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Graphic smoking billboards to be cut  

Iowans no longer will be confronted with stark anti-smoking billboards and ads from a state-sponsored youth group, a leading tobacco-control official said Friday.

The Legislature slashed spending for anti-tobacco efforts, and state leaders earmarked most of the remaining money for such things as local advocacy groups and telephone counseling for smokers who want to quit. That means there probably will be no money for new ads from Just Eliminate Lies, a statewide teen group that portrays tobacco companies as nefarious forces trying to trick young people into thinking cigarettes are cool.

Cathy Callaway, chairwoman of the Tobacco Use Prevention and Control Commission, said she hopes to find enough money to keep the youth group together so it can find other ways to counter cigarette makers' clever campaigns. "They're not cutting their marketing budgets like we're having to," she said at a commission meeting Friday.

The ads' impending demise comes after years of disagreement over their effectiveness and debate about how much the state should spend to combat smoking.

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My Life, My Death, My Billboard 

The Billboard Liberation Front (BLF) is honored to announce a new marketing partnership with Philip Morris (PM) that finally brings together the rugged sense of American independence with your most important choice as a consumer: your death. The message of “My Life. My Death. My Choice.” informs and empowers the consumer to choose, as their god given right, how they want to die. Philip Morris brings this message to the consumer to remind them that some rights are inalienable in life as they are in death.

“We’ve always said that the only two things in life that are unavoidable are death and taxes,” commented Michael E. Szymanczyk, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Philip Morris. “This campaign drives home that message where, if you are gonna die, might as well do it on your terms. Just like our Marlboro Men did.” According to Patrick B. Smelt, Chief of Marketing, “This bold message of independence and demanding life and death on your terms fits with the current zeitgeist of anti-establishmentarianism and post-post-modern rage at the repressive state demanding a healthier you and your environment.”

The BLF was honored to accept this exciting challenge. “We have no comment on President Obama’s health care reform, but many consumer of Philip Morris’s products do. We felt that this campaign picks up on a widespread rage that some nameless, faceless bureaucrat might give them cheaper health care, preventative treatment, and maybe deny them the sweet release we are all seeking,” said Rico T. Spoons, BLF Director of Offense as he idly drew a razorblade across his wrists. “This oppressive political climate and fascist approach towards health raises the comforting question of ‘how will you end it all?’ I like to think that we are just giving some poor folks a reminder that Philip Morris will always be there to help kill you.”

All former Marlboro Men, Wayne McLaren, David McLean and Dick Hammer, were unavailable for comment due to their rugged, manly choice of death by lung cancer.

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"Improved" Billboard Advertises Suicide by Cigarettes  

A billboard in San Francisco advertising the Final Exit Network, a group that helps people suffering from intolerable illnesses end their life, was plenty controversial on its own.

The billboard, located in view of drivers on the Central Freeway near Howard and South Van Ness, read "My Life My Death My Choice," and a link to the organization's website.

But the Billboard Liberation Front, a group of pranksters that have been "improving" advertising in public space for over thirty years, felt that it needed some work.

So the billboard now reads as a friendly message from Phillip Morris, the cigarette-vending subsidiary of Altria which brings you the mild, refreshing option to increase your chances of developing lung cancer in every pack of Marlboros.

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• Indonesian students expected to stir up movement to curb smoking habit in families 

Amid the increasing rate of smoking people across the country, Indonesian students are highly expected to become the agents to encourage adult people in their families to quit from the habit that apparently has been contributing to the increasing deaths related to cancer and heart diseases.

The role of students, particularly the female ones, in influencing their parents and their brothers to quit smoking is considered effective, according to experts speaking in a seminar discussing smoking prevention efforts held here on Thursday.

"Instead of listening to advices from their colleagues and doctors for the sake of their own health, most parents used to pay attention to the requests of their beloved children to quit from smoking," Fuad Baradja, an anti-smoking campaigner, said in the seminar.

According to the former TV soap opera star, the efforts to curb the smoking habit in the family level would be very effective instead of requesting the government and the parliament to issue policies aimed at limiting the cigarette distribution and sentences for those smoking in public areas. . . .

Meanwhile, Prasenohadi, a lung specialist at the Cipto Mangunkusumo general hospital said Indonesian children have been the target of cigar producers in the country as their next consumers.

"With massive TV commercial ads and sponsorships for youth activities, they wanted to make children their next consumers after the older consumers quit smoking or die because of cancer or heart attack," he said, adding that Indonesia has recorded 400, 000 deaths related to smoking.

The massive TV and outdoor cigar ads in the country have driven children at school age to smoke, according to the doctor, with 13 percent of youth smokers starting their bad habit since elementary school.

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L.A. billboard owners squash 'Land of the Lost' anti-smoking ads  

But what the New York Times' Brooks Barnes reveals online today is that L.A. billboard owners, already enormously unpopular for shamelessly installing an ever-growing assortment of hideous video billboards, refused to accept ads from the AMAA publicly calling out the studio for its on-screen promotion of smoking. The AMAA had previously announced that the studio "found to be the biggest smoking offender would be publicly shamed on nearby billboards." But when the AMAA went to buy billboard space, every local billboard vendor refused to sell.

According to the AMAA, the billboard vendors, who take in a huge amount of revenue from (surprise!) movie industry advertising, weren't going to let their favorite clients be embarrassed in such a public way from an anti-smoking organization. It's yet another black eye for L.A., which has allowed billboard pollution to run rampant without even putting up a fight.

But let me give the last word to AMAA President Nancy Kyler, who says: "It's a sad day when movie studios can promote smoking to youth, but public health advocates cannot find a billboard in the whole city of Los Angeles that will run an ad to alert the public about the problem."

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• ‘Land of the Lost’ Haunts Universal in Unexpected Way  

"Land of the Lost" is the gift that just keeps on taking for Universal Pictures.

The American Medical Association Alliance, a volunteer arm of the powerful health organization that focuses on family issues, on Friday released its scorecard for the depiction of smoking in mass-appeal summer movies. Universal was the biggest offender because of "Land of the Lost," the big-budget failure that helped cost the co-chairmen of the studio their jobs this month.

The alliance said it counted 18 shots of Will Ferrell smoking a pipe in the movie, resulting in about 124 million tobacco impressions. (The industry generally calculates an "impression" by multiplying the number of incidences by the film's total gross, then dividing by the average ticket price.)

" 'Land of the Lost' wasn't just a flop at the box office, it was also a real loser for public health," said Nancy Kyler, president of the American Medical Association Alliance.

The group did not name the second- and third-place offenders. A Universal spokeswoman declined to comment.

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Tobacco Industry Marketing at Point of Purchase After the 1998 MSA Billboard Advertising Ban  

In conclusion, evidence suggests that point-of-purchase advertising and promotions have increased since implementation of the MSA billboard tobacco advertising ban. These increases, at least in part, are likely to have resulted from the shifting of resources once spent on billboard advertising to other marketing efforts. As a result of this shift, the intended effect of the billboard advertising ban may not be realized, because overall exposure to advertising and promotions may not be reduced. Further research is needed to examine the impact of the billboard ban and other MSA restrictions on tobacco company marketing strategies and on youth and adult smoking.

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Dear President Obama 

Dear President Obama,

As a former smoker I completely understand the difficulty of quitting smoking. Now that you are the Commander in Chief we need to be assured that you are and will remain in perfect health, not only for the country but also your family and ultimately yourself. There is a new way with The Safe Cig. We have helped over 4000 people start living a healthier lifestyle in the last 60 days since we have launched our retail locations. Throughout the last year you have given our country hope and today we want to give you hope with The Safe Cig.

President Obama we challenge you to try a free starter kit and start living a healthier lifestyle with The Safe Cig. All you have to do is tell your staff to contact us and we will gladly mail or even drive the starter kit out to you. We will keep pushing you either until you try a starter kit or completely quit smoking on your own. We are doing this because we care about this wonderful country of ours and its new leader.

And by the way President Obama..."Yes You Can"

All the best from our family!!!

Billboard Located on I95 in the heart of Philadelphia near the Eagles Football Stadium

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The Smoking Camel Man New York 1964 

Some old 8mm footage of the famous Camel Billboard in New York

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• Anti-smoking billboards draw fire 

As a debate rages in Cheyenne over statewide smoke-free legislation, opponents are questioning the timing of a state-sponsored billboard campaign targeting second-hand smoke.

Top Department of Health officials, meanwhile, insist that the billboard campaign and an accompanying print advertising blitz are appropriate, and were not purposely timed to influence the vote.

"This is part of our mission is to educate the public on the dangers of tobacco use and second-hand smoke," said Department of Health Deputy Director Roger McDaniel.

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• Geographical Information Systems as a Tool for Monitoring Tobacco Industry Advertising 

Background: Although the use of Geographical Information Systems (GIS) approach is usually applied to epidemiological disease outbreaks and environmental exposure mapping, it has significant potential as a tobacco control research tool in monitoring POP tobacco advertising. . . .

Results: The GIS approach identified 133 POP and 44 billboards within 300m of the school gates of Heraklion schools. On average 13 POP (range: 4 - 21) and 4.4 billboards (range: 1 - 9) were located per school, and all had at least one POP within 20m of the school gate. On average 9 ± 6 tobacco advertisements per POP (range: 0 - 25) were noted, and 80% of them were below child’s height. The GIS protocol identified that kiosks, that were excepted from the Greek ban on tobacco advertising, in comparison to other POP were found not only to be closer and visible from the school gates (44.1% vs. 10.8%, p<0.001) but were also found to have more external advertisements (8 ± 5 vs. 5 ± 3, p<0.001).

Conclusions: This study demonstrates the effectiveness of a GIS system in monitoring tobacco industry advertising on a large population based scale and implies its use as a standardised method for monitoring tobacco industry strategies and tobacco control efforts.

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• Remembering Ron Davis 

Ronald Davis, MD, aged 52, passed away on 6 November 2008 after a courageous 10-month battle with pancreatic cancer. Ron’s star shone very brightly, albeit too briefly in the medical community. . . .

At the world conference in Perth in April 1990, Ron convened a meeting of 25 leaders in tobacco control, from a variety of countries, where the concept for a new scientific journal devoted solely to tobacco control was hatched.1 Ron and others helped pitch the idea to the British Medical Journal Publishing Group which accepted the concept idea and later appointed Ron as the founding editor of Tobacco Control: an International Journal. Ron served as the editor of Tobacco Control between 1992 and 1998. . . .

During his career, Ron served as an expert witness to Congress on public health issues and in litigation against the tobacco industry. His encyclopaedic mind made him a perfect editor and spokesperson on medical and public health issues. Ron had the ability to recall virtually everything in tobacco control, often producing obscure forgotten facts and papers that would perfectly frame an issue. As just one example of Ron’s uncanny ability to illuminate the obvious before the rest of us had seen it, he conducted a study to test whether people could read the warnings on tobacco advertisements shown on billboards littering the highway.4 Of course, they couldn’t as they were speeding by, which only helped to illustrate the stupidity of the government policy that permitted tobacco companies to advertise on billboards. We will surely miss his insight and vision. . . .

Ron’s legacy is much deeper than can ever be expressed in the many prestigious awards that chronicle his career accomplishments. As one of his many friends noted, Ron, in Buddhist terminology was a bodhisattva, an enlightened being who sacrificed his own ultimate nirvana for the benefits of others. Ron’s legacy is the example he set for all of us to follow through the strength of his character, impeccable integrity, graciousness and style, and his dedication to serve his fellow man.

On behalf of all whose lives you’ve touched, Ron, all we can say is we love you, and we thank you for allowing us to share your life’s journey. It’s been a privilege. You graced this earth.

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'Love China' ads slammed  

SHANGHAI - CHINA'S love-hate relationship with tobacco is flaring up in Shanghai, where local lawmakers are considering banning patriotic billboards advertising cigarettes.

The billboards, carrying the expression 'Love China', are a play on one variation of the word China in Chinese, 'Chunghwa', which is also the name of a top cigarette brand made by Shanghai Tobacco (Group).

The Chinese characters for both are identical.

The scarlet 'Love China' billboards and posters feature a gleaming golden picture of Beijing's historic Tiananmen Gate, the entrance to the Forbidden City, but no images of cigarettes.

They also carry the warning: 'Smoking can damage your health' - signaling that the slogan refers both to China and to the cigarette brand.

The topic cropped up last week during the annual session of the local legislature, when some lawmakers proposed that the billboards be banned, the state-run newspaper Shanghai Daily and other reports said.

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LETTER: Are billboards useful or a blight on vistas? 

As I drive, I observe billboards with anti-smoking messages, anti-drug messages, political messages, religious messages and public-interest messages. Even billboards advertising restaurants and hotels are usually much more informative and helpful than the useless state signs telling you that the next exit has the inevitable McDonalds.

Your concern with keeping the state pristine seems to be misplaced.

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Antismoking ad replaced / Some say billboard promoted tobacco 

"We had a handful of people who complained about them," said Geralyn Lasher, spokeswoman for the state Department of Community Health, which sponsored the ads. . . The ad, one of five designed for the antismoking campaign that began in April, featured a youngster with a cigarette jutting jauntily from his lips.

Above him, the billboard reads: "Your little brother thinks everything you do is cool." Below him are the words: "Smoking stinks."

The ad was targeted at 9- to 14-year-olds and played very well with them when tested, Lasher said.

But some callers said the ads appeared to be promoting smoking, not attacking it.

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