Smoking is still a real issue at the lake and there is more the Town of Lake Cowichan could be doing to help change it. That was the message from Our Cowichan Communities Health Network at the most recent town council meeting.
Our Cowichan is seeking to build a task force of representatives from throughout the region to address smoking prevalence.
Cindy Lise, regional facilitator for Our Cowichan, told council she was there to talk about “the real ugly data we have about smoking” and to draw attention to health issues relating to cigarettes, e-cigarettes and marijuana. Our Cowichan’s decision to work on smoking-related issues came as part of the organization’s work for the Cowichan Air Shed Roundtable.
“Smoking was an area that we explored really closely because what we discovered was in many cases the consumption and the impacts are significantly greater than the island average,” she said. “Lung cancer within the Cowichan region, chronic lung disease, is much higher. Maternal smoking in Lake Cowichan is double.”
These figures come from the Vancouver Island Health Authority’s 2014 local health area profiles. In the Lake Cowichan profile (which actually includes all the lake area communities, not just the town), the percentage of women who reported smoking during their current pregnancy was 20 per cent — almost twice the island percentage (11 per cent) and more than double the provincial number (eight per cent).
Lise said looking at smoking and related illness numbers for the Cowichan Valley were deeply concerning. She and her team looked into some of the possible factors influencing these rates, and they noticed significant differences between governing bodies in terms of smoking bylaws and regulations.
While the City of Duncan had the “most comprehensive” smoking bylaws, followed by the CVRD, they could not find any for the Municipality of North Cowichan, Ladysmith or the Town of Lake Cowichan.
All these communities, however, are subject to provincial smoking legislation, which includes a ban on smoking within three metres of all doors, open windows and air intakes in most public places and workplaces.
“But the question we started asking at Our Cowichan is: Do our citizens within the communities know where they can or cannot smoke, vape, or even, eventually, smoke marijuana? And do we even know?” said Lise.
Our Cowichan is seeking to form a regional task force to collectively research the best practice and policies regarding local bylaws.
“What we are hoping is that by getting together with representation, that we can have a conversation of what we can do in Cowichan,” said Lise. “It may be not necessarily enforceable, but the fact that we are coming together and clearly stating that it does matter and we are concerned about the health risks.”
Mayor Ross Forest said he agreed with what Lise and her team are doing and said he would like to see some form of support from council. He also said it might be possible to share information about smoking on the town’s website and Facebook page.
If the town were to create a bylaw restricting smoking and e-cigarette use in certain areas, much like the existing provincial rules, the town would be empowered to do some form of enforcement.
“I think we did have bylaws in place around smoking, if we were to hear enough similar complaints, continuous activities or whatever, there would be enforcement of it at some point,” said Forrest. “It’s more an educational tool to start with.”
Councillor Bob Day said the town does not have the manpower to strictly enforce a new smoking bylaw but a greater percentage of the population is willing to abide by any laws, including bylaws, set forth by the municipality.
“By sitting doing nothing, because we can’t enforce, nothing really changes. But by making bylaws we get most of the people to obey,” he said.
Lise said Our Cowichan is still in the process of visiting other communities in the Valley. She said she expects it won’t be until early next year that a task force will begin to come together.
