A NEW report has highlighted the financial burden smoking-related illnesses are placing on stretched social care services.

Research published today by Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) shows that local authorities in England face a bill of £760m a year supporting people with smoking-related illness stay in their own homes.

This is on top of the estimated cost to the NHS of around £2 billion.

In the North-East, the total additional spending by local authorities on social care for adults as a result of smoking was around £44m and more than 13,000 residents receive informal care from friends and family.

Councils in Yorkshire and the Humber spend more than £150m caring for adults with smoking related illnesses.

The new figures are included in an All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Smoking and Health Report published today.

The report is urging the government to renew its efforts to drive down smoking rates and look at ways to force tobacco firms to pay for health campaigns.

South Tyneside Councillor John Pearce, who is also chair of the North-East regional group for directors of adult social services, said: “There is not only rising demand for care but also increasing costs.

“It is not just hospital budgets that are affected. In a region like the North-East with very high smoking rates in previous decades and an ageing population, we are seeing a high burden placed on social care.”

Budget pressures have already led to some Clinical Commissioning Groups, such as the Vale of York, cutting their prescription funding for patients seeking to stop smoking.

Tobacco is the leading cause of early, preventable death in England and leads to almost 80,000 premature deaths every year.

Smoking levels are now at their lowest ever point, but almost one in five adults and eight per cent of 15-year-olds still smoke.

Simon Clark, director of the smokers’ group Forest, said it was “nonsense” to suggest that smoking is contributing to the social care crisis.

He added: “Smoking rates are at their lowest ever level yet smokers still contribute £12 billion a year in tobacco taxation, a sum that far exceeds the alleged cost of treating smoking-related diseases or providing social care.”