Sheffield has second-worst national rates for new mums smoking

Figures provided to the board of the Sheffield Clinical Commissioning Group said 15.1 per cent of new mums in the city were still smokers at the time of the birth of their baby.

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Only Liverpool has a higher rate with 16.2 per cent of the country’s major cities and the figure for Sheffield is considerably above the national average of 11.4 per cent.

A report to the board said the city’s smoking rate for pregnant women has fallen slightly since the high point of 2006/07, when 16.2 per cent of new mums were recorded as smokers.

The report said efforts are being made to further reduce the numbers.

It said: “A range of targeted interventions are being delivered to reduce maternal smoking rates which take a woman-centred whole pathway approach to reducing prevalence and encourage wide stakeholder engagement.

“Maternity Services provide specialist Stop Smoking support, including activities which focus on promoting smoke-free environments in the home.

“A community based maternal relapse prevention service was also commissioned by Sheffield City Council Public Health team.”

The report also reveals Sheffield children have higher rates of tooth decay than the national average.

A 2012 survey of five-year-old children reveals the mean number of teeth per Sheffield child sampled which were actively decayed, filled, extracted or missing was 1.3 compared with 0.9 for England.

The report said: “This represented a small reduction over the 2008 survey where the mean was 1.7 teeth per child compared with 1.1 nationally.

“Nevertheless, the figure for Sheffield remains high. Tooth decay is a predominantly preventable disease.

“Significant levels remain, resulting in pain, sleep loss, time off school and, in some cases, treatment under general anaesthetic.”