Tobacco News

Despite evidence that menthol cigarettes are a significant factor in the rise of smoking among adolescents, a federal advisory panel on Friday stopped short of recommending a ban on the cigarettes. Instead, it urged further study of the issue, which suggested that the Food and Drug Administration would ultimately pursue more modest action, such as marketing restrictions aimed at reducing access for the young.
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More than 20 years ago, when I was living in Washington DC and went on a course to give up smoking, one of the recommended therapies was wrapping your cigarette packet in plain paper so you couldn’t see the name of the brand. Oddly enough, this helped. I hadn’t realised until then how big a part the brand had played in my addiction; how much I was in thrall to the reassuring authority of the handsome Rothmans logo. Ream more »

A Harare-based Chinese tobacco purchasing firm, Tian Ze Tobacco Company, on Thursday opened a new tobacco sales floor in the Zimbabwean capital catering specifically for its contracted farmers.

The company invested about 1 million U. S. dollars in setting up the sales floor, and has entered into a partnership with a local company to process tobacco sold at the floors.
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Newfoundland and Labrador became on Tuesday the latest province to sue more than a dozen tobacco companies for money to cover health-care costs related to smoking. The Newfoundland government filed a statement of claim with the provincial Supreme Court in St. John’s after proclaiming legislation that allows the province to pursue legal action against the tobacco industry, according to a statement sent by the province’s Justice Department. Ream more »

As domestic cigarette consumption and production declines, local farmers hope overseas demand will enable them to grow more tobacco, but they worry if they’ll get the price they need to cover their expenses.
About 165 people attended the annual flue-cured tobacco production meeting at Chatham High School on Thursday night.
Many farmers talked about the possibility of a firm contracting 100 million pounds of flue-cured tobacco for China.
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Up to 50 years ago smoking was generally considered as an acceptable habit. Governments even issued free cigarettes to soldiers and the tobacco industry’s advertising often linked tobacco use with glamour, sex appeal and energy. Then, in 1964, the US Surgeon General issued a report based on 7,000 scientific studies linking smoking with lung cancer, emphysema and other diseases. Since then, public scrutiny of the tobacco industry has become relentless. Ream more »

Newswise — The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center’s popular web-based teen prevention and smoking-cessation program, ASPIRE (A Smoking Prevention Interactive Experience), now speaks Spanish.
The 10-year-old program advances the institution’s national commitment to help prevent teens from smoking or help them quit before it becomes a lifelong addiction. ASPIRE is an evidence-based tobacco prevention and cessation website for middle and high school students.
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In pushing the state senate toward increasing state cigarette taxes up to $1.99 per pack, the Journal Star has put itself squarely into an overwhelmingly anti-business position that ignores the realities of current economic and political realities that Nebraska citizens and key small businesses now face going into our third year of the worst recession of our lifetimes.
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On Jan. 1 of this year, Southwest Minnesota State implemented a policy for our campus to “go tobacco-free.” We joined 10 other campuses in our Minnesota State Colleges and Universities (MnSCU) System which are currently one hundred percent tobacco-free.

Several other campuses are in the process of adopting this tobacco-free policy.
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The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday issued guidelines to the tobacco industry that could lead to some newer cigarettes, smokeless tobacco and roll-your-own tobacco products being removed from the market and prevent others from being introduced, if the FDA determines their ingredients and design encourage non-users to start using tobacco or make it more difficult for users to quit.
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