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Canadian Council for Tobacco Control holds National Non-Smoking Week  

A recent U.S. government reports said construction workers, miners and food service workers are the occupations that smoke the most. Experts say that may have as much to do with education levels as the jobs themselves.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study found 19.6 per cent of working adults smoke, but as many as 30 per cent in the mining, construction and food service industries smoke. Librarians and teachers smoked the least, at less than nine per cent. For decades, the biggest smokers by profession have been roofers, drywall installers, brick and stone masons and other workers in construction trades.

But health officials have warned construction workers may be at elevated risk from smoking, especially if they are exposed to asbestos. Studies have shown people who work with asbestos are more likely to develop lung cancer if they also smoke.

National Non-Smoking Week runs from Jan. 15-21 with the theme "Breaking up is hard to do."

Ten Good Reasons to Quit Smoking, by the Canadian Council for Tobacco Control:

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As Lung Cancer Awareness Month Closes, NY Mesothelioma Attorney Calls For More Funding To Combat Asbestos-Related Diseases 

As November’s National Lung Cancer Awareness Month comes to an end, the need for more research into lung cancer and other asbestos-related diseases continues, New York mesothelioma lawyer Joseph W. Belluck said.

Although 157,300 people are afflicted each year with lung cancer, according to the Lung Cancer Alliance, and an estimated 2,500 to 3,000 die of the related cancer of mesothelioma, research for these diseases is not as well funded as for other cancers, Belluck pointed out.

According to a recent Scripps Newspaper report, the Susan G. Komen Foundation for breast cancer will operate with $200 million this year in research funding, while LUNGevity, the nation’s largest private lung cancer foundation, will give out only $2 million for research.

“Unfortunately, too many people associate lung cancer only with smoking, and that may impact funding, but there are many other causes of the disease – one of which is asbestos,” said Belluck, a partner of the New York personal injury law firm of Belluck & Fox, LLP, who focuses his practice on handling lung cancer and mesothelioma claims related to asbestos exposure.

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Baron and Budd Warns About Lung Cancer Caused by Asbestos Exposure 

--As part of Lung Cancer Awareness Month, Baron and Budd is raising awareness about the many misconceptions of lung cancer. Though smoking is a known cause of lung cancer, studies have found that a growing number of lung cancer cases are occurring in nonsmokers and are linked to environmental toxins, such as asbestos. Despite this, lung cancer continues to have a stigma of the “smoking cancer,” and, in many cases, people are unaware of these other causes and of how to tell if their lung cancer was caused by something other than smoking.

Having worked closely with asbestos cancer patients for more than 30 years, the mesothelioma attorneys at Baron and Budd know that it can be difficult for someone to figure out if their lung cancer was caused by asbestos. While significant asbestos exposure can often be linked to lung cancer, there are also a few distinct markers that indicate prior asbestos exposure: . . .

The national mesothelioma law firm of Baron & Budd, P.C. has a more than 30-year history of “Protecting What’s Right” for asbestos sufferers and their families. As one of the first law firms to successfully litigate an asbestos lawsuit, Baron & Budd continues to actively represent veterans, industry workers and others who are suffering as a result of exposure to asbestos

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Baron & Budd, P.C. Supports National Lung Cancer Awareness Month 

Baron and Budd is working to raise awareness about lung cancer, a disease that is all too misunderstood and underfunded. As a law firm that helps lung cancer and mesothelioma patients, Baron and Budd understands the importance of increased awareness about these cancers and, more specifically, the need for education. Though lung cancer has been labeled as the “smoking cancer,” research points to a growing number of lung cancer diagnoses in nonsmokers from exposure to environmental toxins such as asbestos.

"Lung cancer has developed a stigma as the 'smoking cancer,' as if people diagnosed with the cancer knowingly chose to put themselves at risk"

Baron and Budd is encouraging individuals to participate in the Shine a Light on Lung Cancer Vigil hosted by the Lung Cancer Alliance. Vigils will take place across the country Nov. 1 to honor loved ones who have suffered from lung cancer and help raise awareness. . . .

The national mesothelioma law firm of Baron & Budd, P.C. has a more than 30-year history of "Protecting What's Right" for asbestos sufferers and their families.

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Asbestos promoter Baljit Chadha polishes image 

As the lead developer of the proposed Jeffrey Mine expansion in Asbestos launches a campaign to polish his industry's tarnished image, opponents charge the asbestos lobby with using tactics similar to those of the tobacco industry in its efforts to block public health initiatives to ban the cancer-causing fibre in developing countries.

After years of keeping a low profile, the president of Balcorp Ltd. and lead proponent of the Jeffrey mine expansion, Baljit Chadha, has recently been giving media interviews and requesting meetings with some of his most vocal critics, including NDP MP Patrick Martin, the Canadian Medical Association and the Canadian Cancer Society.

But the clock is ticking down on the Quebec government's latest deadline - Oct. 1 - for Chadha to prove he has firm commitments of at least $25 million from private investors to get a $58-million loan guarantee from Quebec's Industry Department.

Although Chadha has been saying for months he has the money lined up, several deadlines set by the department over the past year have come and gone and it is still unclear how firm Chadha's investment commitments are.

Meanwhile, Chadha's image problems are getting worse. . . .

Critics say a global asbestos industry lobby group, the International Chrysotile Association, has hired a Washington-based public relations firm, APCO Worldwide, to lobby the Malaysian government to exclude chrysotile asbestos from its proposed asbestos ban.

(In the early 1990s, APCO Worldwide was hired by Philip Morris tobacco company to help fight public health initiatives regarding exposure to cigarette smoke.)

Kathleen Ruff, a human-rights and anti-asbestos advocate with the Ottawa-based Rideau Institute, said Quebecers should be outraged that the asbestos industry, which the Quebec and federal governments have long supported financially, is hiring high-powered public-relations firms to persuade foreign governments that chrysotile asbestos can be used safely.

"The asbestos industry is the tobacco industry's evil twin," said Martin, New Democratic MP for Winnipeg Centre.

Martin was exposed to asbestos as a young man working in a mine in the Yukon and later as a carpenter and renovator, and has become an outspoken critic of Canada's continued involvement in the asbestos business.

"The asbestos lobby uses the exact same modus operandi as Big Tobacco did to try to keep a question mark alive" about safety, Martin said.

"They keep sowing doubt while more people get sick and, just like the tobacco industry, they survive using junk science, aggressive political lobbying and bribery."

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• PR agency used by tobacco firm hired by asbestos group  

Anti-asbestos activists in Malaysia and Canada say a global asbestos lobby group has hired the Washingtonbased APCO Worldwide public relations company to persuade the Malaysian government not to ban chrysotile asbestos.

APCO Worldwide was hired by the Philip Morris tobacco company in the early 1990s to set up a group called The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition, after the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency classified secondhand smoke as a known human carcinogen. The coalition's mission was to dismiss concern about second-hand smoke as "junk science," and to fight anti-smoking regulations.

Kathleen Ruff, an anti-asbestos activist and human rights adviser with the Ottawa-based Rideau Institute, sent a letter to APCO Worldwide president Margery Kraus on Thursday, demanding the company inform the government of Malaysia that it was hired by the International Chrysotile Association.

She said APCO brought Dr. David Bernstein, a Switzerland-based toxicologist who has produced studies on smoking funded by the tobacco industry as well as studies on chrysotile asbestos funded by the asbestos industry, to Malaysia to persuade the government the product can be used safely.

"The scientific consensus is clear - just as it is on tobacco - that all forms of asbestos, including chrysotile asbestos, cause mesothelioma, lung cancer, other cancers and asbestosis and that safe use is not possible," Ruff writes in her letter to Kraus.

"Only lobby organizations that have a financial interest in selling asbestos claim that asbestos can be safely used, just as the lobby organizations acting on behalf of the tobacco industry have denied the clear science on tobacco harm."

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• Seaman's widow files lawsuit over husband's exposure to asbestos, cigarettes and tobacco 

The wife of a career merchant mariner has filed a wrongful death lawsuit that claims her husband was exposed to asbestos, cigarettes and tobacco resulting in pulmonary disease that caused his death.

Katrine Davalie individually and on behalf of the estate of Tookie A. Davalie filed the lawsuit on July 9 in federal court in New Orleans. . . .

According to the complaint, Davalie was constantly exposed to asbestos friable fibers, causing him to breathe into his system carcinogenic asbestos dust. The various defendants are accused of maintaining each respective vessel in an unsafe, unseaworthy condition causing the crewmen exposure to toxic chemicals and carcinogens including to friable asbestos and second hand exposure to cigarette and tobacco smoke.

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• Betty Allen Engle Tobacco Trial Begins in Tampa 

Betty Allen brought this suit against R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company and Phillip Morris for the death of her husband in 1994 at the age of 64. Herman Allen began smoking cigarettes as a teenager in the mid-1940s and continued to smoke until months before his death from small cell lung cancer.

Betty Allen alleges that defendants heavily marketed their cigarettes to teenagers so that they would get addicted to nicotine and become "customers for life." Herman Allen, she claims, became a customer for life at his peril.

Hardee Bass of Searcy Denney Scarola Barnhart & Shipley told the jury, "This is a case about personal responsibility; it is a case about choices…ask yourselves about corporate responsibility, ask yourselves at every turn about the choices that the tobacco companies made…ask yourselves about the choices to meet together in 1953…ask about their choices to attack the surgeon general when the surgeon general was trying to get information out to the public.

Representing Phillip Morris, Jonathan Stern of Arnold & Porter told the jury that Herman Allen knew that smoking was dangerous. In fact, he grew up in a household that prohibited smoking. Mr. Stern also told the jury, "The evidence in this case will show that addiction to cigarettes containing nicotine did not cause Mr. Allen's death…Mr. Allen chose to smoke, and that choice was his choice.

Mr. Stern also indicated that asbestos, not nicotine, was the substantial contributing cause to Mr. Allen's death.

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Jury awards $1.4 million to smoker with asbestos-related cancer 

A California jury has awarded nearly $1.4 million to a man who says he developed a fatal form of lung cancer from smoking Kent cigarettes in the 1950s that contained filters laced with asbestos.

The San Francisco County Superior Court jury found that the cigarettes did not perform as safely as expected and that their design was a substantial factor in causing plaintiff Donat Lenney’s mesothelioma.

The Kent cigarettes Lenney smoked from 1952 to 1956 were manufactured by Lorillard Tobacco using Micronite filters made by Hollingsworth & Vose, his suit said.

Lenney was awarded $969,700, and the jury gave his wife $400,000 for loss of consortium.

Lorillard was found 35 percent liable, H&V was found 25 percent liable and a group of asbestos suppliers was determined to be liable for the remainder. The jury did not award punitive damages, as neither Lorillard nor H&V was found to have acted with malice, oppression or fraud.

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• Illegal cigarettes known to have contained asbestos found in Nottingham 

THE recent Budget led to the price of a packet of cigarettes topping £7.

But in two shops in Nottingham, a Post reporter was able to buy 20 cigarettes for just £3.

The reason? The brand of cigarette was Jin Ling – banned from sale within the EU and attracting a maximum fine of £2,500 fine per packet for shops that sell them.

The cigarettes have the letters U.S.A. on the front of the box and look similar in style to Camel cigarettes.

They are made through a network of factories in eastern Europe, China, Japan and Russia, and HM Revenue & Customs says they are made specifically to be smuggled.

When the Post approached the two shops and asked for "cheap cigarettes", in each case the assistant behind the till produced packs of Jin Ling from under the counter.

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Protein Test Detects Early-stage, Asbestos-related Pulmonary Cancer 

Researchers investigating a novel biomarker test believe it is the most accurate yet in detecting proteins secreted from tumors caused by exposure to asbestos. Study results of this aptamer proteomic technology were presented at the AACR 102nd Annual Meeting 2011, held April 2-6.

In a blinded test performed under the auspices of the National Cancer Institute's Early Detection Research Network Biomarker Discovery Lab, the proteomic assay could detect 15 of 19 cases of malignant pleural mesothelioma that were in stage 1 or stage 2, making the test about 80 percent sensitive, a measure of how accurately a test can identify disease. In addition, the specificity of the test was 100 percent, meaning there were no false positives in this study.

Harvey I. Pass, M.D., director of the division of thoracic surgery and thoracic oncology at NYU Langone Medical Center and the NYU Cancer Institute in New York, and colleagues used the SomaLogic Inc. aptamer proteomics platform to examine 170 blood samples from 90 patients diagnosed with malignant mesothelioma and 80 participants who had been exposed to asbestos. Three-fourths of the samples were used to derive 19 significant biomarkers for mesothelioma and the remaining 25 percent were used in the blinded test.

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1950′s Asbestos-Ridden Cigarette Filters May Put Some Smokers at Risk of Mesothelioma 

Mesothelioma is a unique and rare form of cancer, typically affecting the lining of the lungs, caused by exposure to asbestos fibers. Individuals primarily sickened with the asbestos-related disease were exposed to asbestos in the workplace, or through unsafe demolition or renovation practices of pre-1970 structures where asbestos was used in many of the construction materials. Most recently, rescue workers at the scene of the 9/11 terrorist attacks are at risk of mesothelioma due to the high levels of asbestos in the toxic dust cloud.

One fact that has been constant in the research of mesothelioma causes is that unlike many other predominantly pulmonary-related cancers, cigarette smoking has no known causative affect on mesothelioma incidence. Although smoking does increase the chance of getting lung cancer which is sometimes confused with mesothelioma.

However, a caveat should be added to that fact – smokers of Kent Micronite filtered cigarettes between 1952 and 1956 may be at risk of developing the disease. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, Kent’s ads promoted the Micronite filters as “the greatest health protection in cigarette history” because the filter removed more tar and nicotine than the competitor’s filters. However, it was later disclosed the Micronite tip contained highly toxic crocidolite – “African blue” – asbestos.

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Lorillard, Others Face $1.4M Hit In Asbestos Suit ($$) 

A California couple will receive almost $1.4 million in a suit accusing Lorillard Tobacco Co. and Hollingsworth & Vose Co. of causing terminal lung disease by using an asbestos-containing filter in cigarettes sold decades ago, the plaintiffs' counsel said Wednesday.

After a seven-week trial, a jury of the Superior Court of the State of California, County of San Francisco, sided with Placerville, Calif., couple Don and Monica Lenney, according to Levin Simes Kaiser & Gornick LLP.

The jury found that the asbestos-containing filter in the original Kent micronite cigarettes, sold between 1952 and 1956, was defectively designed, releasing microscopic asbestos fibers into smokers' lungs, the firm said in a statement.

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Ex-smoker wins $1.4 million in asbestos-filter suit 

A San Francisco jury has awarded $1.36 million to a terminally ill man who smoked filter-tipped Kent cigarettes in the 1950s that contained asbestos.

Lawyers for Don Lenney and his wife, Monica, said the verdict was a rare victory for plaintiffs who have sued over Kent's use of asbestos in its Micronite filters from 1952 to 1956. The cigarette's manufacturer, Lorillard Tobacco Co., says it has won 15 out of 20 trials nationwide and contends the filters released only trace amounts of asbestos that posed no danger.

Lenney, 73, a former Bay Area insurance agent, now lives in Placerville. He was diagnosed with mesothelioma, a form of cancer linked to asbestos, in November 2009 and had a lung removed in early 2010, his attorney said Thursday. . . .

Lenney started smoking other brands in 1953 at age 16 and soon switched to Kents, Simes said. She said he stopped smoking in 1965, shortly after the U.S. surgeon general warned of the dangers of cigarettes. . . .

The jury rejected a claim that the companies had been negligent but voted 9-3 to find that they had violated Lenney's right to buy and use a safe product.

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• San Francisco Jury Finds Lorillard Tobacco Company Liable in Asbestos Product Liability Case 

After a seven week trial against Lorillard Tobacco Company and Hollingsworth & Vose Company, a San Francisco Superior Court jury awarded nearly $1.4 million to a Placerville, Calif. couple, Don and Monica Lenney. (Case# CGC-10-275529)

The jury found that the asbestos-containing filter in the original Kent micronite cigarettes, manufactured from 1952-56, was defectively designed, releasing microscopic asbestos fibers into the lungs of smokers like Mr. Lenney.

The jury also found that the fibers released into Mr. Lenney's lungs contributed to the development of his terminal mesothelioma, an asbestos-caused lung disease.

The jury rejected the defense claims that Mr. Lenney did not actually smoke the Kent product during the pertinent years and that the filter was not defective because it either did not release any fibers or did not release enough fibers to cause disease.

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