Page 1473 - Week 05 - Thursday, 13 May 2021
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factors. Reducing risky behaviours requires collaboration across multiple government and community sectors.
We have made excellent gains on smoking overall, with the daily smoking rate continuing to decline, and the ACT has the lowest smoking prevalence in Australia. However, smoking remains the leading contributor to the burden of disease in the ACT and there are parts of the ACT community in which smoking rates remain stubbornly high. These include some of our most vulnerable people and communities, people with mental illness, those with drug and alcohol dependencies, those in custody, the homeless and those who identify as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander.
Canberrans want to reduce tobacco-related problems, and the ACT government has been working over a number of years to prevent the uptake of smoking and reduce the harms to the community from tobacco. In recent years the ACT government has taken action to limit the harmful effects of passive smoking and to reduce the exposure of children and young people to role-model smoking.
We know that there is more to do, particularly regarding e-cigarettes. Locally the government will continue to focus on reducing the uptake by young people who, we know, tobacco companies are targeting. Nationally the ACT government is working with all Australian governments to address the risk from e-cigarettes, and I will continue to raise it with my health minister colleagues.
Risky alcohol consumption remains a continuing issue for the ACT and Australia as a whole. However, fewer young people used alcohol in the last year compared with previous reports. While most secondary students have tried alcohol, this number has been steadily decreasing over time. To guide our responses to these challenges, the ACT government developed the drug strategy action plan. The plan is aligned to the national drug strategy 2017 to 2026 and aims to build safe, healthy and resilient communities. It will do this through preventing and minimising alcohol, tobacco and other drug-related health, social, cultural and economic harms among individuals, families and communities.
In line with the national strategy, the ACT government has focused on harm minimisation, taking a three-pillared approach, which includes demand reduction, supply reduction and harm reduction. This approach aims to prevent uptake and delay first use; reduce harmful use and support people to recover; restrict availability and access to alcohol, tobacco and other drugs, to prevent and reduce problems; and encourage safer behaviours and reduce preventable risk factors.
Recent data available on sexually transmitted infections and blood-borne viruses in the ACT shows that while the incidence of newly acquired cases of hepatitis C, hepatitis B and HIV remains stable in the ACT, consistent with trends across Australia, there has been a steady increase in chlamydia and gonorrhoea rates, with the highest number of notifications being detected in younger age groups. Careful monitoring needs to continue in order to be able to respond to new public health trends and threats in this area. There has been an impact of COVID-19 here, with our public health messaging being very much focused on being COVID safe, which has placed on hold some other very important public health messaging.
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