Tobacco.org

• Research: Smoking kills 10,000 Israelis annually 

About 10,000 Israelis die each year from smoking, 8,664 actual smokers and the rest from other people's cigarette smoke, according to Dr. Gary Ginsberg and colleagues who just published an article in the European Journal of Public Health.

Around 23 percent of the population over 18 smokes, and about half of all smokers eventually die of tobacco-related diseases.

The former head of the Health Ministry's Center for Disease Control, Prof. Manfred Green, who is now head of the University of Haifa's School for Public Health, had previously set the estimate considerably lower.

The previous official estimate of deaths among active smokers was 3,859 per year; the new calculation puts the real figure at more than twice that. . . .

The US Centers for Disease Control supplies a widely used online user-friendly computational program called SAMMEC (Smoking Attributable Mortality, Morbidity and Economic Costs) to produce estimates of tobacco-related mortality.

However, the SAMMEC tool, write Ginsberg and colleagues, "loses accuracy because it lacks flexibility in deciding which diseases enter into the calculations, has estimates of relative risk attributable to smoking based on old studies and does not allow for the latency period that occurs between initial exposure and mortality."

The difference between the old estimates and the new one is attributable to expansion of the list of diseases included, updating the estimates of relative risk for smoking-attributable death and the use of smoking prevalence from previous years to more accurately reflect the effect of tobacco use on disease occurrence, the researchers write.

They add that "there is a need to establish an "authority‚ to implement a multi-faceted intervention strategy to decrease the considerable burden from smoking in Israel."

Amos Hausner, a prominent tobacco-control lawyer who heads the Israel Council for the Prevention of Smoking, commented that much publicity is given by the media to less than two dozen deaths from swine flu. But smoking has a much more devastating toll among people of all ages.

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• MK considers bill to bar smoking in vehicles with kids 

After Johns Hopkins University researchers have proven that the amount of harmful nicotine in air-conditioned cars with smokers is much higher than in pubs and restaurants that allow smoking, an MK is considering initiating a bill to bar smoking in vehicles with children as passengers.

Only a few countries and several US states have barred smoking in cars occupied by children. Photo: Tovah Lazaroff

Israel Beiteinu MK Robert Ilatov, whose colleague MK Yuri Shtern proposed such legislation three weeks before his death from brain cancer in 2007, told The Jerusalem Post on Monday after learning of the Baltimore study that such a bill would be a fitting memorial to Shtern. He asked to read the study, which was published on Tuesday in the journal Tobacco Control.

Health Ministry associate director-general Dr. Boaz Lev said he personally was very much opposed to smoking in cars containing minors, but that he had not discussed the proposal with Deputy Health Minister Ya'acov Litzman (United Torah Judaism), who decides policy.

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• Litzman dithers over graphic cigarette warnings 

Although the US has now joined 30 countries in requiring all cigarette packets to display gruesome images of the results of diseases caused by smoking, Deputy Health Minister Ya'acov Litzman (United Torah Judaism) has "not yet decided his position," an aide said.

Use of the graphic displays is being strongly urged by the World Health Organization's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, which Israel has ratified. Putting such images on packets has been proven in scientific research to lower smoking rates significantly, with many smokers getting the message and their children, spouses and friends demanding that they kick the habit.

Images appearing around the world include a mouthful of yellowed, rotten teeth; blackened lungs; gangrenous feet; a dead fetus lying near cigarette butts; a hole in the throat, in addition to bold texts such as "WARNING: Smoking can kill you," and "Tobacco smoke can harm your children."

Countries featuring the warnings include Canada, the UK, Singapore, China, Brazil, Austria, Germany, Finland, the Czech Republic, New Zealand, Australia, Panama, Thailand, Romania, France, Hungary, Jordan and Iran.

"His schedule is packed," Litzman's personal aide Ya'acov Izak told The Jerusalem Post

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• Health Ministry Bans Electronic Cigarettes  

The Health Ministry has banned electronic cigarettes, both the import and use of those previously brought into the country. The product is marketed as an aid to help smokers stop smoking.

The move comes in the wake of a health warning by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) about the product. The FDA did not ban their sale or use, however.

The Israeli Health Ministry decision, which came out Tuesday, covers both the import and sale of the product, including those that are marketed as nicotine-free.

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• Smoke-free advocate: Minister can restrict tobacco products  

Israeli anti-tobacco activists are divided over whether the government should initiate a law to regulate the manufacture and marketing of tobacco products. Such a law is about to be signed by US President Barack Obama - 45 years after the US Surgeon General officially declared that smoking was dangerous to health. . . .

Amos Hausner, Israel's leading smoke-free advocate, told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday that the US legislation was "very controversial" and that he had "mixed feelings about it."

"The danger to health is inherent to tobacco products. But if there is regulation by the authorities, smokers could think they're not so bad," he explained.

He added, though, that if Israel wanted to implement a similar policy, " we don't need the US law, because since 1993, Israel has had pharmaceutical regulations that give the health minister the power to issue regulations regarding consumer products that endanger health - and cigarettes are included. The health minister can demand changes by the manufacturer and even prohibit sale." . . .

The ministry executive briefly discussed the US law during its weekly Sunday morning meeting. It has not yet released its official policy. But the ministry fears that the Treasury would not give it funding for a unit to supervise and regulate tobacco products, even if a law to this effect were passed.

Dr. Lea Rosen, a former Health Ministry public health official who now does research on tobacco cessation at Tel Aviv University's School of Public Health, told the Post that in general, she would favor such a law here.

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• Saving tomorrow's patients 

What is the most effective way to discourage smoking? Chantix tablets? A support group? Nicotine patches? Or, how about sharply raising the price of cigarettes by jacking up the tax?

A new study compared the efficacy of the various methods in Israel for the first time, looking at medical efficacy and cost efficiency. The results are presented here in a ranked list. . . .

The team compiled two lists: One lists methods that save the state money. The other lists methods that may not achieve that end, but the methods in both lists have proved effective in helping people stop smoking.

The first contains methods that were found to be cost-effective, meaning they involve costs, but ultimately save the health system money.

These include raising the tax on cigarettes (which just happened, adding NIS 2 per pack of cigarettes), taking large doses of Champix tablets (2 milligrams a day), or drug therapy combined with a telephone hotline for quitters in crisis.

The second list includes methods that don't save the health establishment money. But they were found to be more cost-effective for the smoker: Each shekel invested in these methods had a considerable contribution to the health of both the actual smoker and his associates, who may suffer the effects of passive smoking. This list also contains Pfizer's Champix tablets, but at a lesser dosage of 1 milligram a day, as well as the drug Zyban. Nicotine patches also make this list, as did counseling.

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• Class action suit filed over menthol cigarettes 

What is being described as the world's first class action lawsuit on behalf of people who developed lung cancer from smoking menthol cigarettes has been initiated by Israel's leading anti-tobacco attorney, Amos Hausner, The Jerusalem Post has learned.

He is representing the family of a Rehovot mother of four who died of a tumor at age 47 after many years of smoking Dubek's Montana brand of cigarettes. He is also acting on behalf of an estimated 3,000 other menthol-cigarette smokers who developed cancer here during the past seven years. The statute of limitations on a manufacturer's responsibility for damage caused by its products runs out after seven years.

The Jerusalem lawyer is asking the Central District Court to recognize the case as a class action suit against Dubek - Israel's largest tobacco manufacturer - for NIS 3 billion. It will probably be several months before the court gives its response.

Research conducted by tobacco companies a decade or more ago to identify additives that increase tobacco addiction showed that menthol did the trick, and the companies made a special effort to market cigarettes with this additive.

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• Bedouin Smugglers Armed Hamas 

A Bedouin man who works with his family as a cigarette smuggler has been charged with helping Hamas bring weapons to Gaza. Hassan Ali Suarcha was charged on Monday in the Be'er Sheva District Court with weapons smuggling and providing material aide to a terrorist organization.

Police say the Suarcha family, a Bedouin clan based primarily in the Sinai Peninsula, is involved in smuggling cigarettes and tobacco from Egypt to Israel. Cigarette smuggling is a lucrative trade – smugglers can earn twice the average monthly salary in just one day, and the trade as a whole brings in tens of millions of shekels each year.

Hassan Suarcha was one of several smugglers who began using his route to bring dozens of Kalashnikov rifles to Hamas, police say. The rifles were hidden in sacks of tobacco.

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• TA pub target of planned NIS 20m. suit for illegal smoking 

Jerusalem lawyer and anti-tobacco activist Amos Hausner has asked the Central District Court to certify a NIS 20 million class-action suit against a north Tel Aviv pub and club, for failure to enforce no-smoking laws in the establishment.

The pub, Mandy's on Rehov Rokah, is named for Mandy Rice Davis, who was involved in the Profumo Affair that discredited the Conservative government of British prime minister Harold Macmillan in 1963, and subsequently converted to Judaism and settled in Israel.

Davis and her husband, Rafi Shauli, are not official owners of the pub, but they are involved in the business, according to Internet news reports. . . .

Hausner was prompted by complaints from a non-smoking couple named Eli and Gal who went to Mandy's to celebrate the anniversary of their meeting and were overwhelmed by smoke. The couple said all their attempts to get the staff to stop the smoking were fruitless.

Hausner then found 19 photos on the Internet used to promote the place. All the photos showed smokers and the lighting up of cigarettes throughout the pub, even though smoking in pubs is illegal except in completely separate and ventilated smoking rooms.

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• Taxmen smoke out cigarette counterfeiters  

Customs officials this week uncovered a gang suspected of manufacturing counterfeit cigarettes in the Kanot Industrial Zone near Gedera. The gang, whose members come from the center of the country, are suspected of manufacturing and selling millions of shekels worth of counterfeit cigarettes.

The Haifa Magistrate's Court extended the remand of three of the suspects for four days. The gang was uncovered by the tax authorities and Haifa's customs investigation department after an investigation lasting several months.

On Sunday the customs people raided the plant and discovered a production line for making counterfeit cigarettes; brands that were copied included Marlboro, Kent and Parliament.

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• Court authorizes NIS 7m. anti-smoking class action against club 

A district court judge has agreed for the first time to certify a class action suit - for NIS 7 million - against a dance club in Tel Aviv for failing to enforce no-smoking laws . . .

The precedent-setting case will be heard in a few months by judge Michal Nadav, who ruled that the law has to be enforced even in relatively small clubs, to protect the rights of nonsmokers and to deter violators.

The Bella Shlomkin's pub, located on Tel Aviv's Rehov Noah Mozes, could be subject to payment of NIS 1,000 to each of more than 6,000 nonsmoking customers who visited the place on Friday nights - when special events were held there for Russian speakers - between January and August 2008.

Lawyer Amos Hausner filed the suit on behalf of Mark Litvin and his wife Yelena . . .

At a preliminary hearing this week, David Assaf, who does not know the plaintiffs, testified that he was ejected from the club by manager Ron Fire after asking that the incessant smoking of customers be stopped.

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• Smoking ban, shaky economy wallop Dutch bars  

He is not the only Dutch smoker deciding to stay home. Bars and cafes in the Netherlands are seeing revenues slump after the government introduced a smoking ban in July, shortly before the credit crisis took hold.

The double whammy is costing bars as much as 30 percent of their business, said Joris Prinssen of Royal Horeca Netherlands, a lobbying group representing 20,000 bar and restaurant owners.

Other countries, too, have been hit by the coinciding smoking bans and economic malaise.

Gerard Laloi, who heads a group that represents France's bar owners, said beer sales fell 12 percent in the first nine months of the year compared with the same period last year. France banned smoking in bars and restaurants on Jan. 1. . . .

In Israel and Cyprus smoking bans also are regularly flouted.

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• Firm sued by ex-employee over asthma linked to smoking coworkers 

The first lawsuit to be filed against an employer whose failure to stop smokers apparently caused a non-smoking employee to contract asthma has been submitted to the Rehovot Magistrate's Court, with the plaintiff demanding NIS 707,500.

Avi Greenberg is a 31-year-old Shoham resident who worked for almost a year in logistics, distribution and service at Negev Ceramics Marketing in Rehovot. He is demanding this sum for permanent disability (of 20 percent); refusal of severance pay; medical devices he needs; a potentially shortened life span; lack of salary; suffering, restrictions and pain; and an objective medical expert's opinion.

He is being represented by lawyer Amos Hausner, the chairman of the National Council for the Prevention of Smoking, who said that if Greenberg wins the case, it will deter many employers from permitting blatant violations of the law preventing smoking at the workplace, other than in designated separate rooms.

Every time Greenberg went to work, he was exposed to "massive amounts of tobacco smoke" from two to eight heavy smokers

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• Stars of Hollywood's golden era were paid to promote smoking 

Top Hollywood stars in the 1930s and 1940s, among them Clark Gable, Spencer Tracey, Joan Crawford, John Wayne, Bette Davis, Betty Grable and Al Jolson, were paid by tobacco companies up to $75,000 a year (today's value) to promote specific brands of cigarettes, according to a study by US researchers published Thursday morning in the journal Tobacco Control.

The companies contracted with actors, actresses and singers and paid them what totaled millions of dollars to endorse the Lucky Strike, Old Gold, Chesterfield and Camel brands of cigarettes - and the performers did it willingly, even though it was already known that tobacco was harmful to health.

In all, almost 200 performers took part in the cigarette endorsements, including two-thirds of the top 50 box office Hollywood stars from the late 1930s through the 1940s. The continued presence of on-screen smoking in today's mainstream films is rooted in these "studio era" deals, according to study authors K.L. Lum, J.R. Polansky, R.K. Jackler and S.A. Glantz of the University of California at San Francisco and Stanford University. . . .

In return for the paid testimonials of their stars in cigarette ads, major studios benefited from nationwide print and radio ads for themselves and their movies in lucrative "crossover" deals, paid for by tobacco companies, the researchers maintain.

The studios with the most "crossover" deals were Paramount and Warner Bros . . .

This all took place even though in 1931, the precursor of the US Motion Picture Association of America had banned actor endorsements and on-screen product placement.

The researchers showed that the studios simply ignored the ban . . .

Amos Hausner, Israel's leading anti-smoking lawyer, commented that showing scenes of cigarette smoking has been a key strategy of tobacco companies to get children and youth hooked on smoking.

"Subliminal advertising is even worse, as it has even more power than obvious advertisements to get young people addicted to tobacco," he said.

Many popular Israeli films, as well as Golden Oldies from Hollywood that are rebroadcast here, are full of tobacco smoke, and some even show brand names, even though it is illegal to advertise smoking on TV.

Hausner, who in 1998 filed a NIS 7.6 billion lawsuit on behalf of Clalit Health Services against Israeli and foreign tobacco companies, included a whole chapter on how movies shown in Israel subliminally advertise cigarettes. The case has been awaiting a decision by the Supreme Court since 2005. . . .

The Israeli reality show on Channel 2, Big Brother, in which most of the residents of a villa cooped up for 100 days smoke, has elicited complaints

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• Smoky air in Israeli pubs, cafés worse than in countries with bans 

Before the latest anti-smoking law went into effect last November, the amount of particulate matter from smoking in Israeli cafés, bars and pubs was nearly 20 times that permitted in indoor air, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and 10 times the levels measured at such establishments in countries where bans on smoking in public places are well enforced.

These findings were reported by Dr. Laura (Leah) Rosen and colleagues at the Tel Aviv University School of Public Health and Dr. Greg Connolly of the Harvard School of Public Health, who are now monitoring levels of particulate matter since the law took effect. Rosen told The Jerusalem Post on Wednesday that she hopes to have data to present by December. Both studies have been funded through Harvard by FAMRI, the Flight Attendant Medical Research Institute. . . .

"Whether the new law will successfully promote clean air in Israeli bars, pubs, cafés and other indoor places is yet to be seen," they wrote in their article published in the just-published August/September issue of IMAJ, the Israel Medical Association Journal.

Rosen said that while her post-enactment data is not yet available, she has the feeling that some municipalities and local authorities around Israel are significantly better than others, even though all are obligated to enforce the law.

Attorney Amos Hausner, who heads the Israel Council for the Prevention of Smoking, agreed and noted that some municipalities have said openly that they don't intend to enforce the 10-month-old no-smoking law . . .

It's impossible to file lawsuits against all the municipalities that fail to enforce the law properly, thus as a last resort, Hausner intends to take the Israel Police - which has the ultimate responsibility for enforcing the law but claims to be "too busy" and has left the job to the municipalities and local authorities - to the High Court of Justice.

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