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NEWS: Norra Macready Stress disorder is common among prostitutes BMJ 1998; 317: 558b [Full text]

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The accompanying photograph reflected the stereotype not the reality of prostitution

E M Gunstone   (16 September 1998)

Smoking Underlying Prostitutes' Behavior and Stress

Leroy J Pletten   (18 January 1999)

The accompanying photograph reflected the stereotype not the reality of prostitution 16 September 1998
E M Gunstone Send response to journal: Re: The accompanying photograph reflected the stereotype not the reality of prostitution	Sir, I would be interested in the editor's reason behind the choice of photograph to accompany the news article "Stress disorder is common among prostitutes", BMJ 29/8/98. Not only did it appear salacious to choose to include a photograph with the item, but I found the stereotyping of a certain type of female attire, and the implication that all those involved in prostitution are female offensive. A major cause of stress for prostitutes of either sex is associated with their clients. If any illustration was needed, surely a car crawling along a kerbside would have been more appropriate? Yours sincerely Eileen M. Gunstone Principal Gordon St. Surgery Burton upon Trent
Smoking Underlying Prostitutes' Behavior and Stress 18 January 1999
Leroy J Pletten, Medicine and Law History Substance Abuse Issues Counselor and Lecturer The Crime Prevention Group Send response to journal: Re: Smoking Underlying Prostitutes' Behavior and Stress	Underlying prostitutes' behavior and stress is a deeper factor, cigarette smoking. Smoking is linked to the prostitution behavior pattern, including alcoholism, drug abuse, promiscuity, preceding history of child abuse, and customer assault and rape. Cigarettes contain high illegal levels of toxic chemicals, example, carbon monoxide, 42,000 parts per million (ppm) though unsafe above 50 average ppm. Smokers typically are exposed to 500 - 1,500 ppm. See Pletten, Smoking as hazardous conduct, N Y St J Med 1986;86:493 and US Dept of Health, Educ and Welfare, Smoking and Health: Surgeon General Report (1964), p 60. Central nervous system dysfunction results. See Silvette, et al., Actions of Nicotine on Central Nervous System Function, Pharmacol Rev 1962;14:137-173, and Ott, et al., Smoking, Dementia, and Alzheimer's Disease, Lancet 1998;351:1840-1843. Cigarettes are the gateway to the drug lifestyle, starting average age 12, then alcohol 12.6, marijuana, 14. See Fleming, et al., Cigarettes' Role in Initiation and Progression of Early Substance Use, Addictive Behaviors 1989;14:261-272. Alcoholism is about 90% by smokers. See Hayes, et al., Alcoholism and Nicotine Dependence Treatment, J Addictive Diseases 1996;15:135. Crime, whether against or by prostitutes, is about 90% by smokers. See McKinney v Anderson, 924 F2d 1500, 1507 n 21 (CA 9, 1991). Cigarettes' toxic chemicals cause addiction, abulia, impairment of willpower despite unwanted consequences. The law term is a "state of dethronement of reason from its governing power," People v Carmichael, 5 Mich 10, 21; 71 Am Dec 769 (1858). Tobacco distributors causing that is, in law, criminal assault. Enforcement of the Carmichael legal concept is essential in tobacco control. See Pletten, Alternative Models for Controlling Smoking among Adolescents, Am J Pub Health 1997;87:869-870. Lead Author Melissa Farley says, "These findings lead me to conclude that prostitution is intrinsically traumatising." We can add the preceding extrinsic trauma, smoking and its correlatives. For solution via prevention, enforcement of the People v Carmichael, 5 Mich 10, concept, supra, to protect adolescents before they are assaulted, rendered abulic and turned to results including prostitution, is essential.