Electronic cigarettes have hit the market with a fury of consumer confidence that has big tobacco shaking in its boots. One would assume, that rather than just running away with their tail between their legs, that big tobacco would begin manufacturing and selling electronic cigarettes themselves but so far none of the big tobacco companies have any electronic cigarettes on the market.

For the past decade public opinion on smoking has deteriorated at a rate that only certain US presidents could contend with. Tobacco companies’ lack of popularity, and the impending doom that they offer their users, have left an enormous void in the marketplace. Over 15 billion dollars a day is spent in the US on cigarettes. If every smoker decided to stop smoking traditional cigarettes and began smoking everywhere with the electronic cigarette that number would be cut in half – at the least.

The reason for this huge decline would be because electronic cigarettes are significantly cheaper than traditional cigarettes. This comes as a huge shocker because most of the time anything with the words “new” and “electronic” in the same sentence usually means expensive. In this case, however, it is just the opposite.

There is also promising evidence that smoking everywhere with the electronic cigarette has the potential to help prevent the spread of respiratory disease. To go from associating the word cigarette with tar, stench, death, and disease – and changing it to something that helps prevent the spread of respiratory illness – is a bit too much to comprehend for many people. The FDA seems absolutely baffled.

The FDA has been doing everything they can to find some reason that electronic cigarettes are bad for people. So far all they can come with is that they “don’t know”. The Federal Court in Washington D.C. even ruled in favor of keeping the flow of the electronic cigarette to the US going. The ports are open and people have already begun smoking everywhere. You have probably already been around someone who has been enjoying smoking everywhere – guilt free. You may not have noticed because the electronic cigarette produces no smell. You are probably thinking to yourself by now “this all sounds too good to be true” right? Well, that is an understandable reaction, but fortunately for smokers all over the world that is not the case. Available only in reality – the electronic cigarette has made smoking everywhere a guilt free phenomenon. So put a smile on your face and keep smoking without digging your own grave.
www.electronic-cigarettes-now.com is the us based electronic wholesaler with the safest product and lowest prices.

Ohio taxpayers have paid more than $2 million to rid bars, restaurants and workplaces of tobacco smoke since the statewide smoking ban took effect in 2007, a sum that opponents say could be better used elsewhere.

The state has spent $3.2 million so far to identify businesses that are violating the smoking ban, to look for infractions and to process them through the court system, according to information released by the Ohio Department of Health to state Sen. Bill Seitz, a critic of the smoking ban.

Health authorities have issued $1.2 million in fines and collected about $400,000, the health department said.

Critics of the smoking ban, which was approved by 58 percent of Ohio voters in 2006, point to the data as evidence that taxpayers are putting a lot of money toward patchy enforcement of the smoking law while violators shirk their fines.

“Even if they collected every single dime of every fine they’ve issued, they’ve still spent more than $2 million,” said Pam Parker, owner of a Grove City saloon and a regional director of the Buckeye Liquor Permit Holders Association.

Backers of the smoking ban take the opposite view. They say $2 million over nearly three years is a modest sum to reduce smoking rates in Ohio and protect nonsmokers from secondhand smoke. Since the ban took effect, Ohio’s adult smoking rate dipped from 22.5 percent to 20.2 percent, according to the Ohio Department of Health, although the trend might not be attributable to the no-smoking law alone.

The state Health Department says smoking-related health costs in Ohio come to about $4.37 billion a year, including $1.4 billion to Medicaid, the federal-state health-care program for the poor and disabled.

“I don’t think this has been an unreasonable cost for enforcement,” said Mandy Burkett, chief of the indoor environment section at the Ohio Department of Health. “I think the costs will be recouped by savings in other areas, particularly health-care costs.”

Seitz, a Cincinnati Republican and a smoker himself, said every dollar spent to look for smokers or ashtrays is money that could be used to pay for education, health care or other good causes.

“It’s a matter of priorities,” Seitz said. “We are in unprecedented times.”

He said bars should be able to purchase “smoking licenses” – similar to a liquor permit and costing a few thousand dollars – that would exempt the businesses from the ban. Money from the licenses then could be used to enforce the smoking law at businesses that aren’t exempt.

Seitz’s idea may face the same fate as other proposals to weaken the statewide smoking ban. Attempts to exempt certain businesses, such as fraternal organizations and family-owned bars, have fizzled in the legislature. Public-health advocates regularly trot out polls showing strong public support for the ban.

Seitz’s “smoking license” idea isn’t the only route by which certain businesses might be able to exempt themselves from the ban. Zeno’s, a Columbus bar that the state sued in August for repeatedly violating the ban, is challenging the constitutionality of applying the law to bars that are restricted to people 21 years or older.

“It might be perfectly constitutional to bar smoking in certain buildings or sports stadiums or family restaurants, but here you have a business that’s only 21 and up and that has a bar that’s big enough where someone can sit on one side of the bar and not bother someone on the other side of the bar,” said Maurice Thompson, the attorney for Zeno’s.

Franklin County Common Pleas Judge David Cain has not ruled on the case.

In Franklin County, the number of investigations into suspected violations has ebbed since authorities began enforcing the statewide ban in May 2007. (Many Franklin County jurisdictions, including Columbus, had local no-smoking laws that predated the statewide ban.)

The Franklin County Board of Health investigated 273 cases in 2007, 200 in 2008 and 163 in 2009, according to records. More than half of the cases were dismissed each year.

The health departments in Franklin and Delaware counties, which receive 90 percent of fine revenue for cases they investigate plus a flat rate from the state Health Department, say the ban hasn’t been a big financial burden.

“We haven’t had to add staff to get the investigations done,” said Stephanie DeGenaro, the head tobacco enforcer for the Delaware General Health District.
By James Nash
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

Tanzania exported tobacco worth Sh239 billion ($184.07 million) between September 2008 and October 2009.
The crop earnings have outstripped those of cotton.

The country earned $504.3 million from exporting tobacco, coffee, cotton, cashew nuts, tea and cloves during the period.

Tobacco accounted for 36.5 per cent of traditional exports, the Bank of Tanzania’s economic review for November 2009 showed.
But the World Health Organisation (WHO) reports that tobacco use causes 5.4 million deaths around the world each year, mainly from cancer and heart diseases.

It warns that the number of deaths will rise to 8 million annually by 2030 unless urgent action is taken.

Overall, about four per cent of Africans are smokers.
But the rate is much higher in some countries. At least 20 per cent of men use tobacco in Algeria, Burkina Faso, Comoros, Gambia, Kenya, Mauritania, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, So Tom and Prncipe, South Africa, Tanzania, and Zimbabwe, according to WHO data.

Women in Africa smoke less than men, but female smoking already exceeds eight per cent in Burkina Faso, Comoros, Namibia, S�o Tom and Prncipe and South Africa.

Smoking costs the UK’s National Health Service five times as much as previously thought, Oxford University researchers have calculated.

Reports show that Tanzania collected Sh340 billion in taxes from tobacco in the last five years.
It garnered Sh52 billion in 2003/4 and Sh90 billion in 2007/8.

During the year ending October 2009, the value of traditional exports increased by 31.8 per cent to $504.3 million from the level recorded during the corresponding period in 2008, largely due to a rise in export volumes of coffee, tobacco and cloves, read the BoT review.

In its November 2008 review covering September 2007 and October 2008, tobacco was in the second position and accounted for 18 per cent of traditional exports worth $375.1 million.

But in the year ending October 2009, cotton accounted for 21.4 per cent of traditional exports, followed by coffee at 23.2 per cent, cashew nuts at 10.2 per cent, tea at 5.8 per cent and cloves three per cent.

The government is encouraging farmers to increase output from 58,702 tonnes in 2008/9 to 60,000 tonnes in 2009/10.
Main tobacco buyers and exporters include the Tanzania Leaf Tobacco Company, Alliance One and Premium Active Tanzania.

A federal judge has ruled that electronic cigarettes cannot be regulated as drug delivery devices by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). This decision has left the public health community red-faced.

This means electronic cigarettes will stay in the market for now. The ruling could have far-reaching implication on federal regulation of tobacco products.

Those in favor of tobacco-control said that this ruling could give birth to a range of new nicotine-laced products that have been controlled by the FDA.

The case
In September 2008, the FDA confiscated imports of battery-operated devices that were used for turning a nicotine solution into vapors, for inhalation.

The FDA labeled these as drug delivery devices and banned their entry in the nation on the pretext that they these e-cigarettes were unapproved, misbranded products being used as a substitute to traditional cigarettes.

The agency had also expressed concerns over the indefinite intensity of nicotine and other chemicals in these.

FDA was sued by Smoking Everywhere Inc. and NJOY, whose e-cigarettes were seized. The companies alleged that the agency had overstepped its authority.

On Jan. 14, a U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia agreed to this argument. Judge Richard J Leon wrote, “There is no basis for FDA to treat electronic cigarettes … as a drug-device combination when all they purport to do is offer consumers the same recreational effects as a regular cigarette.”

“FDA cites no evidence that [e-cigarettes] … are any more an immediate threat to public health and safety than traditional cigarettes, which are readily available,” the court observed, adding that FDA’s concerns did not in any way prevail over the economic harm sustained by the plaintiffs.

Concerns over e-cigarettes
As per the ruling, no restriction is to be imposed on the marketing of e-cigarettes while the case is still under litigation.

Reacting to the ruling, an FDA spokeswoman said, “The public health issues surrounding electronic cigarettes are of serious concern to the FDA.”

Questions are being raised over e-cigarettes functioning as a smoking-cessation tool, however, the World Health Organization (WHO) has ruled out it being a valid therapy.

The issue has been taken up by the American Medical Association, which will reveal the outcome of a study currently underway at its House of Delegates Annual Meeting in June.

Thomas P Houston, MD, chair of the American Academy of Family Physicians’ tobacco cessation advisory committee, said, “These devices may not be marketed for cessation, but anecdotally, that’s what the public is using them for. We still don’t know the quality control, so somebody needs to be able to set standards for safety for whatever ingredients might be added and to understand what these do for the smoker in the short and long term. Someone has to be accountable.”

Jonathan P. Winickoff, MD, MPH, chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics Tobacco Consortium, has expressed concerns over the possibility of claims made by the companies being misleading. “This product delivers nicotine, and nicotine is a potent drug that fosters addiction,” he said.

Dr. Winickoff, who helped the FDA in its study of e-cigarettes, said, “The primary claim that there is a net benefit for the public health is just unproven, and there’s a very real risk that even people who have not used any tobacco products — including children and young adults — start with an e-cigarette thinking it’s safe.”

Sacramento – When Republican state legislators decided last month that they needed to escape Sacramento and kick back in a more relaxed environment to hash out issues, they headed for a luxury beach resort in Santa Barbara.

Such sojourns don’t come cheap, so oil and tobacco firms and other companies that are pressing an agenda in the Capitol funneled $120,000 to a group that picked up much of the tab. About 25 Republican senators and Assembly members and a dozen aides attended the retreat at Fess Parker’s Doubletree Resort.

The three-day event featured a budget briefing and included a tour of the nearby Ronald Reagan ranch, gift bags worth up to $299 each, gourmet meals and a cocktail reception where lawmakers mingled with a dozen lobbyists.

Senate Republican leader Dennis Hollingsworth of Murrieta solicited the $120,000 from 11 trade groups and businesses including Anthem Blue Cross, tobacco company Altria and oil firms Chevron and Plains Exploration & Production. Another contributor was the Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians, which operates a casino in Temecula under a compact with the state.

The donations were made through a nonprofit called the Council for Legislative Excellence, which is headed by the wife of a legislative aide, according to the organization’s most recent tax filing.

Legislators said the financial arrangement allowed the retreat to be held without cost to the state. But it drew objections from Kathay Feng, executive director of California Common Cause, who likened it to “money laundering.” The contributions amounted to “buying access by interested parties through a third-party conduit,” Feng said.

Hollingsworth did not return calls from The Times, and his representatives declined to say what the retreat cost. But his spokesman Hector Barajas said he believes some money was left over and would be applied toward future events. Barajas also noted that leaders from both parties, including the governor, do similar fundraising.

“There is a firewall between legislation and money raised for various events,” he said.

Democratic lawmakers solicited $14,000 in 2008 to cover gourmet meals, rooms and cocktails for a retreat at a wine country hotel that 24 of them attended. The event included a reception that also drew eight Senate Republicans. The money came from the California Professional Firefighters, the Consumer Attorneys of California and the Northern California Carpenters Regional Council.

Barajas said most of the Republican lawmakers paid for their own hotel rooms in Santa Barbara, many from accounts made up of political contributions. The Council for Legislative Excellence helped rent meeting rooms and pay for meals and receptions, he said.

The council also gave those who attended the retreat a gift bag that included a $150 briefcase, cuff links for the men and charm bracelets for the women, one lawmaker said.

Some legislators said they did not know who footed the bill for the retreat and did not feel pressured by lobbyists who attended.

“I didn’t know who paid for it,” said state Sen. Tony Strickland (R-Thousand Oaks). The important thing, he said, is that all financial details be disclosed publicly, “and let the people decide what they think about it.”

Lawmakers said they expect a written account of the gifts so they can properly report the information.

Lobbyists who attended the reception included a representative of Chevron, according to company spokesman Sean Comey. Chevron and Altria were the biggest donors, giving $25,000 each to the council. Both actively lobby lawmakers on bills before the Legislature.

Altria has for years fought proposals to raise the state’s tobacco tax. The latest such proposal died last year in a legislative committee after Republicans voted against it.

Chevron and other oil companies have long battled a proposed oil-extraction tax. One such proposal was vetoed last year by Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Asked why Chevron donated the money for the retreat, Comey said, “We wanted to attend the event and we made the contribution.” He added that the firm supports such conferences for legislators of both parties “to facilitate their ability to reinvigorate the economy.”

Plains Exploration would have been the major benefactor of a bill last year to open the door to more oil drilling in the Tranquillon Ridge field off the coast of Santa Barbara County. Fourteen of the 15 Republicans in the state Senate voted for the legislation. The bill failed, but the proposal is back in Schwarzenegger’s proposed budget for the next fiscal year.

The company sent a representative to the retreat “to get the message out on the Tranquillon Ridge project,” Plains Exploration spokesman Steve Rusch said.

Copyright © 2010, The Los Angeles Times
By Patrick McGreevy
January 24, 2010

Sellers of cigarettes and other tobacco products are likely to be given a 10–month grace period to stock up on packaging with required health warnings and display signage, the Ministry of Health has confirmed.

The new Tobacco Law comes into force on 31 December, banning smoking in public places, bars and offices.

Under the new law, cigarettes must carry large graphic health warnings and signage outlining the dangers of smoking must be erected at points of sale in stores and outlet.

Minister Mark Scotland said the ministry had initially envisioned a timeframe of 1 May next year for tobacco dealers to fully comply with display and packaging requirements and for cigar bars to install required ventilation systems, but was aware that they may have difficulty meeting this deadline.

“Accordingly, the ministry is proposing to allow the registered tobacco dealers a period up to the end of October 2010 to take the necessary steps to become fully compliant with the display and packaging provisions, and similarly for the cigar bars to be fully compliant with the ventilation requirements,” Mr. Scotland said.

He stressed that there was no plan to postpone the ban on smoking in public places.

The proposal is for the tobacco dealers and cigar bars to comply with the initial registration deadline of 1 May, 2010, but they would not be expected to be fully compliant with the display and packaging requirements at the time of initial registration, the minister added.

Under the new law passed by the Legislative Assembly in October, anyone selling tobacco products needs to apply for a Certificate of Registration. Submission for renewal of applications must be made by 1 November each year.

Mr. Scotland said once dealers register, they can use the first 10 months of next year to sell off their existing non–compliant packages, and to make the necessary changes to their display areas, prior to their registration renewal submission at the end of October 2010.

CHARLESTON, W.Va.–One Kanawha County lawmaker believes targeting tobacco could be the key to combating rising health care costs and paying down debt in West Virginia.

When the Legislature convenes in January, Sen. Dan Foster wants fellow lawmakers to look at increasing the state cigarette tax by an additional dollar. That tax now stands at 55 cents in West Virginia.

“I always push for increasing the cigarette tax. Nothing makes more sense in terms of revenue and affecting public health,” said Foster, who is a doctor and serves on the Senate committee for health and human resources.

The last time the state cigarette tax went up was in 2002 when it increased from 18 cents to 55 cents.

Earlier this year, legislators debated a proposal that would increase the tax another 65 cents to a total of $1.20 per pack. The measure ultimately failed. Some supporters of the legislation said they believed the bill would have been successful had Congress not decided to raise the federal tax on cigarettes at the same time. The federal cigarette tax jumped 61.6 cents in April to $1.01.

If the state decides to raise its cigarette tax by one dollar, West Virginia smokers would be paying a total of $2.56 in taxes per pack.

Foster, a Democrat, estimates the buck-a-pack increase could bring in as much as $100 million in additional revenue for the state, but says the incentive for smokers to kick the habit is equally as important.

“The farther you go (with increasing the state tax), the more effective it is,” Foster said.

The senator brought up the issue during an interim meeting Tuesday after new DHHR secretary Patsy Hardy gave a presentation to a legislative oversight committee.

Foster asked Hardy whether she would support the cigarette tax hike. The secretary sidestepped the question, saying she needed more information before weighing in.

DHHR spokesman John Law told committee members the tobacco tax is “probably the best way to reduce cigarette use” in West Virginia.
However, Law said he would defer to the governor before making a decision about whether to back the increase.

Tuesday also provided the first opportunity for many lawmakers to hear from Hardy, who took over the reigns at the DHHR in September.

The secretary gave a comprehensive report on the department’s progress, highlighting several areas of concern lawmakers have brought to her attention in the past few months.

For example, the DHHR has come under fire in recent years for its consistently high number of job vacancies. Hardy said the department has hired close to 100 additional staff members in the 100 days since she took office.

Hardy also vowed to keep the lines of communication open between her department and the Legislature, addressing another criticism from lawmakers.

Several legislators have said they support the idea of dividing the DHHR into two separate departments in order to make it more effective.

The massive agency has 6,000 employees and is responsible for hundreds of programs that provide a wide range of services to state residents.

“The services impact them from the day they are born until the day they die,” Hardy said.

Delegate Don Perdue, D-Wayne, plans to push for a special committee to study the idea of splitting up the DHHR during the 2010 legislative session.

By Sara Gavin
Daily Mail, December 9, 2009

The Indonesian Cigarette Industry Community Forum (Formasi) has pledged to stage a demonstration to protest a government plan to increase excise from cigarette products in 2010, arguing that the move is unjust.

“We plan to propose a judicial review with the Constitutional Court on the planned implementation of the 2009 Finance Ministry regulation on tobacco product excise,” Formasi secretary Johanes Paulus Suhardjo told The Jakarta Post on Tuesday.

The plan to take legal action was made after forum members walked out of a meeting with the Customs and Excise Directorate General in Jakarta on Monday, which was intended to familiarize the sector with the new regulation, Paulus said.

The regulation, issued Nov. 16, 2009 also regulates retail prices of cigarettes, a change which the forum says will burden small-scaled cigarette producers.

The forum will also call for a judicial review of the 2008 Finance Ministry regulation on cigarette excise, which was issued in December 2008 and came into effect in February 2009, he said.

Formasi had also chosen to take legal action after learning that the proposal to increase cigarette excise in 2010 had not been made with approval from either the association of Indonesian cigarette factories (Gappri) or the association of Indonesian light cigarette producers (Gaprindo), but from large-scale tobacco industries, Paulus said.

“The Gappri chairman corrected the Customs and Excise director general’s statement yesterday, explaining that his organization had never proposed an increase in the cigarette excise in 2010. The government must change the decision,” he said.

Formasi’s 512 members, Paulus said, would face bankruptcy if the excise was increased next year, resulting in possible mass layoffs of more than 35,000 workers in the sector.

In 2009 the excise increased 30 percent on 2008 levels, and the government plans to increase 2009 excise levels 62.5 percent next year, he said.

Separately, Malang Industry and Trade Agency head Sjakur Kullu said his office could do nothing to help the 300 cigarette factories in the region, arguing that the regency administration was in no position to change state fiscal and financial policies.

The regency administration also had no plan to anticipate possible impacts of the implementation of the 2010 excise hike.

“We will just direct them to convey their arguments to the Finance Ministry, the House of Representatives and other competent parties,” Sjakur said.

“It is completely up to the central government. We don’t want to be involved,” he said.

However, Sjakur said he hoped the central government would listen to the small-scale cigarette industries, adding that they would be the hardest hit by the new excise.

Sjakur acknowleged that there could be possible layoffs following the increase of the excise next year.

“Just wait and see what happens after the regulation is introduced,” he said.

Small-scale tobacco industries in the regency need to improve their management to prepare themselves for competition with larger producers, Sjakur added.

The statements raised concerns among cigarette producers in the region, since the regency administration was seen to be washing their hands of the case, despite it receiving Rp 26.3 billion from tobacco excise annually, some of which was contributed by small industries.

Malang regency is home to 374 small, medium and large cigarette companies, which employ around 32,000 workers.

Wahyoe Boediwardhana, THE JAKARTA POST, November 25, 2009

If you want to smoke in Prestonsburg, you’ll have to do it outside or at home.

Today is the first business day since the smoking ban started. There are people who were strongly for the ban, against it, and those who are neutral.

Most supporters say it is a health issue, but others say their rights are being violated.

Harold Burchell smoked for 18 years. He gave up the habit, and is glad Prestonsburg restaurants are now smoke-free.

“I do believe people have a right to smoke, that would be their choice. However, I also understand the medical problems caused by smoking,” Burchell said.

Jerry Stone is not a smoker, but says the ban doesn’t really concern him one way or the other.

“It doesn’t affect me either way. I don’t mind if people smoke. But I don’t smoke, so I’d like it if they don’t,” Stone said.

Prestonsburg Mayor Jerry Fannin says smoke-free buildings are better for everyone.

“What’s the best for the majority of people, and like I said this was a health issue. That’s the reason that council decided to go non-smoking,” Fannin said.

City officials say there are three reasons for the ban.

“Better business, better health, and most of all a smoke-free community,” Brent Graden said.

Although there are some concerns businesses will suffer, Graden says the ban may actually bring in more companies to Prestonsburg.

“Overall, I think the smoking ban has had a negligible impact on businesses. In fact, we’re hoping we’ll become a more family-friendly community with the ban,” Graden said.

Graden also says the ban is a sign of progress, and that the city is hoping for future economic growth.

Nov 2, 2009
By Marcus Conroy

Connecticut’s decision to hike the state cigarette tax to $3 per pack was a no-brainer. The new rate, effective on Oct. 1, will raise millions in urgently needed state revenue, will convince more people to quit smoking and will slash health care costs associated with smoking-related illnesses.

One of the greatest benefits is that more teenagers will not take up the dirty habit in the first place. The national Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids estimates that Connecticut’s $1-per-pack tax increase will deter 24,000 youths from becoming addicted smokers, and will convince 10,000 adults to quit. The group also projects $520 million in health care savings. These are significant numbers.

Tobacco use is the leading preventable cause of death and disease in Connecticut, claiming 4,700 lives each year and costing the state $1.63 billion annually in health care bills, the group says.

State officials estimate the higher tax will bring in nearly an extra $100 million in revenue this fiscal year, money desperately needed to support essential services.

Now that Connecticut has shown leadership by boosting the cigarette tax rate, it ought to take the next logical step and devote more dollars to smoking cessation programs. Nicotine is one of the toughest addictions to overcome, but with help smokers can kick the deadly habit.

Connecticut for years has allocated a pittance to smoking prevention and cessation efforts. Currently, the state spends less than 2 percent of $447 million in tobacco-generated revenue for these programs, far below what the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends.

Connecticut can do better. Lawmakers who saw the wisdom of raising taxes on cigarettes ought to demand that some of that new revenue be used to support effective smoking cessation programs.

Courant

CONTRACT sales ended last week bringing the total of tobacco sold this year to above 56 million kilogrammes after 94 selling days.

Contractor’s purchases during the final week were slightly above 700 000 kg which saw the seasonal volumes rise to 56,5 million kg at an average price of US$3,00 per kg.

A total of 44,6 million kg were sold in 2008 after 94 selling days at an average price of US$3,24/kg.

Contract sales accounted for 72 percent of the 2009 crop and the other 28 percent were shared among the three auction floors.

The contract system’s offered better average prices at US$3,05 per kg compared to auction floors average price of US$2,87 per kg.

Clean up sales, which ended on Friday and put a final cap on sales, are likely to increase the seasonal volume close to 57 million kg. Generally the prices were fairly good for the closing week.

In comparison with the previous week significant losses were recorded across all grades mainly those that traded very firmly in week 19 ending the week with an average price of US265 c/kg. Majority grades traded at prices weaker than in the previous week.

Some groups, notably Leaf and Cutters ‘C’ despite the losses still managed to trade above the seasonal average price. The seasonal average price was US$3,00/kg compared to US$3,24/kg during a similar period last year.

The wastage rate for the week decreased to 2,2 percent from around 3 percent in the previous week mainly due to the reduction in bales withdrawn for price considerations that accounted for 1 percent.

Mixed and mouldy bales were the major reasons for rejection each constituting 1 percent.

The seasonal wastage rate was at 6,04 percent compared to 11,55 percent in a corresponding period in 2008.

Defective bales constituted the 4,28 percent with two percent of this being poorly graded tobaccos.

Weekly throughput had 51 tonnes above the previous week at 716 tonnes. However despite higher volumes, the value went down due to lower prices.

Typical of the final sales the quality of offerings declined and majority grades traded weaker, posting an overall loss of US19 cents per kg to close the week at US265 cents per kg.

Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer is in the middle of a major campaign to convince Australian smokers that they should not try to quit without taking anti-smoking medication.

The company sells over-the-counter nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) and prescription drug varenicline (brand name Champix). A Pfizer brochure “what makes you think you can quit this time?” and website stress that “only 3-5% of people who try to outsmart cigarettes without treatment succeed”, that “a serious quit attempt needs a plan” and that most smokers “require help from a health-care professional”.

Each of these claims is highly contestable. Pfizer and other pharmaceutical companies see cold turkey as the enemy of their efforts to medicate as many smokers as possible. Smoking cessation has become increasingly pathologised to the point that public awareness of its natural history has become heavily distorted.

For years, cold turkey has been denigrated as a hopeless strategy and ignored in public campaigns. But ask 1000 ex-smokers how they stopped and you get a very different answer. As occurs with personal efforts to stop problem drinking, gambling and narcotics use, population studies consistently have shown that a large majority of smokers who permanently succeed in quitting do not use any form of assistance.

In 2003, 20 years after the introduction and widespread promotion of cessation pharmacotherapies, those trying to stop in the past year unaided (64.2%) were still twice as many as those using pharmacological aids (32.2%) and only 8.8% of US smokers attempting to quit used a behavioural treatment. Moreover, despite the best efforts of the well-resourced pharmaceutical industry to promote pharmacologically mediated cessation, a large body of clinical trials demonstrating that various forms of pharmacotherapy and other forms of help can significantly improve cessation, the most common method used by those who successfully stop remains unassisted cessation (cold turkey or reducing before quitting).

In 1986, the American Cancer Society reported that “Over 90% of the estimated 37 million people who have stopped smoking in this country since the Surgeon General’s first report linking smoking to cancer have done so unaided”.

Today, multiplying the number of people using a method by the number successfully quitting using it, there is daylight between the number of ex-smokers who have stopped unassisted and the next most common successfully attributed method (nicotine replacement therapy). A 2007 paper in the American Journal of Public Health [97(8):1503-9] showed that of smokers who had quit successfully for 7-24 months, 75.7% had gone cold turkey; 8.6% had cut down then quit and 12.4% had used NRT.

Pfizer’s claim that “most require help” is not only nonsense, but contrasts with a reference it cites in its own brochure, which states “about one-third of smokers now use a medication when they try to stop”, meaning that two-thirds don’t. Its claim that smokers need a plan is also highly debatable. A recent study (Nicotine Tob Res 2009;11(7):827-32) of unplanned cessation found that unplanned cessation attempts were twice as successful as planned attempts and significantly, that most unplanned quit attempters do not use any assistance.

The emphasis about the futility of people trying to stop smoking unaided acts to exclude popular understanding of what is the most common story of cessation: doing it without professional or therapeutic help. When citizens have common, ordinary and self-limiting ailments, traits and behaviours constantly redefined as needing treatment, avoidable iatrogenic consequences and burgeoning health-care expenditure can follow. But the steady erosion of human agency and self-belief as people lose confidence in their ability to recover or change unhealthy practices is perhaps of greater concern.

Copyright © 2009 18 September 2009 Crikey

The news that for the first time since the auction floors opened in March, prices have taken upswing movements is a very welcome development considering that there had been loud outcries from the farmers for a long time over poor prices on offer. While we appreciate the new development, it is a pity that it is being executed at the time when many farmers have already sold their leaf prices at low prices and incurred huge losses in the process.

What is strange is that the tobacco prices have been adjusted upwards just few days after government expelled bosses of major tobacco firms and this raises a lot of speculation on whether there is a link between the expulsion of the tobacco firms’ bosses and the new prices of tobacco per kilogramme, which is above the government set minimum prices. This is so considering the fact that President Bingu wa Mutharika openly accused the deported executives of conniving amongst themselves by among others forming a cartel aimed at deliberately frustrating the policy of the government to improve the welfare of Malawians through better prices of tobacco. According to Mutharika in his special address to the nation last week, the expelled buyers had been sabotaging the economy and as a result harming the very people who grow tobacco for them to buy.
Mutharika in his speech emphasised that tobacco is a crop of national significance because the country derives up to 70 percent of its foreign exchange earnings and it is therefore a huge mistake for buyers to be exploiting farmers who toil a lot and spend a big fortune on production, only to see their produce earning low prices.

It is important for all stockholders and stakeholders to know that since independence the leaf has been regarded as an economic lifeline in this country without rich mineral endowments. As Mutharika has been rightly saying, it is a pity that some buyers have deliberately been playing hide and seek with government directives on tobacco prices, defying them at will, when it is a known fact that the crop is treasured because of economic contributions to the country and for its historical associations. Commercial production can be traced back as far as 1889 when it was introduced by settlers from Virginia in the United States.

Due to some the dirty tactics, for years poor auction prices and a dearth of buyers have been among the challenges that the leaf’s producers – the farmers- have been grappling with, and attempts by the State President has been defied time and again with numerous lame excuses being advanced.
The issue now is: Let there be sanity at the auction floors with farmers offering the best of their leaf and the buyers in turn buying it at reasonable prices.

Ontario’s provincial Tory caucus chairman plans to have a private members’ bill up for debate later this month to cut tobacco taxes by a third.

Haldimand-Norfolk MPP Toby Barrett, who’s also the party’s environment critic, said in a release last week that his bill’s fate now rests with Premier Dalton McGuinty’s government.

The party said in its release that the bill “would be a great opportunity for Mr. McGuinty to do something right for the people of Caledonia, for hard-working corner store operators, and tobacco farmers.”

Caledonia, south of Hamilton, has become known in recent years not only for land disputes and blockades but for a proliferation of roadside smoke shacks selling tax-free or discount tobacco.

Barrett said his bill would see tobacco taxes cut to 8.23 cents per stick, down from 12.35 cents, “on the understanding that the federal government would follow suit.”

Barrett, in his release, cited “the spirit of co-operation there was in 1994 when the federal government, along with five provinces, slashed taxes and shut down hundreds of smoke shacks overnight. It’s up to both levels of government to address the criminal networks that have set up shop across the country.”

Ontario has the highest percentage of illegal tobacco of almost anywhere in the world, he said, at almost 50 per cent of all tobacco sold in the province.

“The province has spent over $13 million over three years on Smoke-Free Ontario and $7 million on smoking cessation programs, and yet there is evidence, at least locally, that smoking has gone up 33 per cent,” the party said.

“It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that people are accessing cheap smokes close to home from smoke shacks or trunks of cars,” Barrett said.

“All the while, corner stores who rely on smokers to pick up other items, are experiencing a decrease in traffic to the point where many of them have had to permanently close their doors.”


Copyright © September 8th 2009 Manitobacooperator

Australia may raise cigarette taxes by A$2 billion ($1.7 billion) if it adopts the recommendations of a panel of advisers, the Australian newspaper reported.

The National Preventative Health Taskforce recommended a price rise of 17.5 Australian cents a cigarette, raising the price of a packet to A$20, and an increase to alcohol pricing, the newspaper said, citing Taskforce Chairman Rob Moodie.

More than 800,000 people might be saved from early deaths if the strategy reduces smoking and drinking rates and obesity levels stabilize, the newspaper said.

By Robert Fenner, Sept. 2
Copyright © 2009 Bloomberg

ALBANY – Governor David Paterson’s administration has “written off” taxes that it had expected to collect on cigarette sales by American Indian retailers within New York State, the Buffalo News reports.

In April, the governor agreed to a fiscal year budget that projected revenue of $65 million from taxing cigarettes sold to non-Indians in smoke shops, through the mail, or from Internet sales from reservation-based businesses.

But without public notice, the administration has eliminated the $65 million line item and won’t begin collecting the tax at least until April 1, 2010, the beginning of the new fiscal year. The decision prompted criticism from non-Indian retailers who say that they cannot compete with the Indian sales, who do not charge the state’s $2.75 per pack excise tax.

“It’s embarrassing, and it’s outrageous that the Empire State can’t seem to figure out how to collect this tax when just about every other state does,” said Russell Sciandra, director of the Center for a Tobacco Free New York.

State officials have feared potential clashes between state troopers and Indians over Indian reservation sales. Indeed, violence erupted in 1995 when then-Governor Pataki attempted to end tax-free sales.

Governor Paterson’s budget director, Robert Megna, said that the state deleted the $65 million line item from the budget “to prudently address potential risks to our receipts forecast. We continue to work diligently toward a negotiated settlement of this issue.”

Despite state laws that permit the state to collect the tax, the Seneca Nation maintains that treaty rights dating to the 18th century give them the right to sell products, including cigarettes, without taxes.

A 1978 document, recently made known, revealed the sleight used during that time by the tobacco industry of the United Kingdom in order to overcome the crisis in the sector before evidence that cigarettes were harmful: “We need something for people to die,” said the report.

According to the consulting agency Campbell-Johnson for the British Association of Tobacco (BAT), tobacco consumption was functional for the Government, due to the fact that cancer and other illnesses associated to cigarettes limited “the number of dependent elderly that the economy must maintain.”

The document’s author recognizes that “obviously” those arguments “cannot be used publicly,” but he insists: “with a general increase in life expectancy, we need something for people to die. In replacement of the effects of war, poverty, and hunger, cancer, considered the illness of rich and developed countries, has a role to play.”

This idea, considered a “psychological factor in order to continue the taste people have of smoking as something pleasant, although it may be a dangerous habit, should not be under valuated,” the document continued.

Also, the damage that may be caused to the industry by associating smoking with lung cancer is recognized. “This medical challenge has acted like a nuclear bomb which will have lasting effects” on the sector.

Another argument used in order to defend the consumption of cigarettes indicated that the demonization of tobacco could accompany “a relaxation before marijuana, or an association between both substances.” Although tobacco may be a “relaxation drug” which can be “a blessing for humanity in a stressed world,” its association with marijuana would be harmful, insisted the document.

The document also gave criteria for lifting the public image of cigarettes: “we still have a margin to try to get smoking to be considered on of those habits that aren’t questionable per se,” it says.

One of the actions is to promote a code of conduct among smokers that, if followed, “would assure they wouldn’t be accused by non-smokers of arrogantly assuming the right to contaminate the air around them.”

“Their tone has to be frank and positive,” and one of the objectives must be to “restore the smoker’s image as an outgoing and sociable person, and not neurotic, smelly, and marginal as the non-smokers think,” concluded the report.


Copyright © 2009 Buenosairesherald

YOKOHAMA, Japan (AP) -– One plaintiff is a cancer patient. Another is represented by his widow. The third, has emphysema and rolls into the courtroom on a wheelchair with tubes trailing out of his nose. The three Japanese are waging a minnow-vs.-whale battle against Big Tobacco in one of the world’s most smoker-friendly countries. But precedent suggests they’re likely to lose, and they hope their suit will at least draw attention to the dangers of smoking.

Even if they win, they’re unlikely to dent the finances of Japan Tobacco Inc., a former monopoly still half-owned by the government. The three are asking for a total of 30 million yen ($320,000) from a company with 6.8 trillion yen ($72.8 billion) a year in sales.

Their larger goal, they say, is to gain stronger curbs on tobacco, and legal and social acceptance of a notion that much of the world now takes for granted: that smoking makes you sick.

They have a long way to go. There’s little of the concerted discouragement of smoking that has gained momentum in the West. Few bars and restaurants ban smoking. Only last year, to curb smoking among children, did a smart card become necessary to buy cigarettes from a vending machine.

A pack of 20 costs 300 yen ($3), less than a third of New York prices, and about 60 percent of it is tax.

Other countries print dire health warnings in bold letters and add pictures of dead babies, gangrenous feet and crumbling teeth. Here, in small print, they say: “Smoking can be one of the causes for lung cancer.”

Secondhand smoke? “Tobacco smoke has a harmful effect on people around you, especially infants, children and the elderly. When smoking, please be careful of those around you,” the warnings say.

Japan Tobacco officials still flatly deny passive smoking is a problem, arguing that the dangers come from burning cigarettes left on an ashtray — not secondhand fumes.

The corporation has argued in Yokohama District Court that it has no case to answer because smokers are free to quit anytime, smoking is legal and cancer has multiple causes. It’s the same defense that gained it victory the last time it was taken to court, in 2003.

The current case began in January, 2005. Since then, co-plaintiff Kenichi Morishita has died of pneumonia and bacterial infection at age 75, leaving 67-year-old cancer patient Koreyoshi Takahashi who has one lung, and Masanobu Mizuno, the emphysema sufferer, a former mechanic who is also 67 and smoked from age 15 to 51.

With final arguments over, the judge has promised a ruling Jan. 20.

Although the case has attracted little media attention, there are signs that even Japan is beginning to kick the habit.

Among adult males, the number of smokers has been falling and now stands at 39.4 percent compared with about 24 percent in the U.S., according to the Japanese Health Ministry and the American Lung Association.

Cigarette ads no longer appear on TV, though Japan Tobacco gets on the air with ads that discourage tossing butts on the street or in trash cans.

There are more smoke-free cabs and areas on train platforms. Some communities have passed ordinances allowing small fines for smoking on streets.

Smoke-free bars and restaurants are enough of a novelty to have spawned a backlash against “smoker-bashing.”

In April, a major restaurant chain opened Cafe Tobacco, a Tokyo coffee shop billing itself as a haven for smokers. It has proven popular among customers such as 28-year-old Kousuke Kishi, who takes his coffee with a Marlboro Light.

“I don’t want to live an extra year or two by giving up what I love to do,” said Kishi, 28, manager at a consultancy.

The lawsuit demands sterner warning labels on cigarettes, a ban on cigarette vending machines, and an acknowledgment that smoking is addictive and harmful.

“When I began smoking, about 80 percent of men were smokers,” Mizuno said. “The advertising phrase was, ‘You’re healthy when a cigarette tastes so good.’“

In the U.S., President Barack Obama has signed a law empowering the Food and Drug Administration to regulate tobacco products, and while that too got little attention in the Japanese media, Obama’s own struggle to quit smoking has been an inspiration to Mizuno.

“Times have really changed,” he said. “The people’s victory is near.”


Copyright © 2009 Tehrantimes

I have been an American Cancer ambassador for the past two years and want to comment that raising the tobacco tax is a good thing since it will help the state budget deficit as well as save lives and reduce health care costs.
Advertisement

Smoking costs California $8.6 billion per year in medical costs and $7 billion per year in productivity losses, according to the California Department of Public Health.

A cigarette tax increase will reduce smoking, especially by children.

Polling in California suggests that there is strong bipartisan support for increasing the cigarette tax. There has not been an increase in the tobacco tax here since 1998.

This would be for the good of everyone.

Elizabeth Falcione
Cathedral City

In this country that takes its smoking very seriously, a ban on lighting up indoors will take effect on July 19, a change that will surely please smoke-averse travelers.

But customers and business owners alike are unsure of how, or even whether, the no-smoking rules will be applied. Turkey remains a major producer of tobacco, cigarettes are relatively affordable, and cities like Istanbul are dotted with smoked-filled water-pipe cafes where young and old alike gather to puff scented smoke, play backgammon and catch up with friends.

Umit Unal, manager of the Parma Café in the American Bazaar section of the Tophane neighborhood in Istanbul, isn’t rushing to make any changes.

“Nothing is clear,” he said recently, as customers lounging on pink and purple bean-bag chairs inhaled fruit-flavored smoke from ornate glass water pipes. “I really don’t know what to do, or what to expect when the law goes into effect. I’m assuming that we’ll have to stop people from smoking inside, but for now, nobody has a plan.’’

Part of the problem is in the definition of “inside.” At Parma, one of several nargile cafes in a block-long stretch of them, people sit under striped awnings or in the open air, sipping tea and inhaling.

But what happens when the weather turns cold? Unal, himself a non-smoker, doesn’t know.

“I guess we’ll have to ban smoking indoors for sure,’’ he said. “It’s harmful to your health, but this is a tradition from Ottoman times. We’ll have to wait and see.’’

Turkey is joining more than a dozen countries, the most recent being its neighbor, Greece, in trying to ban smoking in bars and restaurants.

According to figures provided by the U.S.-based Global SmokeFree Partnership, compliance rates have generally been high at restaurants and bars under the effect of bans: 97 percent in New York City, 98.5 percent in Italy, 94 percent in Ireland, for example.

An initial phase of the Turkish law took hold on May 19, 2008, making it a crime to smoke on public transportation or in most public buildings. Phase two takes effect this month and covers restaurants, bars, night clubs and even kirathanes, old-fashioned, male-only coffee houses. The rules also call for designated smoking sections at places like sports arenas and in prisons.

Many in Istanbul are embracing the changes.

“The smoking ban is the only thing I support from this government,’’ a 30-year-old actor said as she read a newspaper at a cafe in the trendy Cihangir neighborhood. (She asked that her name not be published because she didn’t want her parents to learn that she used to be a smoker.)

“I saw how the ban works in New York, and I think people here will obey,” she said.

And while the ban’s affect on local businesses has yet to be seen, it may bode well for one non-smoker’s romantic life.

“I prefer a nonsmoking boyfriend,’’ the actor added. “It really affects the relationship. In Turkey, every man is smoking. Maybe it’s the symbol of machismo here.’’
Copyright © 2009 Globespotters

In 1988, they banned it in airplanes. In 1994, in offices. In 2006, the bars.

And this month, they finally banned smoking in Teri Richard’s apartment building.

“When I grew up, there was a big ashtray on everybody’s table,” said Richard, 53, sitting under a small corner of awning that stretches 25 feet from the nearest door.

Though Richard and a handful of her neighbors are only the latest of millions of tenants across the country to choose such indignities for the sake of an addiction, these tenants have an unusual landlord: the Vancouver Housing Authority.

The new decision by Clark County’s subsidized housing agency to ban smoking in some of its properties reflects Washington’s successful crusade to drive down cigarette use.

But the heated disputes between smokers and nonsmokers in Richard’s building, inflamed by the VHA’s action, also reflect an awkward fact about Washington’s anti-smoking campaign: it’s been relatively unsuccessful among the poor.

Heavy smokers who live in Richard’s building, Esther Short Commons on the west side of downtown Vancouver’s Esther Short Park, said they’ll do as smokers whose buildings go smoke-free have done for decades: move to another place as soon as they can.

But the continuing spread of no-smoking apartments is leaving smokers with a new worry.

Where can you smoke, if not in the projects?

‘A right to be mean’

Pinching one of the 60 cigarettes she smokes each day in a cupped hand, hidden behind her wheelchair to avoid the grimaces of pedestrians, Richard said she’s the object of scorn from nine out of ten people who walk past.

“Nonsmokers feel they have a right to be mean,” she said.

Richard, who worked as a nurse’s aide before her legs were suddenly paralyzed by myelomalacia, said she draws $875 a month from Social Security and a part-time job soliciting donations for the Arc of Clark County.

As one of a few thousand VHA tenants who’ve waded through the agency’s overflowing wait lists to receive an indefinite housing subsidy, Richard pays $377 for her downtown apartment.

“Obviously, with my income, I can’t afford a regular rent,” she said. “I’m trying to pinch every penny I can so I can have a nice life, and they’re going to take it away.”

After years of debate, the VHA banned smoking indoors and on the balconies of Richard’s building at the start of June. The company that manages the property has left notes on apartments but is still working out how the new rules would be enforced.

On Wednesday, Columbia House in the Hough neighborhood will become the VHA’s second smoke-free property. The agency might roll the ban out to others of its dozens of buildings across the county, VHA deputy director LaVon Holden said in May.

Most public housing agencies are doing the same, she said.

“It is just a standard of the business,” said Holden, a former smoker. “We are becoming a culture that is less tolerant of secondhand smoke, because we now know the downside.”

The decision will save the agency about $1,900 for every two-bedroom apartment that doesn’t have to be scrubbed and repainted every time a smoker moves out, Holden said.

A smoking subsidy?

Smokers’ habits had been making life less nice for some of the Esther Short building’s nonsmokers, who are a majority of the tenants.

“When I toured, I was told that the only place they could smoke was on the balcony, (so) it wasn’t a big deal,” said Mark Jander, 75. “But it was a big deal. … Every half hour or so, there was smoke coming into your apartment.”

Sometimes smoke even woke him up at night, said Jander, who is asthmatic.

When the county health department circulated a survey in the building that asked about a possible smoking ban, Jander was thrilled to back it.

So did the “overwhelming” majority of Esther Short residents who responded, Holden said.

Jander, a retired engineer who pays $945 a month for one of the building’s unsubsidized apartments, said he doesn’t like it that his taxes support people who spend so much on tobacco.

“I’m an egalitarian, a liberal,” Jander said. “But they’re putting out a month’s rent … to pay for their annual smoking habit at a pack a day. And I resent that, dammit. If we’re giving you a break, you should really be struggling.”

In fact, at $4 a pack, a pack-a-day habit costs $1,460 a year — almost four months’ rent on Richard’s apartment.

Poor are ‘left behind’

The proportion of tobacco users among Washingtonians who earn $25,000 to $35,000 a year is down 9 percentage points since 1997, to 19 percent, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Among residents earning less than $15,000, use is down just 3 points, to 30 percent.

That’s partly because Washington’s anti-smoking campaigns have focused on middle-class issues such as health insurance savings, said Roger Valdez, who studies housing for the left-leaning Sightline Institute in Seattle.

“People who make $15,000 or less — they don’t have insurance. So increasingly, (smoking) is becoming concentrated among the poor,” Valdez said. “That lower demographic is getting left behind.”

Even so, a growing majority of poor people are nonsmokers. And with governments at all levels passing anti-smoking laws, Valdez said, nonsmokers are increasingly quick to complain about any smoke they encounter.

Kevin Keay, an Esther Short resident who said he lives on $123 a month in disability payments, is one of those newly empowered nonsmokers.

Keay, 47, said he had wanted a smoking ban in the VHA building for months. But now that the ban is in place, he said, some smokers are simply concealing their habit by smoking indoors instead of on balconies.

“They’re smoking in the bathrooms,” Keay said. “They’re smoking in the hallways. You can tell.”

He’s had enough.

“As soon as I get funding coming in, I’m moving out,” he said. “I don’t want to come down with lung cancer on account of them.”

Richard, the three-pack-a-day smoker, said she’s hoping to move out, too.

Unless, that is, she can save $80 for an electric steam cigarette kit that might help her kick her 20-year smoke habit.

“I put $5 in an envelope for electronic cigarettes,” Richard said last week. “I did that today.”

Langley RCMP handed out their first ticket recently to a driver caught smoking with a child in the car.

The man was pulled over while he was smoking with a 13-year-old in the car. The driver was handed a ticket with a $109 fine and also was given a 24-hour suspension for driving under the influence of alcohol.

The man’s name was not released by police.

Langley RCMP Cpl. Holly Marks believes it was one of the first tickets of its kind handed out in B.C.

“The wife was in the car and she was not upset that he got a ticket,” she explained Wednesday. “She told the officer she had been trying to get her husband to stop smoking in the car.”

The law making it illegal to light up while a child under 16 years of age is in the vehicle came into effect April 1. The offence is listed as Section 231.1(3) of B.C.’s Motor Vehicle Act.

According to the Canadian Cancer Society, second-hand smoke contains thousands of chemicals, many of which cause cancer. Infants and children are especially at risk because their lungs are still developing.

The cancer society says cigarettes produce about 12 minutes of smoke, yet the smoker may inhale only 30 seconds of smoke from their cigarette. The rest of the smoke lingers in the air for everyone to breathe.

Each year, more than 1,000 non-smoking Canadians die from second-hand smoke, the society estimates.
Copyright © 2009 Vancouversun

Background: Regulatory oversight of tobacco product design has gained momentum both in the U.S. and internationally. Appropriate standards for assessing commercial brands and characterizing product features must be considered a priority. An area of potential concern is in-market design changes adopted within a single commercial brand over time.

Methods: Internal tobacco industry documents were identified and used to assess internal discussion of product guidelines and practices regarding in-market brand changes.

Results: Commercial tobacco products undergo a constant process of revision in-market, beginning at the most basic level of physical product characteristics and components, and including every aspect of design. These revisions commonly exceed guidelines for acceptable product variance adopted within the industry. While consumer and market testing is conducted to ensure that products remain acceptable to users, explicit marketing often may not accompany brand changes. In the absence of such marketing, it should not be assumed that a brand remains unchanged.

Discussion: For manufacturers, assessment of competitor brands includes identification and analysis of non-routine changes, that is, those changes likely to significantly alter the character of a given brand. Regulators must adopt a similar practice in determining standards for product evaluation in the face of ongoing commercial product revision.
Copyright © 2009 Tobaccocontrol

A Saudi citizen has filed a lawsuit against two tobacco companies asking for $10 million (SR37.5 million) in compensation for the health damages he suffered from smoking.

This is the second lawsuit from the Kingdom and considered the first personal case against tobacco companies in the Middle East, said Abdullah Seruji, executive director of the Smoking and Drugs Awareness Association.

He said a court in Jeddah has accepted the lawsuit from Abu Abdullah, a businessman.

The victim had throat cancer and went though a major surgery in King Faisal Specialist Hospital in Riyadh.

Seruji said the victim lost parts of his throat and vocal chords and he cannot talk any more except with the help of a special device.

He noted that this case, which is supported by the association, is inevitable because the victim’s medical report proved that his disease was due to smoking tobacco.

Seruji noted that Saudi citizens are no less important than American or European citizens where they file lawsuits against tobacco companies and win huge financial compensations.

The plaintiff told the association that he would build a hospital for treating tobacco addicts free of charge with the money that he hopes to win from the tobacco companies.

Copyright © 2009 Arabnews

A lot of people try and quit smoking cold turkey. The only problem here is that most people need a little bit of help whenever they are trying to stop smoking. The best way to get this help is to count on some quit smoking aids. These are aids that you can buy at stores come in a lot of different styles. Not all styles work for everyone, but that is why there are so many different kinds. Today we are going to talk about a few well known quit smoking aids that can help you, as well as some nice habit breakers that could release you from your smoking dungeon. Sure, it costs some money buying these quit smoking aids, but in the end, you will save so much money from not buying smokes that you will end up saving a ton of money!

First of all, a lot of people have a hard time quitting smoking, because it is a habit. What people really need is a little will power and a habit breaker. For most people, using things to keep in their mouth really helps. This could be hard candies, gums, or something like that. Of course, these do not work for everyone. One of the best habit breakers looks almost like a straw. Inside these straws are little nicotine patches that you actually inhale. This works much in the step down method. As you become in control of your craving, you are able to step down to lower doses of nicotine. However, the reason why this works better than other methods is because of the way that you take your nicotine. Unlike other products that you just place on you, this is one that you actually hold like a smoke. You even huff on it like it is a smoke. This gives you the feel like you are smoking, which helps most people learn to quit.

Some other methods that people like to use are, of course, the nicotine gum and the nicotine patch. These are products that are full of nicotine, which just so happen to be the drug that makes smoking so addicting. However, unlike smoking, these patches and gum come with a step down plan. This is a way to get less and less nicotine with each product you use. Soon you will be able to just wing yourself off of it. Choosing which one will work for you is always something that is up in the air. If one does not work, do not give up. Try the other method, and see if that helps you.

A federal judge on Wednesday asked the Oklahoma Tax Commission not to stop Muscogee (Creek) Nation vehicles that are transporting tobacco until a judge can rule on part of a lawsuit filed against the commission by the tribe.

“I hope this doesn’t cause a flurry of vans filled with illegal cigarettes traveling the roads late at night, but I would ask that you stop this (until the court can rule),” U.S. District Judge Terence Kern said Wednesday.

The tribe filed the suit against the Tax Commission on Friday in Tulsa’s federal district court after agents working with the Oklahoma Highway Patrol stopped trucks on May 13 and May 15. Agents seized $40,000 worth of cigarettes in the first stop and about $68,000 in the second.

Each stop and seizure happened without a warrant, without the driver’s consent and without probable cause, the tribe alleges.

The Tax Commission estimated that an estimated $42,000 worth of taxes on the combined loads would have been lost by the state had the tobacco been sold.

The cigarettes were not on the state’s Master Settlement Agreement roster, which lists what brands can legally be sold in the state. None had tax stamps.

The Muscogee (Creek) Nation is the largest tribe in the state that does not have a compact with the state to sell cigarettes, and the tribe has used various methods to keep its smokeshops stocked.

The tribe has established its own wholesale company — not recognized by the state — and gets non-MSA discount cigarettes from other tribes.

The tribe’s lawsuit alleges that the Oklahoma Tax Commission violated the Fourth and Fourteenth amendments to the U.S. Constitution by stopping the trucks without probable cause and by searching the vehicles without the drivers’ or the tribe’s consent or a warrant.

In its motion to dismiss the case, the Tax Commission states that the stops and seizures were legal because state law allows the OHP to stop and inspect trucks without a search warrant if they are believed to be carrying contraband cigarettes.

A preliminary injunction request filed with the lawsuit asks the court to rule that the tribe’s property cannot be seized while traveling for Indian commerce and asks that the seized cigarettes be returned before their shelf life expires.

At Wednesday’s hearing on the preliminary injunction request and the Tax Commission’s motion to dismiss, Kern told attorneys that he has several unanswered questions. He allowed them until Tuesday to submit briefs on the motion for the preliminary injunction.

Kern also asked the Tax Commission to refrain from pulling over the tribe’s trucks and seizing its tobacco until he can rule on the motion.

State troopers and Tax Commission agents stopped another tribal vehicle Monday and searched for non-MSA cigarettes, a Tax Commission agent at the hearing said, but no tobacco was found.

Tribal officials said the vehicle was a tribal Housing Authority truck and was hauling toilets.

Copyright © 2009 Tulsaworld

Anti-smoking researchers need more actions from Government for to decrease the smokers’ number.
Dr. Yusuf Saloojee, executive director at the National Council against Smoking (NCAS), said: “We appreciate and applaud the efforts made by government to discourage people from using tobacco products, but we believe that more can, and should be done.”
Government proposed a new law which will provide an extra exciting for smokers who want to quit. They include a R50 000 fine for the owners of a public place who allow smoking in non-smoking area and a R500 fine for the offender. Smoking in private cars where children under 12 years of age are present will be illegal, and the outdated text warnings on boxes will be replaced by more graphic pictorial warnings.
Dr. Salooje added: “We’re hoping the use of labels, like mild or low tar, will be banned, because it has been proven that these do not necessarily reduce the risks associated with smoking. It’s the biggest fraud in the tobacco industry.”
Even doctors and researchers don’t want to see how tobacco products are taxed, because at the moment smoking is still a very acceptable habit for most South African smokers.
According to Dr. Saloojee, “already one in every 11 deaths worldwide is caused by tobacco usage. Within 20 years, one in every six deaths will be tobacco-related if we don’t initiate effective interventions.”
And the only thing which is required from all smokers is a real desire to stop smoking.
According to a recent study, at least 70% of the smoking population is unhappy smokers. That’s why they have to quit if they want to become happy.
The findings of a World Bank study on tobacco consumption point to the fact that tobacco prices are the main decisive of tobacco consumption. Because increasing the price of tobacco products will definitely have an impact on current smokers, and possibly act as a protection for teenagers who are thinking of starting to smoke.
Nevertheless this has to go hand in hand with the enforcement of the current legislation such as no smoking in public places, the ban on tobacco advertising and the minimum legal age to purchase tobacco products.

A recession is a good time for bad habits to go up in smoke, a Timaru nurse believes.

When times are tough economically it makes sense to quit smoking, Timaru Hospital smokefree clinical nurse specialist Olly Wilson says in the lead-up to World Smokefree Day on May 31.

“A pack-a-day smoker could save more than $4000 a year by quitting or $8000 if a couple smokes.

“Imagine having that much extra money. It could take a lot of stress out of car repairs, school fees, rent payments, groceries and the winter power bill.”

World Smokefree Day’s focus this year encourages people to give quitting smoking a go. Mr Wilson says this fits well with the economic climate.

“We are all looking for ways to save money. Quitting smoking is a great way to keep more money in your family’s pocket and invest in your family’s health.

“You wouldn’t pay someone to wreck your car, why pay someone to wreck your body?” He acknowledged that quitting can be hard and suggests that people find out about the help available, enlist the support of their loved ones and set a quit date.

Help is available for those wanting to quit. He recommended calling the free Quitline on 0800 778 778, and using nicotine replacement therapy such as patches or gum, which can double a person’s chances of stopping.

He suggested people write down all the reasons they want to stop and tape the list to the fridge to help them stay motivated.

Copyright © 2009 Stuff

An anti-tobacco group has called on governments to butt out of the business of buying cigarettes with public money.

But it’s a habit some governments in China might have a hard time breaking as recent figures show public funds have paid for about 70 percent of brand-name cigarette purchases over the past few years.

“It is a shame governments have become the biggest purchasers of brand-name cigarettes. It seriously damages their image,” Xu Guihua, deputy director of Chinese Association on Tobacco Control, told a press conference Tuesday in Beijing.

The figures, from Beijing-based NGO Thinktank Research Center for Health Development, show public funds continuing to pay for cigarettes despite surging prices since 2000.

Xu said the government should tie its anti-smoking efforts with its anti-corruption campaign, as cigarette vouchers had become hot items and were sometimes ideal for paying bribes.

When a government official in Yiwu, Zhejiang province, was arrested last year on a charge of taking bribes, the evidence against him was not bundles of cash, but 200,000 yuan worth of redeemable cigarette vouchers.

A survey by the NGO on Sohu website from May 11-15, showed 98.7 percent of 3,630 netizens were against officials buying cigarettes with taxpayer money. Around 93 percent of netizens support the government banning officials from accepting cigarette vouchers, which could lead to corruption, the survey said.

Yet some local governments see things differently.

Gongan county in Hubei province asked all of its administrative organizations to make it their “duty” to collectively consume about 23,000 cartons of cigarettes a year, reported Chutian Metropolis Daily.

Any organization that failed to consume at least 400 cartons of cigarettes a year would lose public funds, said the report.

At an average cost of 170 yuan a carton, that “duty” would cost the county 4 million yuan a year.

“Governments have also implemented favorable policies for the cigarette industry, raising revenue from taxes and creating local economic development,” Wu Yiqun, deputy director of the think tank, said. “Some officials even see the tobacco industry as a way to promote economic growth, so the anti-cigarette campaign might face unexpected challenges,” she said.

Copyright © 2009 Chinadaily

The authors of a proposed statewide indoor smoking ban declared the measure extinguished Tuesday, and one blamed the tobacco lobby.

“Big Tobacco is a powerful interest group to go up against,” said the Senate author, Rodney Ellis, D-Houston. “But we made tremendous progress.”

Ellis said that despite help from Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, he couldn’t win enough support in the Senate. At a news conference, Ellis and Rep. Myra Crownover, R-Denton, the House author, vowed to bring the proposal back in 2011.

Twenty-seven states have passed comprehensive bans, according to Smoke-Free Texas, a coalition supporting the proposal.

“Texas will one day follow suit, but unfortunately, more people in the state of Texas are going to die because of secondhand smoke because we did not take action,” Ellis said.

Secondhand smoke kills 53,000 Americans a year, according to the coalition.

“Secondhand smoke is not an annoyance — it doesn’t just make your hair smell bad or burn your eyes,” Crownover said. “It literally kills people.”

Tobacco companies have hired 40 lobbyists who are earning between $1.2 million and $2.4 million this session, the Dallas Morning News reported.

The Ellis/Crownover proposal, which would have banned smoking at indoor workplaces, including restaurants and bars, was passed by a Senate committee, and a House committee approved a weaker version. But the measure — which was also attempted in 2007 — wasn’t taken up on the House or Senate floor this year.

Sen. Bob Deuell, R-Greenville, said it should be up to individual businesses to set smoking policies. And he said most people who are around secondhand smoke are exposed at home.

“I hate cigarettes,” said Deuell, who is a physician. “I don’t dispute the medical data that secondhand smoke is bad. I just don’t think people are getting exposed at the workplace.”

And Democratic Sen. Mario Gallegos Jr. said that since his city, Houston, already has a smoke-free ordinance, it’s not right for him to tell other Texas cities whether to allow smoking.

Ellis said he chose to end his fight rather than accept amendments that would have gutted the bill.

The ban had support from groups such as the American Cancer Society and the Lance Armstrong Foundation, which are part of Smoke-Free Texas. James Gray, a lobbyist for the cancer society, said the coalition will work to ensure that the smoking ban becomes a campaign issue in 2010 state elections.

“Big tobacco spent millions to kill smoke-free legislation and they got to enough of our legislators to win this round,” Armstrong, who was in Italy, said in a statement. “As we’ve seen in states all over America, it’s just a matter of time before our efforts succeed. We are not intimidated by big tobacco and we will not give up.”