures highlighted “yet another area where the SNP/Green Government is completely failing to meet its own targets.”Cole-Hamilton said: “Smoking claims the lives of thousands across Scotland every year, predominantly in the most deprived areas of the country.

Every person that is helped to quit reduces the burden on our NHS.“Liberal Democrats were instrumental in delivering the ban on smoking in public areas and in cars with children, but further progress is being choked off.”He continued: “It’s clear that this is a Government that is running out of puff.