FEDERAL

SINGLE-PAYER HEALTH PLAN WOULD TAX CIGARETTES $2
HEALTH CARE PAYMENT POLL
"FRIENDS OF TOBACCO" TO PROTEST TAX
FRIENDS OF TOBACCO PROTEST TAX IN DC
AFBF PRESIDENT SEES MINOR TOBACCO TAX
CLINTON'S STATE OF THE NATION ADDRESS--ON TOBACCO
GATT IMPORT PROTESTORS WIN PANEL
UPDATE ON 75% TOBACCO IMPORT RULE
REP. TALLON CAUGHT IN "REVOLVING DOOR"
ELDERS ATTACKS SMOKING AROUND KIDS
HEALTH GROUP ARGUES AGAINST WARNING LABELS

HEALTH 9

DIET CAN CUT LUNG CANCER IN NON-SMOKERS
HEALTHY SHOPPING?
GENE TRACKS TOBACCO DAMAGE?
OTHER LUNG CANCER RISK FACTORS
RACIAL DISPARITY IN PRENATAL ADVICE FOUND

LOCAL ISSUES

"PRIVY COUNCIL" OPPOSES NYC PAY TOILET ADS
NEW YORK'S MAYOR REFUSES $1 MILLION FOR PUBLIC HEALTH ADS
VIRGINIA OPENS AFRICAN TRADE OFFICE
US CRACKS DOWN ON RESERVATION SMUGGLING
BOSTON RED-LINES SMOKING IN SUBWAYS
VERMONT TO BAN CARTOON TOBACCO ADS?
MINNESOTA MAY TAX CIGS ANOTHER $2 FOR HEALTH CARE
UTAH IN FAVOR OF SMOKEFREE BILL

INTERNATIONAL

WAR-TORN CANADA
CANADIANS CALL FOR PLAIN PACKAGING
UNTAXED CIGARETTE CHAOS IN CANADA
GERMANY FACES SMOKING RESTRICTIONS
GERMAN COMPANY REWARDS NONSMOKING EMPLOYEES
CIG SMUGGLING IN ITALY
ZIMBABWE CUTS TOBACCO ACREAGE

THE TOBACCO BUSINESS

TOBACCO INDUSTRY TARGETS CA STATE LEGISLATURE
SECRET TOBACCO PAPER CHASE
LORILLARD WINS TOBACCO SUIT
NICERASE-SL ENTERS PHASE 2 TESTS
NICOTINE REPLACEMENT THERAPIES SEEN TO WORK

SOCIETY

30 YEARS LATER
BACKGROUND ON THE SURGEON GENERAL'S 1964 REPORT
AMA HIT ON DONATIONS TO TOBACCO INTERESTS
SLICK CIG PACKS APPEAL TO KIDS
UNITED TO TEST SMOKEFREE INT'L FLIGHTS
NORTHWEST AIR FREES FIRST CLASS
RJR WINS PLACE ON NADER'S WORST
CHRYSLER'S OPTIONAL ASHTRAYS

SPORTS

LILLEHAMMER'S CONFLICTING DRUG POLICIES
CHAMPION SMOKER

PEOPLE

Virginia Kelley
Fran Liebowitz

RELATED ISSUES
MEXICO CITY OFFICIALS TAKE PAGE FROM TOBACCO INDUSTRY

THE FUNNY PAPERS
Jay Leno's Tobacco Jokes
DAVE BARRY ON TOBACCO INDUSTRY TACTICS
SARAJEVO JOKE

FEDERAL

SINGLE-PAYER HEALTH PLAN WOULD TAX CIGARETTES $2

Washington, Jan. 27, 1993. The single-payer health plan would raise $59 billion by 1999 for universal health care by a $2 tax on cigarettes.

The "Canadian-style" plan, sponsored by Rep. Jim McDermott, (D-WA). in the House, and in the Senate by Sen. Paul Wellstone, (D-MN) would also raise:

• $1 billion. with a 50% excise tax on handguns and ammunition
• $1.2 trillion with an 8.4% payroll tax on most employers and a 2.1% levy on employees' taxable income. (Employers now pay the government a 12% payroll tax for health insurance. Clinton's plan would mandate large employers pay a 7.9% premium cap to a "health care alliance" that would purchase a health care plan.)
• an unspecified amount with a 4% payroll tax for small employers.

75% of Americans would pay $1,000 a year less for health insurance, and have more benefits by 2003, according to the Joint Tax Committee, which has reviewed the financial aspects of the plan.

In addition, the Congressional Budget Office has said the plan would save up to $100 billion a year in administrative costs, as compared to a previous CBO estimate that the Clinton plan would save $7 billion annually.

Of all the alternatives to Clinton's plan, this is the only one that guarantees universal health care coverage. Clinton said in his recent State of the Union address that he would veto any bill which "does not guarantee every American private health insurance that can never be taken away."

The proposal would also effectively obsolete the health insurance industry.

HEALTH CARE PAYMENT POLL

New York, NY Jan. 24, 1993. A recent poll on Clinton's health care package found that 40% believe that groups with lower health care expenses--i.e., young people, non-smokers, etc.--should pay less for health insurance, while 57% believe that everyone should pay an equal amount because everyone gets old, and anyone can get sick. 50% of those over 35 held this position, as did 70% of smokers, according to the Associated Press telephone poll of 1,005 people.

"FRIENDS OF TOBACCO" TO PROTEST TAX

Jan. 6, 1993. "Friends of Tobacco," a North Carolina organization, announced it will protest Clinton's proposed $.75 a pack cigarette tax increase Jan. 26.

North Carolina is the largest tobacco producing state in the US. Tobacco in 1993 was its biggest crop, generating $1.3 billion in sales.

According to Friends of Tobacco, a $.75 tax increase would reduce tobacco revenue by $250 million, devastating the states 15,000 tobacco farmers.

Adam Goldstein, a UNC-Chapel Hill assistant medical professor and member of the N.C. Medical Society's tobacco task force said 11,000 North Carolinians die a year from tobacco-related diseases.

"I sympathize with tobacco farmers," he said, in support of using part of tobacco-tax proceeds to help farmers shift crops, "Any measures to support them while at the same time supporting public health, I'm for."

For the Washington rally, Friends of Tobacco has organized charter bus service from various Eastern NC locations, for which it will charge $25.

FRIENDS OF TOBACCO PROTEST TAX IN DC

Washington, Jan. 26, 1993.

1,000 tobacco farmers and tobacco industry workers protested Clinton's plan to raise tobacco taxes to pay for health care.

Carrying hand-painted signs reading ""Don't Take Away Our Livelihood" and "No More Taxes on Tobacco," tobacco farmers, land-owners and cigarette workers rallied outside the Capitol in a demonstration organized by Friends of Tobacco.

"We need medical reform, but not on the backs of the tobacco farmers," said Rep. Tom Barlow (D-KY).

"This is called a sin tax, but I didn't see the president in Hollywood calling for a tax on R-rated movies. You want to talk about sin!" said Rep. Lewis Payne (D-VA).

Protestors fear that if taxes go up, demand for tobacco products will go down, with a resulting loss of income.

Patsy Spain, whose family rents land to tobacco growers in North Carolina, said higher taxes would decrease the value of the land. "Everything we have is tied up in farmland," she said. "We have invested our whole life in this land."

AFBF PRESIDENT SEES MINOR TOBACCO TAX

Dean Kleckner, the president of the American Farm Bureau Federation said today, "I would bet some money...a 75-cent cigarette tax will not carry," There may be a tax, he said, but it won't be $.75, "or even very close."

Kleckner said such a tax would throw 18,000 tobacco growers out of work, and that the AFBF opposes any kind of tax increase, on cigarettes or otherwise.

CLINTON'S STATE OF THE NATION ADDRESS--ON TOBACCO

" . . . The minority of business that provide no insurance and shift the costs to others, will have to contribute something. People who smoke will pay more for a pack of cigarettes. If we want to solve the health care crisis in this country, there can be no more something for nothing. . . "

GATT IMPORT PROTESTORS WIN PANEL

Geneva. Jan. 25, 1993. Foreign tobacco-producing member nations of GATT finally were granted an independent panel, which will review the US's recent 25% import limitation to see if it is unfair or in violation of GATT rules.

On the opening day of the annual meeting of the 115 member nations of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, Rufus Verxa, US deputy trade representative, agreed to the panel.

The US regulation, quietly slipped into Clinton's budget deficit bill last August, limits imported tobacco contents of domestically produced tobacco products to 25%. The regulation caused a howl of protest from tobacco producing countries Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Thailand and Zimbabwe.

Unable to resolve their objections with the US, they demanded the establishment of a panel, but the move was blocked by the US trade delegation last December.

According to sources, other nations supported the panel at the GATT meeting, including New Zealand, the 12-member European Union, and Indonesia, which spoke on behalf of the Association of South East Asian Nations

Once the panel of three members is constituted, it will have 90 days to report its findings.

UPDATE ON 75% TOBACCO IMPORT RULE

In the months since it was slipped into Clinton's budget deficit bill, the tobacco import rule has raised accusations of US protectionism both here and abroad. "This has become a poster child of our duplicity in international trade negotiations," said Sen. Hank Brown, (R-CO).

The law took effect this month, but regulations for it are not yet complete.

Meanwhile, growers are having doubts.

"We growers have that concern, that we may have shot ourselves in the foot with the 75-25 rule," said Danny McKinney, of the Burley Tobacco Growers Cooperative in Lexington, KY.

Charles Harvey, executive vice president of the Tobacco Growers Association of North Carolina, said he'd prefer less restrictive limitations on cigarettes for the foreign market, where cheaper tobacco is needed to compete against state tobacco monopolies.

In addition, some see the need for cheaper tobacco for the domestic generic market, in order to keep prices low for discount cigarettes.

In 1992, 41% of tobacco in cigarettes was imported, mostly from Turkey.

The USDA wrote an analysis that said the law could drive 11,000 manufacturing jobs out of the country, and that the law "might slow the decline" in tobacco growers, but offered no greater encouragement.

Sen. Wendell Ford (D-KY), who sponsored the measure, said the USDA analysis was "the work of a small group of bureaucrats who failed to consult with any members of the industry."

As for the threat of Philip Morris increasing its overseas capabilities and moving jobs out of the country, a spokesperson said that Philip Morris had no such plans, and emphasized that the entire industry must stick together against taxes, smoking restrictions, and other pressing threats here.

"For political reasons external to production agriculture, it's extremely important that the entire tobacco industry, from the growers all the way to the convenience store owners, stand together on these external issues," said Philip Morris' director of government and community relations, Jay Poole.

REP. TALLON CAUGHT IN "REVOLVING DOOR"

The FBI is probing the activities of Robin Tallon to see if he violated the one-year ban on lobbying activities of ex-congresspeople.:

The following is the original story from Tobacco News, with an update.

REVOLVING DOOR OF CONGRESS

October 8, 1993

Ex-Rep. Robin Tallon, R-S.C., has come under scrutiny for his post-government-service activities. His actions in his new position as a senior consultant to the Tobacco Institute have spurred a renewed interest in what's known on the Hill as the "revolving door," whereby ex-government officials go directly from congress to special-interest lobbying groups. The groups often are involved in areas once regulated by their new employees. A recent bill, the Ethics Reform Act is supposed to prohibit ex-congresspeople from direct lobbying activities for a year after their terms have ended.

But Mr. Tallon, along with a delegation of tobacco industry lobbyists, paid a visit on March 22 to his successor of only three months, Rep. Jim Clyburn, D-S.C. The delegation presented a slide show on ventilation improvements as an alternative to indoor smoking bans. Tallon suggested the show be presented at upcoming hearings for the proposed house smoking ban.

A recent report by Public Citizen identified 98 senior government officials who had left their federal jobs last year to join a lobby, and specifically cites the Tallon incident as a "profile in chutzpah" that indicates that the bill has few teeth. Rep. Tallon has said that he didn't feel he was breaking the law as he himself didn't directly call for any legislative action.

"When special interest lobbying groups gobble up members of Congress, Capitol Hill aides and executive branch officials, they literally are buying access to government decision makers," said Joan Claybrook, president of Public Citizen.

President Clinton has issued an executive order barring his policy makers from lobbying for five years. A bill, sponsored by Sen. David Boren, D-Okla, which proposes a similar ban for members of Congress appears to be languishing.

UPDATE:

Jan. 13, 1993. The Tallon story was originally broken by Brigid Schulte, a reporter for the Columbia, S.C., State.

In her article, she detailed the March 24 meeting between the three-member Tobacco Institute delegation and Clyburn in Clyburn's office. She quotes Tallon as saying, "If Traficant (D-OH, and chair of the House Public Works subcommittee on public buildings, which was holding hearings about a Congressional proposal to ban smoking in all public buildings and parks) continues to hold hearings, I think he would be doing a real public service" to show the slides. (Traficant later did request the slide show be presented.)

Tallon has denied active lobbying at the meeting, but admits he would have shown better judgement not to have attended the meeting.

The FBI probe came to light last Thursday, when Ms. Schulte received a call from the FBI, who wanted to interview her as a witness to the meeting.

A spokesperson for the newspaper expressed discomfort with the idea of Ms. Schulte testifying on events of the meeting, but said the newspaper would issue a affidavit testifying to the accuracy of the story.

Violation of the "revolving door" provision in the House Ethics Manual is punishable by up to one year in jail and a $50,000 fine.

ELDERS ATTACKS SMOKING AROUND KIDS

Washington. Jan. 6, 1993. Surgeon General Joycelyn Elders, using her office as a bully pulpit, launched a drive to urge smokers to spare children from their second-hand tobacco smoke.

As part of a campaign to make parents, teachers and childcare workers aware of the health risks to children of second-hand smoke, Elders released a new report showing that children who breathe second-hand smoke have worse asthma, more respiratory problems, more trips to the hospital and more ear infections than those who live in smoke-free homes. Up to 67% of children under 5 (9 million) live in a home where at least one parent smokes and "are exposed to secondhand smoke almost the entire day."

"I don't think parents know the problems that they're causing their children. You know, they have a choice to smoke or not smoke, but their children are really innocent victims," Elders said on CBS-TV's Good Morning America.

Second-hand smoke is considered more damaging for children than adults because children's developing lung tissue is more vulnerable to damage, their air passages are smaller, and they breathe more rapidly.

Elders said 9 million children under the age of 5 live in homes with at least one smoker

She pointed out many others are forced to breathe polluted air in schools, day care centers, cars, restaurants, shopping malls and other public places. Babies are three times more likely to die of SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) if their mothers smoked during and after pregnancy.

She urged that children be protected "from the senseless health hazard of secondhand tobacco smoke."

Cigarette smoke has about 4,000 chemicals, 43 of which are carcinogenic. 6-12% of the carcinogenic chemicals linger in the air even after a smoker has been in a room.

Elders was joined on the Good Morning America show by the American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, which released a national survey of 1,018 adults conducted in November, 1993, found 95% of adults favor a ban on smoking in day care centers and elementary schools. The survey also found 89% of Americans recognized second-hand smoke as a serious health hazard, but only 30% knew of the ear infection association. Doctors believe second hand smoke irritates the eustachian tubes between the middle ear and the pharynx, which swell and block the passage of fluids and air.

HEALTH GROUP ARGUES AGAINST WARNING LABELS

New York, NY Jan., 1994.

On the anniversary of the surgeon general's first report on Smoking and Health, Dr. Elizabeth Whelan has called for the elimination of warning labels on cigarette packs, claiming they unduly protect tobacco companies from civil lawsuits, while doing nothing to curb smoking.

Whelan claims that "if government had not meddled in the first place, cigarette companies would conduct business on the same legal turf as every other industry. They would have been sued by smokers made ill by their deadly products and by the loved ones of people who had died from their use. The industry would have paid, and paid big."

Whelan, president of the American Council on Science and Health, says the labels have provided the tobacco industry "a unique and privileged legal status" that has allowed them to evade paying "a cent in liability damages."

Whelan says that such a shield allows the tobacco companies to refute with impunity the scientific evidence of over 60,000 medical citations. The quotes the Liggett group's vice president Michael Rosenbaum, testifying in Miami when asked if cigarettes cause cancer, "I'm not a medical doctor. I don't have a clue."

Whelan writes, "Tobacco companies spend $4 billion annually to promote cigarettes as healthy, invigorating and part of the good life, a clear distortion of the grim medical realities. Only an industry that perceives itself as immune from lawsuits would have the gall to offer 'free' designer clothing (Virginia Slims attire, fashions any young woman would just die for) in return for proof of purchase of 975 packs of cigarettes in a six-month period-a consumption rate in excess of five packs per day."

"If free-market forces and an unfettered judicial system had prevailed," she concludes, "the cigarette might now be an anachronism, simply because it would be too expensive to buy and too unprofitable to produce."

HEALTH

DIET CAN CUT LUNG CANCER IN NON-SMOKERS

Jan. 3, 1993. A diet rich in raw fruits and vegetables, plus vitamin E can help reduce lung cancer risks in non-smokers, according to a study reported on in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Beta Carotene, plentiful in raw fruits and vegetables, and vitamin E supplements have been associated with a reduced risk of lung cancer in smokers, but 15% of lung cancer deaths cannot be attributed to smoking.

The study was headed by Susan Taylor Mayne of Yale University School of Medicine.

HEALTHY SHOPPING?

Jan. 3, 1993. In perhaps a telling indication of America's outward obsession with health, the true story may be reflected in Supermarket Business magazine's tally of the 5 top-selling supermarket purchases:

1. beef (6.15 percent of store sales)

2. beer (4.06 percent)

3. cigarettes (3.83 percent)

4. soft drinks (3.23 percent)

5. doughnuts and other bakery products (3.16 percent).

GENE TRACKS TOBACCO DAMAGE?

"IMAGINE that the body keeps a book of insults. Recorded there are injuries done lo it by environmental agents, from noxious chemicals to intense sunlight. Now imagine that scientists might learn to read this record to discover which agent was the cause of a person's cancer, or which might be likely to lead to cancer in the future and how soon.

"Such a record of chemical insults does, in fact, seem to be kept in the form of alterations to a gene known as p53. These alterations, or mutations, are changes in the sequence of DNA units that make up the p53 gene."

Thus writes Philip J. Hilts in "Cells May Bear Mark Of Each Cancer Agent," published in the New York Times on January 18,1993

p53 has been known to protect cells from growing into cancers for some years, but only recently have scientists come to "the realization that different carcinogens produce different patterns of mutations in the gene."

p53 can act like a switch, controlling a gene's ability to divide, and can even direct a cell with damaged DNA to self-destruct before it starts the path of uncontrolled growth and proliferation that leads to a tumor. If it is damaged and disabled, cancer will soon result.

It has been found that p53 plays a role in the formation of at least 51 different types of tumors.

"This was a surprise," said one doctor. "Ten years ago we thought of cancer as 100 different diseases. And if you told me half the cancers had one gene in common, I wouldn't have believed it."

Recent studies have found that some cancerous agents seem to mutate p53 in highly specific ways. "This suggests the remarkable possibility that analysis of p53 in a patient's tumors could yield a mutation pattern that would identify the carcinogen responsible," writes HIlts. "Environmental carcinogens that are now believed to leave characteristic fingerprints of mutations on the p53 gene include radon and the tar and other carcinogens in tobacco,"

The following is the text of the article that addresses tobacco specifically:

"Scientists . . . are investigating the possibility that cigarettes may cause a distinctive change in p53 to induce lung cancer. 'This particular mutation, guanine to thymine in the p53 gene, is rare in nonsmokers but common in smokers,' said Dr. Harris. . . .

"Dr. Harris and others are now starting a large study of nonsmokers to try to answer such questions as whether lung cancers in passive smokers result from different kinds of p53 damage than those of smokers.

"'The potential value of this information for litigation against tobacco companies is intriguing,' says Dr. Harris.

" . . . researchers have already begun work on creating tests that could detect precancerous changes in p53 genes in the mouths and throats of smokers.

"Despite the strong clues given by these fingerprints, cancer is known to be a multistage disease, and other agents are probably involved. 'We may never be able to say with certainty that this person was exposed to this mutagen and thus got this cancer' said Dr. Franklin Hutchinson, professor emeritus at Yale University. 'But we will be able to get some percentage of likelihood that the effect came from the exposure.'"

OTHER LUNG CANCER RISK FACTORS

WOOD BURNING Jan. 11, 1993. The American Lung Association has said wood burning can harm the lungs. Wood burning produces sulfur dioxide and carbon monoxide, and creates particulates of dust and smoke that have been linked to lung tissue damage.

Thought the EPA classifies particulates as PM-10 pollutants, the American Lung Association is suing to force the EPA to review its PM-10 standards quickly.

RADON Jan. 20, 1993. Radon is a colorless, odorless radioactive gas naturally occurring in soil and rocks, and in some building materials. Risks from radon are virtually eliminated by free air circulation from outdoors.

Swedish researchers have confirmed that radon can be an important risk factor for lung cancer, especially among smokers, according to a report printed today in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The chances of people getting lung cancer increased with dosage levels and length of exposure. Smokers living with the highest residential radon exposure were up to 4 times more likely to get lung cancer. The ratio was much less for non-smokers.

The EPA has estimated that over a lifetime's radon exposure to 20 picocuries per litre (pCi) can produce 6 to 21 lung cancer cases per 100 people--the same risk run by pack-and-a-half a day smokers.

4 pCi is the maximum considered safe.

AIR POLLUTION Air pollution also contributes to lung cancer and cardiopulmonary disease. A report in the Dec. 9 New England Journal of Medicine tracking 8,111 residents in 6 cities for over 11 years found that Steubenville, Ohio, the city with the worst pollution, had a 26% higher death rate than Portage, Wisconsin, the city with the least.

According to coauthor Douglas W. Dockery of the Harvard School of Public Health, death rates closely tallied with levels of pollution. High concentration of particulates in the air, especially soot sulfates and nitrates from industrial and auto emissions, tallied most closely.

This was the first study that linked air pollution to death rates that corrected for other health factors, such as smoking, said Dockery.

The other cities studied were Topeka, Kan.; Watertown, Mass.; Harriman, Tenn.; and St. Louis, Mo. The cities were picked as representative of the range of pollution levels in US cities.

RADIATION IN CIGARETTES UNDER NEW SCRUTINY

"It is not widely known that cigarette smoke is substantially radioactive," wrote Dr. Gary D. Evans in the September edition of Pediatrics, the journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics. "Smokers," he continued "should be informed that they spend their days in radioactive clouds and that they, their families and friends are at potential risk from those clouds of smoke."

The report brought new attention to this aspect of smoking. The radioactivity of tobacco smoke has been known since the 60s, but little research has been done on it.

The radiation is due to several factors, including: --tobacco-producing regions contain polonium-210 --the leaf-hairs, or trichomes, of the tobacco plant efficiently collect and concentrate radioactive material.

Thus each cigarette contains an average .3 picocuries of radioactive polonium, which is vaporized upon burning, and becomes a component of tobacco smoke. Smokers breathe it deep into their lungs, and nearby nonsmokers get a dose just by breathing.

RACIAL DISPARITY IN PRENATAL ADVICE FOUND

Washington, DC. Jan. 19, 1994 Black women have more than twice the rate of low birth weight babies and infant death than white, and part of the reason is that black women receive poorer counseling on the risks of smoking and drinking while pregnant, a study found.

Black women are 20% more likely to report they were not told to give up smoking, and 30% more likely to report they were not told to give up alcohol, according to a study by the National Centre for Health Statistics.

Dr. Michael Kogan, who led the study, said, "The content of prenatal care -- what women are receiving in their prenatal care -- does not appear to be uniform across racial groups."

The study was based upon a 1988 survey among 10,000 women, and accounted for mitigating factors such as education, income, source of prenatal care, marital status and drinking and smoking habits.

No matter what their race, 1/3 of the women reported receiving no prenatal advice at all on alcohol, tobacco or drug use, nor information about breast feeding.

LOCAL ISSUES

"PRIVY COUNCIL" OPPOSES NYC PAY TOILET ADS

The use of ads to pay for New York City's first outdoor pay toilets is being opposed by the Metropolitan Art Council, several local community boards and an advocacy group called "The Privy Council." The groups oppose such advertising on the grounds that "we should not be putting up 20-foot billboards on the sidewalks," and that the bulky towers would be used to advertise liquor and tobacco.

Suzanne Davis of J.C. DeCaux, the company about to be awarded contract for the toilets, said, "Toilets are very expensive and the city can't afford to rent them. . . The billboards will provide a public service and they will also enhance the streetscape by providing within them newspaper vending machines or interactive videos or recycling bins," Davis said.

She said the company has not ruled our liquor or tobacco advertising, but would accede to the wishes of city leaders on what to advertise.

NEW YORK'S MAYOR REFUSES $1 MILLION FOR PUBLIC HEALTH ADS

A $1 million offer by Smokefree Educational Services founder Joe Cherner to fund a public health ad campaign is seemingly being spurned by New York City's new administration under Mayor Rudolf Giuliani.

The New York Post reported that after many calls and faxes, the former bond trader's offer has gone largely unacknowledged by the new administration.

"They haven't said boo," said Cherner, 36.

"Nobody should have to write the city four letters offering a million dollars and not get a response in writing or on the phone."

"I'm not trying to be adversarial," Cherner told the Post. "Just the opposite. I'm trying to be helpful."

VIRGINIA OPENS AFRICAN TRADE OFFICE

Johannesburg. Jan. 5, 1993. Virginia Gov. Douglas Wilder signed an agreement between the state of Virginia and Botswana today, and opened a trade and investment office there.

The moves were made to help increase Virginia's exports to southern Africa. There are currently 60 Virginia-based companies doing business in Africa.

Virginia's main exports to Africa in 1992 were tobacco, coal, industrial machinery, food products and electronics.

Gov. Wilder himself opened an African trade office in Senegal on Jan. 3. He steps down as Governor of Virginia Jan. 15.

US CRACKS DOWN ON RESERVATION SMUGGLING

Helena, Mont. Jan. 12, 1993. Two proprietors at the Puyallup Indian Reservation near Tacoma, Wash were found guilty of racketeering last week and agreed to forfeit $175,000. They face additional fines of up to $2.2 million and prison terms of 8-12 years.

The case stemmed from an investigation of the operation in which cigarettes would be bought from a Montana wholesaler and then transported from businesses on the Flathead Indian Reservation in Montana to smoke shops on reservations in Washington.

Between 1988 and 1991, Washington lost at least $13 million in tax revenues, and Montana lost $1.8 million.

Several other principals, including wholesalers and shop operators, are awaiting trial. Assistant U.S. Attorney Kris McLean said recent court actions should convince people that the government is serious about stopping illegal cigarette sales.

"People are going to jail and people are losing money," he said, noting that other arrests are expected in the continuing investigation.

BOSTON RED-LINES SMOKING IN SUBWAYS

Boston, Mass. Jan. 1994. After years of smokers flaunting the Boston transit system's non-smoking regulations, Boston police Wednesday began handing out $25 tickets.

"Smoking is a major source of complaints from our customers," said MBTA General Manager John Haley.

Previous enforcement procedures required cumbersome court proceedings. It took a new state law, signed by Gov. Weld last fall to give police the ability to hand out tickets payable by mail. In addition, police have the ability to arrest repeat offenders.

VERMONT TO BAN CARTOON TOBACCO ADS?

Vermont, Jan. 28, 1993. Vermont's House health and Welfare Committee may ban the use of cartoon characters to promote tobacco or alcohol products, USA Today reports.

Such a ban would eliminate the much criticized Joe Camel ads, along with ads for a smokeless tobacco product featuring "Bandit."

MINNESOTA MAY TAX CIGS ANOTHER $2 FOR HEALTH CARE

St. Paul, MN. Jan. 25, 1993. The Minnesota Health Care Commission has proposed that cigarettes be taxed an additional $2 by 1998 in order to pay for MinnesotaCare, its fledgling medical insurance program for working poor people.

The present state cigarette tax is 48 cents a pack. Under the proposal, an additional 40 cents would be added each year for 5 years.

MinnesotaCare, whose start-up costs were funded by a 5 cent per pack cigarette tax (which expired this month) faces a major shortfall by 1997. Its present costs are paid for by a tax on hospitals and health care providers.

Walker Merryman of the Tobacco Institute said he expected such a plan would cause discount cigarette shops to spring up in nearby states, and in Indian reservations within Minnesota.

UTAH IN FAVOR OF SMOKEFREE BILL

A recent poll found 70% of Utah residents strongly in favor of a bill that would ban smoking in restaurants and workplaces, while only 11% opposed it.

INTERNATIONAL

WAR-TORN CANADA

Jan. 2, 1993. Cornwall, Ontario. Shots ring out almost nightly, bullets are fired into a civic complex, or a building, and cars are firebombed. At least one building has been bombed. The mayor wears a bullet-proof vest.

Sarjevo? Bogota? No, the sleepy border town of Cornwall, Ontario, pop. 47,000, and hot spot in Canada's raging cigarette smuggling war. Canadian taxes are 4 times those of the US. Thus a carton of cigarettes costing $15-20 in the US costs $45 in Canada. Black market cartons go for around $30, and by some estimates account for 25% of cigarette sales in Canada.

"Today," said Mayor Ron Martelle, who has received death threats, "we're more like Dodge City."

According to police, 50,000 cartons of cigarettes worth $1.5 million are brought through the area every day. The smuggling business is a ripe plum, attracting organized crime gangs.

Mayor Martelle has become a target since declaring war on the smugglers, and organizing a special police task force that in its first 7 weeks has confiscated $1.7 million worth of contraband.

CANADA MAY CUT CIG TAX TO FIGHT SMUGGLING

Ottawa. Jan. 5, 1993 The Canadian government my lower its high cigarette tax in order to combat the increasing cigarette smuggling problem. By decreasing the discrepancy of price in a pack of cigarettes between the US and Canada, the government hopes to make smuggling less lucrative, and to make it less worthwhile for a Canadian smokers to go outside legitimate channels for their cigarettes.

Currently, Canadian taxes are at $14 US a carton. Canadian cigarettes sell for anywhere from $34 US to $46 US a carton in some provinces, whereas the same Canadian cigarettes sell for closer to $24 US in the US.

Canada loses twice any smuggled transaction, because the contraband are often Canadian cigarettes which were exported to the US, then illegally re-imported.

"As a result we lose C$1.5 billion ($1.1 billion) and the Americans gain a quarter of a billion or C$300 million ($228 million) because the cigarettes are shipped to U.S. where U.S. duty is payed and they are then "reimported" back into Canada," Revenue Minister David Anderson said.. Canada's loss in such a situation is the US's windfall profits.

Most of the cigarettes are smuggled by well-organized gangs. Much of the contraband is transported by heavily-armed Mohawks speed-boating across the St. Lawrence river from the Akwesasne reservation, which crosses the US-Canadian border in upstate New York.

Quebec is considered to have the worst problem, with an estimated 70% of cigarettes sold being smuggled. The underground economy could be worth as much as US$42 billion.

Canada apparently had a similar problem in 1951, which was solved by lowering taxes.

The Canadian government, however, needs agreements from the 9 provinces not to use the lowering of Federal taxes to raise local taxes.

CANADIANS CALL FOR PLAIN PACKAGING

Citing a recent survey that shows kids think classy cigarette packs are "smart" and "cool" to buy, a Canadian anti-smoking group has called for either plain packaging of cigarettes, or a ban on tobacco company promotion of events that appeal to young people.

David Hill, president of the Canadian Council on Smoking and Health, said, "These sponsorships are nothing more than thinly-veiled advertisements for tobacco and are making a mockery of the federal government's tobacco advertising ban. The federal government has two options: Ban sponsorship advertising outright, or legislate plain tobacco packaging to sever the relationship between this form of advertising and the tobacco package,"

Jacques Lariviere, vice-president of the Canadian Tobacco Manufacturers' Council, said he knew of no precedents for such an action, and that the issue is hypothetical. Tobacco manufacturers, he said, "will do everything possible to protect their trademark."

Canadian cigarette packs are already sullied by large, blunt health warnings on both sides of the pack.

Canadian Non-smoking Week begins Jan. 17.

UNTAXED CIGARETTE CHAOS IN CANADA

Ottawa, Canada. Jan. 27, 1994.

As Quebec storeowners revolted against Canada's cigarette tax, openly selling untaxed, smuggled cigarettes as smokers lined up to buy cartons at half the normal price, the Canadian government said it may slash cigarette taxes in order to undercut the profits in smuggling.

The problem of smuggled cigarettes is especially intense in Quebec. Police say the cigarettes are exported tax-free to the US, then smuggled back into Canada by Mohawks through the Akwesasne reservation, and distributed throughout Quebec by organized crime groups, costing retailers 2/3 of their business, and the government an estimated $1 billion a year in uncollected taxes. There is concern the underground economy could spread to other sectors.

Canada has one of the highest cigarette taxes in the world, up to $3.25 per pack. Untaxed cartons in Quebec go for $15, 1/2 the taxed price.

Any change in the tax rate must be approved by all the provinces, and though Quebec is lobbying for a tax cut, debt-ridden Ontario is adamantly opposed.

GERMANY FACES SMOKING RESTRICTIONS

Bonn, Germany. Jan. 4, 1993. Germany, a smokers' paradise, may soon get smoking restrictions, if some lawmakers have their way.

Ronald Sauer, of the Helmut Kohl's Christian Democrat party, proposed indoor smoking restrictions in the latest issue of the newsmagazine, Focus. Sauer plans to introduce a parliament bill that would require designated smoking areas in airplanes, subways, restaurants and the workplace.

Ingrid Matthaeus-Maier, deputy chief of the opposition Social Democrats, and proponent of a total indoor smoking ban, expressed full support of Sauer's proposal. "The current practice of allowing smoking in restaurants and at the workplace must be reversed. Children and other non-smokers should be protected from secondary smoke," she said.

Sauer says at least 40 other federal politicians support the movement.

But the Federal Association for the Cigarette Industry's Axel Helm said 70 to 80% of Germans are against legal restrictions on smoking. Helm said Germans look at smoking in public places as a democratic freedom akin to the right to keep a bear arms in the US.

GERMAN COMPANY REWARDS NONSMOKING EMPLOYEES

Berlin, Jan. 11. A German company has begun paying its 40 nonsmoking employees $30 a month more than its 35 smoking employees.

"There has been so much talk and so little action in Germany about restrictions on smoking that we spontaneously decided to offer smokers a financial incentive to quit," said the company's boss Eckart Wust.

The cleaning company in Leipzig has been deluged by calls from other companies. Though the bonus payments will cost the company some $14,000 a year, Wust said it was worth it because smokers usually took many 10 minute breaks, and were more prone to illness.

CIG SMUGGLING IN ITALY

Rome, Italy. Jan. 27, 1994. Widespread cigarette smuggling in Italy continues unabated, so the Italian government has come up with a new penalty: not only must smokers caught buying contraband cigarettes pay a fine of $60, and they must also post a notice of their crime in one or more newspapers--and pay for that, too.

The law takes effect in two weeks. The government hopes such public shame will help abate the smuggling problem. Most of the contraband is brought in by speedboat across the Adriatic.

SINGAPORE TURNS THE SCREW ON SMOKERS ANOTHER NOTCH

Singapore. Jan. 1, 1993. Singapore's efforts to become the first non-smoking country in the world redoubled for the new year.

Cigarette packs now must carry warnings on both sides, and there are two new messages: "Smoking kills," and "Smoking harms your family."

Last year, Singapore introduced laws making possession of cigarettes illegal for those under 18. Those caught selling to minors became subject to a $6,300 fine.

Despite Singapore's years-long anti-smoking campaign, the smoking rate among 18-19 year olds tripled from 5% in 1987 to 15% in 1991.

ZIMBABWE CUTS TOBACCO ACREAGE

Because of a loss of $49 million last year due to a world-wide tobacco glut, Zimbabwe tobacco farmers have cut the amount of land dedicated to tobacco, Zimbabwe's top agricultural export.

Last year tobacco accounted for 60% of agricultural exports, and earned $307 million.

THE TOBACCO BUSINESS

TOBACCO INDUSTRY TARGETS CA STATE LEGISLATURE

Sacramento, CA Jan. 25, 1993. The tobacco industry is in a full-court press to preempt local smoking regulations with a new law, the "California Uniform Tobacco Control Act," The proposed ballot initiative would nullify any stronger measures enacted by local communities.

The law would allow restaurants, bars, offices and other public spaces to set aside up to 25% of their area for smoking and require a 2/3 majority of state legislators in order to modify the law.

Lee Stitzenberger, head of the Dolphin Group, the political consulting firm which is handling the campaign, is trying to get the measure placed on the November ballot, but must gather 385,000 voter signatures by April 22. Stitzenberger's group expects to raise at least $1 million with the help of the tobacco and restaurant industries.

Preemption became an identifiable tobacco industry strategy during passage of the Synar amendment, which mandated that states come up with a credible method of enforcing laws against tobacco sales to minors, or lose their funds for drug and alcohol abuse. In order to ensure passage, the bill's sponsors agreed to allow the specifics of enforcement to be left to the state legislature, rather than localities, and a preemption clause, which would allow any new state laws to preempt stronger local ones.

Since state governments are easier and cheaper to influence than myriad local ones this allowed for more effective targeting by the tobacco industry. The flow of funds into the California legislature especially has been noted by the news media..

Preemptive measures have been enacted in North Carolina, Illinois, North Dakota, Florida, Iowa, Nevada, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Oregon and Washington.

The Washington law attracted attention, because, while sounding reasonable, in actuality it seriously weakened enforcement of tobacco sales to minors. The law moved such enforcement from localities to the State Liquor Control Board without giving the Board the necessary funds and staff. One effect of the law was the immediately dismantling of the King County Health Department's tobacco control program -- a program which was considered to be a model for the nation in that over a 2 year period it dramatically reduced tobacco sales to minors. Other Washington localities were looking to emulate King County's success before their efforts were obviated by the state law.

Tobacco control groups fight hard against any law that seeks to be preemptive. They claim any state law by definition should set minimums, not maximums.

California governor Pete Wilson, who has received considerable monies from the tobacco industry, last year tried to pull funds from Proposition 99, the voter-approved measure which raised tobacco taxes and used the money for health education. The attempt was thwarted by a lawsuit brought by the American Lung Association, but last December Wilson appointed Kimberly Belshe--the chief Southern California tobacco spokesperson against Proposition 99--to head the Dept. of Health, which runs the program.

Many California communities have enacted strict smoking bans. Los Angeles has banned smoking in its 7,000 restaurants, and San Luis Obispo has banned smoking in all public indoor spaces. These ordinances would be invalidated by the proposed state law.

SECRET TOBACCO PAPER CHASE

Louisville, KY Jan. 3, 1993. A tobacco company has won a vicious legal battle over purloined papers that allegedly demonstrate that tobacco companies and their law firms have been engaged for decades in a campaign of fraud and deception about the health effects of cigarettes.

Jefferson Circuit Judge Tom Wine ruled that Merrell Williams must immediately surrender his summary of the documents and never speak to the press about what was contained in them.

In making his decision upholding the client/attorney privilege, Wine refused to examine the summary.

"To do so would encourage litigants to break into opposing counsel's office," Wine said. "This court will not sanction such activity."

Williams, 52, was hired in 1988 as a $9/hour paralegal for four years at Wyatt Tarrant & Combs, Kentucky's largest law firm. He was part of a team screening documents that might be used against the firm's client, cigarette company Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp.

According to attorney J. Fox DeMoisey, Williams was so "shocked at the fraud and hoax being perpetrated on the government and the American people," that he copied a box full of the documents.

In 1992 Williams was laid off and suffered a heart attack. He took the papers to a lawyer who refused to read them and told him to return them to the law firm. Williams did so, but kept an inch-thick summary.

Williams plans to sue Brown & Williamson for his heart disease. He is also being sued by the law firm for theft and violating his secrecy agreement. The law firm and Brown & Williamson won an injunction that bars him from revealing the documents, which he claims he needs for file his own suit and to defend himself against the law firm's.

"Williams is asking for approval of the theft of attorney-client, confidential information, and shatter for all time the sacrosanct attorney-client and work-product privileges," said Jack Ballantine, attorney for Wyatt Tarrant & Combs, in court papers.

Williams' attorney DeMoisey said the case should be subject to a crime-fraud exemption to the attorney-client privilege. The exemption does not protect clients who engage attorneys to help them commit fraud.

DeMoisey claimed he couldn't mount a defense without knowing what is in the documents. "It's like playing poker and betting without ever looking at your cards," he said.

DeMoisey claimed if there is indeed no fraud, then Brown & Williamson should find no problem in letting the court see the documents.

Jefferson Circuit Judge Tom Wine issued the injunction Oct. 5. It also prohibited all parties from discussing the documents.

DeMoisey, said he would appeal.

Brown & Williamson manufactures Kool, Capri, Raleigh, Belair and Viceroy cigarettes.

LORILLARD WINS TOBACCO SUIT

Baton Rouge, LA. Jan. 27, 1993 A jury ruled cigarettes are "unreasonably dangerous," but refused to place the blame for a smokers death from lung cancer on the manufacturer of her brand of cigarettes.

Jane Covert and her family sued Lorillard Tobacco Co., manufacturer of the Kent cigarettes she smoked from the age of 15 until she was diagnosed with lung cancer 40 years later. She died in 1987 at 56.

Attorneys in the week-long case said it centered on whether cigarettes were unreasonably dangerous and whether their benefits outweighed their risks.

Though the jury of nonsmokers found cigarettes' "unreasonable" dangers outweighed the benefits, they also found for Lorillard in regards to the cause of Covert's lung cancer.

Medical experts at the trial said her cancer was located at the periphery of the lung, away from the windpipe, and thus was unlikely to have been caused by smoking. Other testimony showed Covert had regularly smoked other brands than Kent.

Mrs. Covert's husband had vowed to give any winnings in the $1.2 million suit to anti-tobacco groups. He said his motive for the suit was revenge.

"I got it," he said after the verdict. "We proved the danger of the cigarettes."

.Lorillard is the manufacturer of Kent, Newport, Style and True. It's parent company, Loews, also owns CNA Life, an insurance company which recently offered life insurance to 30 year olds for half as much money if they didn't smoke.

NICERASE-SL ENTERS PHASE 2 TESTS

Cambridge, Mass. Jan. 12, 1994. DynaGen, Inc. announced the start of Phase 2 of its clinical trial of NicErase-SL, the sub-lingual delivery system of L-lobeline sulfate as a stop-smoking aid.

The study, using about 20 patients, is targeted at dosage levels to determine those that will be used in Phase 3 clinical testing.

NicErase-SL is a lozenge to be placed under the tongue. It will dissolve and distribute lobeline to the brain within 40 to 60 seconds.

Lobeline is one of several non-nicotine compounds that bind to nicotine receptors, reducing nicotine withdrawal symptoms.

"Based on this initial study, we expect to begin Phase III trials with NicErase-SL in the second quarter of 1994. NicErase-SL will offer a user-friendly, non-nicotine format for people who wish to quit smoking," said Indu A. Muni, Ph.D., president and chief executive officer of DynaGen.

The company's other lobeline-based products currently undergoing trials are NicErase-IA, an injectable formulation aimed at relieving nicotine withdrawal symptoms in hospitalized patients unable to smoke, and NicErase-CR, a controlled-release subcutaneous injection system intended to be used once a week.

DynaGen, Inc: 617-91-2527

NICOTINE REPLACEMENT THERAPIES SEEN TO WORK

Jan. 14, 1994. Whether chewed in the mouth, sprayed up the nose, or patched in through the skin, nicotine delivery systems help smokers quit smoking, a British analysis of 53 studies shows.

The study involved over 18,000 smokers, and found those using nicotine replacement therapies were 1.7 times more likely to quit for at least 6 months than smokers going "cold turkey."

The study found the most successful method is a nasal spray, followed by patches. Least effective is nicotine gum.

The study was published in an unusual fashion today--not only in the British medical journal Lancet, but also on-line, in the Online Journal of Current Clinical Trials, an electronic, peer-reviewed scientific journal operated by the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

The study was co-authored by Christopher Silagy, David Mant, Godfrey Fowler and Mark Lodge, and Oxford University's department of public health and primary care.

SOCIETY

30 YEARS LATER

Washington, DC. Jan. 11, 1993. On January 11, 1964, 200 reporters were locked into the State Department's auditorium to hear a two hour briefing by then-surgeon general Dr. Luther L. Terry and a panel of experts. The measures were felt necessary because of the bold and closely-guarded conclusion reached in a just-released brown paperback book titled Smoking and Health. In 1964 the US was a country where over 50% of adult males smoked, and where a multi-billion dollar industry seemed to hang by the book's astounding verdict: smoking causes cancer.

Thirty years to the day after the surgeon general's Report on Smoking and Health first officially warned the nation that smoking causes cancer, a quarter of the population continues to smoke--largely because of the tobacco industry's economic clout and political influence on Congress, said a group commemorating the occasion.

The group, consisting of the Coalition on Smoking Or Health, ex-president Jimmy Carter, surgeon general Joycelyn Elders and 7 other surgeons general, urged more aggressive federal and local regulation of the sale and advertising of tobacco products, with special attention to the exploitation of the youth market.

"The tobacco industry's influence on public policy has undermined national tobacco control efforts and has severely jeopardized the public's health," said the Coalition, which is made up of the American Cancer Society, the American Lung Association, and the American Heart Association, on the occasion of the release of the first surgeon general's report on smoking and health on Jan. 11, 1964. "For too long, the health of the American public has been sacrificed because of the political stranglehold that the industry and its allies have put on government for the sake of profit."

The group issued "A 30-Year Report Card for the Federal Government on Tobacco Control." The grades given were:

F: the Federal Trade Commission for failing to regulate deceptive advertising practises like those which "promote smoking as something that is sexually attractive, sophisticated, healthy and makes us physically fit, cool and successful."

F: the Justice Department for failing to bring action against the tobacco companies for circumventing the ban on TV ads.

F: the US Trade Representative

F: the Occupational Safety and Health Administration

D-: Congress for accepting $9.3 million in just the last three elections, while failing to pass nearly 1,000 smoking control bills since 1964.

D: the Health and Human Services Department

B: the Department of Veterans Affairs

B+ (highest grade given): the Environmental Protection Agency for its report on the effects of environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) on non-smokers.

While many adults have quit smoking, Dr. Elders said "the next battleground" is underage youth, which she said has been targeted by the tobacco industry. Her predecessor, Dr. Antonia Novello, said 47 states have laws controlling youth access to tobacco, but only 2 states enforce them. Tobacco is "the least regulated consumer product" in the country, and is marketed "with reckless abandon" to the young, Novello said.

Former president Jimmy Carter in a letter urged President Clinton to pass a $2 per pack tax on cigarettes to help prevent the nearly 3,000 children who take up smoking a day.

1 1/2 million smokers quit or die each year, to be replaced by virtually the only ones taking up smoking today, underaged kids.. Tobacco companies earn $221 million a year on the underage market.

The group urged:

• President Clinton "to speak forcefully in favor of regulation of tobacco products"
• the Government to create more aggressive regulation on advertising and sales. The group said Congress should give the Food and Drug Administration full authority to regulate the sale, advertising, and distribution of cigarettes. The group specifically urged the FDA to ban implied health claims for low tar and -nicotine cigarettes, and the FTC to ban the "Joe Camel" ad campaign for its targeting of children.
• Congress to make smokefree schools, public areas and workplaces mandatory.
• Congress to pass higher cigarette taxes
• Congress to fund anti-smoking commercials

Walker Merryman of the Tobacco Institute said the advocated measures would amount to prohibition. "What they want from the tobacco industry is a product that is too expensive to buy, too inconvenient to use, that you can't tell anybody about. It is prohibition by another name," he said.

Institute spokesperson Thomas Lauria said tobacco is already regulated "from seedbed to sales counter." He said, "There is no consumer product, including alcohol, that is more regulated, more under the thumb of various federal agencies than tobacco, in particular cigarettes."

He added that smoking's legality and "enormous popularity" in every country in the world "only indicates that there is a natural human market for this product. Some folks like smoking." Mr. Lauria himself does not smoke.

In regards to children, Merryman said the industry fights youth access to minors, and that "there is no such advertising aimed or targeted at kids."

The ex-surgeon generals joining the appeal were:

• Eisenhower Administration: Dr. Leroy E. Burney
• Johnson Administration: William H. Stewart
• Nixon Administration: Jesse L. Steinfeld
• Nixon & Ford Administrations: S. Paul Ehrlich
• Carter Administration: Dr. Julius Richmond
• Reagan Administration: C. Everett Koop
• Bush Administration: Dr. Antonia Novello

Next month Elders will release the 24th surgeon general's report, which is said to focus on smoking and youth.

BACKGROUND ON THE SURGEON GENERAL'S 1964 REPORT

Within 3 months of Terry's report, cigarette consumption had dropped 20%.

At the time 46% of Americans smoked, smoking was accepted in offices, airplanes and elevators, and TV programs were sponsored by cigarette brands.

"It was a very dramatic and courageous thing to do," said Joseph Califano, the top domestic policy aide to President Johnson.

But the Johnson Administration had enough on its plate, and didn't want to complicate more pressing issues by addressing the implications. "We wanted to get schools integrated, the voters' rights act passed, fair housing passed. And all of those things required us to take on the whole phalanx of Southern states," Califano said.

As President Carter's secretary of health, education and welfare Califano publicly declared war on smoking on Jan. 11, 1978. "The tobacco industry went crazy," he said. "It ultimately cost me my job."

Dr. Joycelyn Elders said that today the key is to see tobacco as central to a larger preventive health effort, much as Califano tried to do.

"We know that young people who smoke are far more likely to abuse marijuana, cocaine, alcohol or heroin. They're far more likely to have unprotected sexual intercourse," she said.

"What we need is a comprehensive program. Tobacco sits at the center of that."

Today Mr. Califano is chairman of the Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University.

Smoking rates since 1965, from National Health Interview Surveys compiled by the U.S. Office on

Smoking and Health.

% US Adult

Smokers in: %ALL % Men % Women

1965 42.4 51.9 33.9
1966 42.6 52.5 33.9
1970 37.4 44.1 31.5
1974 37.1 43.1 32.1
1976 36.4 41.9 32.0
1977 36.0 40.9 32.1
1978 34.1 38.1 30.7
1979 33.5 37.5 29.9
1980 33.2 37.6 29.3
1983 32.1 35.1 29.5
1985 30.1 32.6 27.9
1987 28.8 31.2 26.5
1988 28.1 30.8 25.7
1990 25.5 28.4 22.8
1991 25.7 28.1 23.5

Data from U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and from the Coalition on Smoking or Health:

ASSORTED STATISTICS

Jan. 1994. Miscellaneous data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and from the Coalition on Smoking or Health:

• Cigarettes consumed in the United States since 1964: 17 trillion.
• Americans killed each year by smoking-related diseases: 420,000.
• Americans killed by smoking-related lung cancer since 1964: more than 2 million.
• Lives saved by quitting smoking or never starting: 2 million.
• Nonsmokers killed by lung cancer caused by secondhand smoke each year: 3,000.
• Scientific articles linking smoking with cancer and other diseases, 1964: 7,000.
• Scientific articles linking smoking with cancer and other diseases, 1994: 60,000.
• Surgeon general reports on hazards of smoking: 23.
• Percentage of adult smokers who have quit: nearly half.
• Children who try their first cigarette each day: 3,000.

The following information is from the American Heart Association: No. of children 12-17 who smoke: 2.2 million No. of children under 5 living with a smoker: 9 million. No. of lower respiratory tract infections in childrenlinked to second hand smoke: 300,000 Increased risk of heart attack in smokers: more than two times.

The following financial losses caused by smoking-related health problems were estimated for the year 1990 by The Office of Technology Assessment: --Medical costs of treating smoking-related health problems: $21 billion --Lost productivity: $7 billion --Lost earnings: $40 billion

SECOND-HAND SMOKE PAMPHLET: The American Academy of Otolaryngology offers a pamphlet on second-hand smoke Send a stamped, self-addressed envelope to Secondhand Smoke - Head and Neck Surgery, 1 Prince Street, Alexandria, VA., 22314.

AMA HIT ON DONATIONS TO TOBACCO INTERESTS

Jan. 6, 1993. In a report on donations of the American Medical Political Action Committee--the American Medical Association's Washington lobbying arm--researchers have found that the organization gave more money to politicians who promoted tobacco exports than to those who opposed them.

The study found that during the 1989-90 and the 1991-92 political seasons, AMPAC's donations to House members in favor of federal promotion of tobacco exports averaged $11,549. Donations to those opposing such promotion averaged $9,842.

The study by Harvard medical School student Joshua Sharfstein and his father, Steven, a psychiatrist at Baltimore's Sheppard and Enoch Pratt Hospital, also addressed the AMA's conflicting positions on the Brady bill and on the abortion gag rule.

While the AMA gave money to almost everyone in Congress, Steven Sharfstein said, "I am concerned that the positions of American medicine are not being reflected well in the political contributions of the AMA's political action committee. It's important for the AMA to represent the best interests of our patients."

Joshua Sharfstein said that though no specific issues affecting doctors' payments came up in the sessions studied, he felt pro-tobacco, pro-abortion gag rule, and anti-Brady bill legislators were more likely to reflect conservative viewpoints on economic issues of particular interest to doctors and the AMA.

"In an effort to support the economic agenda of medicine, it appears that AMPAC is inadvertently subverting the excellent public health stands of the AMA," said Steven Sharfstein.

AMA Executive Vice President James S. Todd issued a statement noting that the American Medical Political Action Committee is only one of many AMA lobbying organizations.

"A subject of this complexity does not easily lend itself to a relatively simplistic appraisal," he said. "The findings are interesting but allow no credible conclusions to be drawn."

The article was submitted to --and rejected by--the Journal of the American Medical Association before being published by the New England Journal of Medicine, which is not affiliated with the AMA.

SLICK CIG PACKS APPEAL TO KIDS

Jan. 11, 1993. According to a Canadian Cancer Society study, teens would feel stigmatized buying cigarettes that look ugly.

The teens in the survey characterized people who would buy plain-packaged cigarettes as losers, wimps and geeks, and those who bought cigarettes in fancy packs as smart and cool.

UNITED TO TEST SMOKEFREE INT'L FLIGHTS

United Airlines will begin a 6 month test of smokefree daily flights between Los Angeles and Auckland/Melbourne. Starting this March, United will offer passengers a choice of smokefree or smoking-permitted flights, and judge the results in September.

In addition, United announced that this summer they may test flights between London and the US the same way.

NORTHWEST AIR FREES FIRST CLASS

St. Paul, MN. Jan. 5, 1993. Northwest Airlines, the first airline to ban smoking on its domestic US flights in 1988, is due to become the first US airline to ban smoking in First Class worldwide when its new policy goes into effect Jan. 12.

The airline says its market research indicates 75% of Europe-bound and 63% of Asia-based passengers want smoke-free cabins.

RJR WINS PLACE ON NADER'S WORST

Dec. 30, 1993. Ralph Nader's Multinational Monitor publication placed RJR Nabisco on its yearly list of worst multinational companies for its alleged marketing of Camel cigarettes to children through the "Joe Camel" cartoon character.

Maura Payne Ellis, spokesperson for RJR, said "there isn't any data to believe that more kids are smoking due to the campaign."

CHRYSLER'S OPTIONAL ASHTRAYS

Detroit, MI Jan. 5, 1993. Chrysler Corp.'s new car models, the Chrysler Cirrus and Dodge Stratus, which are due out this summer, will come equipped with ashtrays only on request.

"Research shows that something like 78 percent of people who ride in cars don't smoke," said Suzanne Hofmann, interior designer of both cars, "so why should it be easier for the minority that does?"

Instead, an extra cup holder will pop out of the dashboard, and the electricity receptacle will have a removeable rubber plug.

These will be the first mass-market cars since the Model T not to have an ash tray. Chrysler said it plans to implement the design in other new models.

"What's the name of this model," Walker Merryman of the Tobacco Institute asked, "just so I don't accidentally buy one?"

SPORTS

LILLEHAMMER'S CONFLICTING DRUG POLICIES

Lillehammer, Norway. Jan. 1994. Lillehammer is having trouble adjusting to the influx of tourists due when the winter Olympics takes place next month. The little lakeside town of 24,000 will be a showcase of Norwegian culture.

One aspect of the culture that worries residents is Norwegian's affinity for alcohol. Norway has strict alcohol laws, which have been liberalized somewhat to allow many temporary bars, nightclubs and restaurants to serve the visitors.

"If the world wants to see the Norwegian habit of getting drunk in the ditch, they'll be able to do so at Lillehammer," said Tove Lehre, a left-wing member of the town council who opposes the licensing plan as bowing to commercial interests.

"We're just filling a need," said the proprietor of a plumber's shop that will be a restaurant during the Games.

The liberal alcohol policies contrast greatly with the Olympics' anti-smoking campaign, which will discourage smoking even at outdoor events.

CHAMPION SMOKER

U.S. National Champion Tonya Harding, 23, on being an athlete, asthma sufferer and smoker: `Maybe I'm the Charles Barkley of figure skating.' Ms. Harding's ex-husband and bodyguard are under investigation in the clubbing of a rival skater's knee.

President Clinton's recently deceased mother Virginia Kelley, was "recognizable by the dramatic silver streak in her black hair, smoked like a chimney, gambled and had a passion for the ponies," according to the Chicago Tribunes Carol Jouzaitis.

Fran Liebowitz has been caught smoking on airlines about 12 times, according to an interview in the January Travel & Leisure magazine.

RELATED ISSUES

MEXICO CITY OFFICIALS TAKE PAGE FROM TOBACCO INDUSTRY

Mexico City. Jan. 1, 1993. According to Tod Robberson in an article in the Washington Post, Mexico City, infamously known as the world's most polluted city, "enjoyed only 31 days of safe, breathable air in 1993, according to government statistics. For one of every five days, airborne pollutants reached levels regarded by the World Health Organization (WHO) as dangerous to inhale."

Yet Mexico City officials criticize WHO's standards, and continue to deny health consequences of such heavy pollution.

As Robberson writes, "local and federal officials are questioning the validity of some WHO standards and contend that while pollution is an eyesore and a nuisance, it is not necessarily dangerous to a person's long-term health. Jaime Villalba, director of Mexico's National Institute of Respiratory Diseases, told reporters last week that 'there is not a shred of proof' linking air pollution and long-term health problems. It was only after 25 years of research, he added, that doctors in the United States were able to establish a direct link between cigarette smoking and lung cancer. 'It will take at least that long to determine the effects of extended exposure to air pollution.'"

THE FUNNY PAPERS

Jay Leno's Tobacco Jokes

Los Angeles, CA. Jan, 1994

"New research just released this week (says) that smokers tend to be thinner than nonsmokers. Well, you know the tobacco industry is jumping all over this. In fact, have you seen those new tobacco ads? `Give us 20 years, we'll take off all the weight!' Oh, those lungs are good for five pounds apiece there, cut them out."

"Here is a sign that times are really changing. Chrysler has come out with a car, in fact, a lot of new cars now ... no ashtray. The Chryslers have no ashtrays. Do you know why? They say that most people don't smoke, so why have it? You know if that's the logic, why have turn signals and low beams ..."

DAVE BARRY ON TOBACCO INDUSTRY TACTICS

In a satirical year-end roundup, Dave Barry writes, . . . "OCTOBER 21-In Los Angeles, the jury in the Reginald Denny beating trial, after much thinking, concludes that Person A is not necessarily trying to kill Person B just because Person A happens to very deliberately bash Person B's skull in with a brick. The verdict is applauded by scientists at the Tobacco Institute. . . "

SARAJEVO JOKE

Sarajevo. Jan. 1, 1993. According to Reuter's Kurt Schork, a joke making the rounds of humor-starved Sarajevo goes like this:

4 International relief workers run afoul of the law, and are sentenced to 10 years solitary confinement. The judge tells them they can each have one luxury item to stock his cell with.

The Frenchman chooses champagne

The Dutchman chooses cheese.

The German chooses ham.

The Bosnian chooses cigarettes.

10 years later, the warden opens the Frenchman's cell. The slightly inebriated man says, "My dear friend, come in, come in. What a fantastic holiday this has been. I'm down to my last bottle of champagne, But I'm happy to share it with you."

The warden then opens the Dutchman's cell.

"Come in," the man says, "and help me finish this last bit of Edam."

The German says, "Never eaten so well in my life. I'm going to be sorry to leave."

Then the warden opens the cell of the Bosnian.

"Have you got a light?" the man asks.

END OF DOCUMENT