The fight against smoking: "The stakes are just too high"

Excerpts from an article by Kira Vermond in the latest issue of University of Waterloo Magazine

Psychology professor Geoff Fong, along with David Hammond, assistant professor in the Department of Health Studies and Gerontology, and Mary Thompson, a statistics professor emerita, have gone global with tobacco research. And the accolades are coming in.

In 2009, the trio received one of the first Top Canadian Achievement in Health Research Awards from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Canadian Medical Association Journal for "their outstanding work with the International Tobacco Control Policy Evaluation Project in assessing the effectiveness of various programs to reduce smoking around the world."

In other words, they're not just finding ways to protect Canadians from the deadly effects of using tobacco products, but finding innovative means of combating the brewing smoking epidemic in middle- and low-income countries.

Roy Cameron, executive director of the Propel Centre for Population Health Impact, says the team's win mirrors the centre's — indeed the university's — mandate of relevance. "Waterloo actively encourages faculty members to get involved in the real world," he says. "We're concerned with not only generating knowledge, but making sure that knowledge is used in ways that benefit society."

That knowledge has never been so vitally important. Tobacco use is described as the No. 1 killer around the world, with more than 500 million people expected to die due to tobacco-related illnesses before 2050. And although smoking rates in Canada have stalled in recent years, according to recent findings in the Canadian Tobacco Use Monitoring Survey, 17 per cent of the Canadian population aged 15 and older — or 4.8 million people — are still lighting up.

There's also an estimated billion smokers worldwide and that number is on the rise. Depressing? No, claims Thompson, the main survey statistician on the ITC project. "We feel the numbers might have climbed more had the governments not tried to implement the provisions of the treaty," she says.

Courageous and innovative decisions are not all being made in India, China, the U.S., or Ireland. Some are happening much closer to home. Think Woodstock, Ontario. That's where Ryan Kennedy, a PhD candidate in the Health Psychology Lab who works with Thompson and Fong, found himself in 2008 when city councillors voted on a new bylaw that would ban smoking outdoors. Amazingly, it was a unanimous decision. Even more amazingly, it happened in Oxford County, which includes tobacco-growing fields, and in a city where the smoking rates were higher than the provincial average.

Kennedy knew Woodstock could have enormous impact, simply because it wasn't über-liberal California where these kinds of bylaws are expected.

"There's no 'California effect' with Woodstock," jokes Kennedy. "In some ways it was an unlikely community. That's why we argued it would make a good evaluation subject."

For weeks Waterloo shipped a van full of students to Woodstock, where they approached and questioned smokers in parks, near soccer fields, transit stops, and any other banned outdoor areas. A year later, the subjects were interviewed again. The result? Not only did non-smokers and smokers end up supporting the bylaw, it actually helped some smokers butt out.

"People don't always think of smoke-free policies as a means to help smokers, but the more difficult you make it to smoke, the more reason they have to quit," Kennedy says.

Still, some might argue that government has no business regulating what its citizens do outside in the open air, but Propel researchers don't buy that line of reasoning when tobacco use remains the leading public health issue in Canada and around the world. Put simply, the stakes are just too high, says Hammond. "At the end of the day more Canadians die from smoking than anything else," he says. "At Propel, we're trying to find a solution to that."

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Renison launches satellite

Renison’s English Language Institute (ELI) is establishing a satellite campus in Toronto. The new campus, operated in partnership with Hudson College, will initially offer the high-intermediate and advanced levels of ELI’s English for Academic Success (EFAS) program. This program will be accepting its first students at the Hudson campus this September.

Successful completion of the advanced level of EFAS satisfies the University of Waterloo's English Language Requirement (ELR). The new campus will provide Renison with room for expansion and an opportunity to serve ESL learners in the GTA.

Ron Champion, Special Projects Manager for ELI, is looking forward to the launch of this new program. “The Hudson EFAS campus is an exciting initiative for Renison and the ELI – our first satellite campus and most ambitious off-campus project to date.”

Hudson College's Principal Jack Bavington says the campus is ready for the incoming EFAS students in the fall. “The satellite campus is a modern facility, fully equipped to meet students’ learning needs and centrally located to take advantage of Toronto’s many cultural, recreational and entertainment venues.”

Hudson College is a private, non-denominational, co-educational school offering programs from pre-kindergarten through to university and college entrance. Hudson College’s 4.5-acre campus is located in central Toronto.

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Notes on a Friday

Bridge work brings closures starting August 9. The steel structure for the bridge between Mathematics 3 and the existing DC-MC link is being put into place next week, necessitating a closure of the Mathematics road and loading dock area to both vehicle and pedestrian traffic. There will be no access to the QNC/Aecon's parking lot, and deliveries to the Math loading dock are being prohibited between 7:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m. What will this mean for pedestrians? If you are walking north up the centre of campus, from the Dana Porter library for example, you will either have to go through the MC building, or else detour to the Ring Road on either side to get to areas like the Student Life Centre or Burt Matthews Hall. The closure will last approximately two weeks. Expect signage and fencing to appear in advance of the construction to help prevent this unpleasant scenario.

Web redesign usability testers are needed. Phase three of the web redesign usability testing is starting shortly. The next phase will have two components. The first component is another round of paper prototype testing, which will feature the new uwaterloo homepage wireframes. Faculty members and graduate students are needed for this round of testing. The test will be one hour in length, and testing will run from August 16th to to August 25th. Any interested testers can sign up here. The second component will be remote-user based, and more information about that part of the testing phase will be announced next week.

There will be an electrical power shutoff in Modern Languages on Saturday. The areas affected include the foyer and the south-east side of the building from 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.. The cause is a panel replacement. Computers should be shut down in orderly fashion.

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