Tobacco.org

• Pubs failing to tackle smoking 

Less than half the pubs and bars in England and Wales are complying with a voluntary code to reduce customers' exposure to tobacco smoke, a report reveals.

The hospitality industry introduced the code, called the Public Places Charter in 1999.

It aims to encourage bars and restaurants to inform potential customers about their smoking policy by placing signs outside the premises and having a written policy available.

However, an independent report, commissioned by the Department of Health and trade groups, shows that just 43% are doing this.

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• From adversary to target market: the ACT-UP boycott of Philip Morris (Abstract) 

Conclusions: Unless the goal of a boycott is to convince the tobacco industry to abandon tobacco altogether, such actions invite the industry to expand its marketing under the guise of philanthropy. Tobacco control advocates should be clear about goals and acceptable settlement terms before participating in a boycott of a tobacco company.

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• From adversary to target market: the ACT-UP boycott of Philip Morris 

Results: Philip Morris used the boycott to its own advantage. It exploited differences within the community and settled the boycott by pledging large donations to combat AIDS. Through corporate philanthropy, Philip Morris gained entrée to the LGBT market without appearing gay friendly. Many LGBT organisations, thirsty for recognition and funding from mainstream corporations, welcomed Philip Morris’s overtures without considering the health hazards of tobacco.

Conclusions: Unless the goal of a boycott is to convince the tobacco industry to abandon tobacco altogether, such actions invite the industry to expand its marketing under the guise of philanthropy. Tobacco control advocates should be clear about goals and acceptable settlement terms before participating in a boycott of a tobacco company. . . .

The boycott’s settlement ended any gains the boycott might have brought to the tobacco control movement. In addition to creating legitimacy and fostering dependence on industry largesse, tobacco company donations silence opposition.56 In a 1992 memo discussing questions raised at previous shareholder meetings, one Philip Morris vice president noted ACT-UP’s past criticisms of the company and added: "Considering that we met with them in May and agreed to donate $1,200,000 to AIDS-related organizations, they may decide not to raise the topic again."57 Indeed, we were unable to find reports of any subsequent ACT-UP protests against Philip Morris in the tobacco documents nor in a hand search of the Advocate, a leading national gay publication.

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• Philip Morris targeted gays in 1990s, say documents 

In its push to find new smokers, tobacco giant Philip Morris targeted America's increasingly visible gay community as an enticing new market -- only to distance itself after negative publicity, according to once-secret industry documents examined by University of California-San Francisco researchers.

The researchers detail how, in the early 1990s, Philip Morris first began advertising Benson and Hedges cigarettes in gay-oriented publications as marketers touted the burgeoning community's brand loyalty and spending clout.

But as unfavorable news reports and some angry, conservative consumers questioned the cigarette maker's maintaining its macho ``Marlboro Man'' image, Philip Morris quickly emphasized that it was not targeting gays and downplayed its advertising in gay publications, saying that it was also advertising in Penthouse and Playboy.

The research article outlining the documents was released Wednesday and appears in the June issue of the American Journal of Public Health. A related study focusing on a national AIDS advocacy group's 1990 boycott of Philip Morris also appears in the June issue of the journal Tobacco Control. . . .

ACT-UP intended to pressure both Philip Morris and Miller Brewing to withdraw support from U.S. Sen. Jesse Helms, a leading opponent of gay civil rights and AIDS funding. But that effort died down, the researchers concluded, after Philip Morris co-opted key gay community leaders by agreeing to financially support HIV/AIDS advocacy groups.

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• CUMMINGS: A promise is a promise 

Philip Morris promised to "shut down instantly"if cigarettes were found to be harmful. Now that the company has admitted that "smoking causes lung cancer, heart disease, emphysema, and other serious diseases", when will they keep their promise to stop making cigarettes?

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• CHAPMAN: Other people’s smoke: what’s in a name? 

The editors at Tobacco Control are sometimes asked by authors for our policy on the nomenclature that should be used when referring to "other people’s smoke". To date, the journal has not had a policy of standardising a preferred term, as is the case throughout the research literature . . .

the LexisNexis data in the table show that "secondhand smoke" is now overwhelmingly the term most used in the English speaking news media. . . .

As early as 1973, there is evidence that at least one highly placed individual in Philip Morris loathed the term "passive smoking" . . .

Environmental tobacco smoke

The first published use of this term can be traced to the title of the proceedings of an industry sponsored meeting held in Bermuda in 1974,5 edited by industry consultant Ragner Rylander who claimed it gave "a more precise definition of the exposure than "passive" or "involuntary" smoking . . .

The editors feel that, depending on the context of use, all the terms above have their place in the journal. We do not wish to impose any limiting orthodoxy on authors, but will continue to assess the appropriateness of each occasion of use.

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• Anti-tobacco ads burn McLellan 

A coalition of health groups, non-smoking action groups and public service unions is running full-page ads in the Edmonton Journal and The Globe and Mail today denouncing what it calls backpedalling by Health Minister Anne McLellan on federal plans to curb smoking.

The ad, in the form of an open letter to McLellan, asks why a landmark tobacco-control strategy, announced two years ago by then-health minister Allan Rock and former finance minister Paul Martin, has stalled. "You have been backpedalling on a number of issues," says the ad, timed for World No-Tobacco Day on Saturday and endorsed by 29 organizations across the country.

It takes McLellan to task on five issues. . .

But McLellan, who hadn't seen the ad Tuesday but had been informed of its contents, said her government is doing more and spending more on tobacco control than any of its predecessors.

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• Smoking ban comes with a few exceptions 

"Ninety percent of our members or their husbands or wives smoke," said Holmes, 53. "If we couldn't smoke here, we'd either have to close down because nobody would come, or we'd have to build a deck outside. And we just don't have the money.

"Thankfully, we won't have to do that."

That's because groups like the VFW, Disabled American Veterans and American Legion won an exemption Tuesday when the Florida Legislature passed the law implementing the state constitutional amendment that voters approved in November to ban smoking in indoor workplaces, restaurants and bars.

There are other exemptions as well. The smoking ban, which takes effect July 1, excludes fraternal and civic groups that staff their own events, restaurants that have outdoor patios, and so-called "stand alone" bars that serve incidental snacks.

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• France comes out smoking against cigarettes 

The French government warned this week that it was considering a 25 percent increase in cigarette prices, as part of a drive to reduce nicotine addiction, especially among teenagers.

France is also to ban the sale of cigarettes in tens - known to tobacco companies as "children's packets" - and, for the first time, will make the sale of tobacco to anyone under 16 a criminal offence.

Four days before World Non-Smoking Day, Health Minister Jean-François Mattei signalled that France plans to abandon its traditional tolerance of tobacco and smoking over the next few years.

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• Smoking ban called flawed, in need of a fix 

Legislators left town Wednesday after working out a compromise to crack down on workplace smoking, but the people who put the antismoking measure on the ballot last November said the measure has some ''blatantly unconstitutional'' holes -- including one that would allow globetrotting passengers at Miami International Airport to light up.

The coalition of health groups that sponsored the antismoking initiative said it's elated that the Legislature finally reached a settlement on an issue that had eluded lawmakers during the 60-day regular session. But the flaws, the group said, might force the antismoking contingent into court to block some of the provisions.

The measure, passed Tuesday and expected to be signed into law by Gov. Jeb Bush, would take effect July 1 and would ban smoking in restaurants and most workplaces.

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• Panel weakens bill to let local governments restrict smoking 

Local governments will have more power to restrict smoking under legislation approved Wednesday by a House committee, but they won't be able to restrict smoking in bars or in restaurants that serve alcohol.

It was less than Sen. Jon Johnson, D-New Orleans, had wanted. But he agreed to compromise legislation exempting bars and restaurants from his bill. . . .

As amended by the House Health and Welfare Committee on Wednesday, the bill still allows local governments to pass tougher anti-smoking ordinances -- but those tougher ordinances couldn't be applied to bars and restaurants licensed to serve alcoholic drinks.

Rep. Buddy Shaw, R-Shreveport, tried to amend the bill to allow restrictions in restaurants. Johnson resisted, saying he had reached a compromise with restaurant and liquor industry lobbyists.

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• LETTER: Breathing Others' Smoke: It's Not Going to Kill You 

James Enstrom's finding that exposure to environmental smoke cannot be associated with increased risk of cancer and heart disease comes as no surprise to me as I authored, with a colleague, a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine (292:844-845, 1975) detailing the results of inconspicuous air samplings at restaurants, cocktail lounges, transportation terminals, etc. "to evaluate the health implications for nonsmokers" and found that the concentrations of tobacco smoke were equivalent to smoking about 0.004 cigarettes an hour while in these facilities. It should be recalled that smoking in public places was normal and prevalent a quarter-century ago.

Nor am I surprised at the scurrilous responses of the concerned voluntary health associations. . . .

Nor am I surprised that an attempt is being made to trash Dr. Enstrom's conclusions because the study was funded in part by money from tobacco interests. Does this mean that all the researchers funded by anti-smoking agencies are biased in the opposite direction? . . .

Melvin W. First, Sc.D. Professor of Environmental Health and Engineering, Emeritus Harvard School of Public Health

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• French Open Notebook 

French Open officials are eager to clear the air at Roland Garros, where for the first time cigarettes aren't being sold.

The tournament is enforcing a federal anti-smoking law that has been in effect for years but never strictly observed, according to the office of Christian Bimes, president of the French Tennis Federation.

That meant removing Phillip Morris stands that long sold cigarettes.

The French remain passionate about smoking, and fans roaming the grounds at Roland Garros or watching matches continue to puff as they please.

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• Big Tobacco's new threat 

Today, in the first of a three-part series on the tobacco industry, Peter Kuitenbrouwer tracks the path of a factory's worth of old cigarette-making equipment and finds it leads directly to the door of Big Tobacco's newest problem -- an upstart micro industry that is gobbling up market share. . .

Today, native-owned ADL Tobacco, which produces the brands Supreme and Bailey's, employs 175 people and is the country's largest Canadian-controlled cigarette maker. . .

A native tobacco company with the clout to buy a factory's worth of machines. A tobacco giant desperate to keep its equipment out of a competitor's hands. These are some of the dynamics in the rapidly changing cigarette business in Canada, as uncovered during a three-month probe by the Financial Post. A dozen new companies in the cigarette business have taken an important chunk of business away from big tobacco -- and now command 18% of the market in Quebec, and 12% nationally. Even with taxes sky-high and consumption declining, and charging about $1.25 less per pack than the major brands, these new businesses are discovering that selling cigarettes is among the most lucrative businesses in Canada.

Just about all the tobacco Canadians smoke is Canadian-grown. . .

Cigarette smuggling has returned. However, because Ottawa changed its rules to tax all cigarettes as they leave the factory gate, the old game, exporting Canadian brands tax-free and then smuggling the product back in, is no longer profitable. Today at least one factory on the U.S. side of the Akwesasne Mohawk territory, which straddles Ontario, Quebec and New York State, is producing "Native" brand cigarettes, some of which slip by speedboat across the St. Lawrence River into Canada, for redistribution largely in the Mohawk communities near Montreal. Other illegal players have emerged as well; in March a joint police team raided a non-native tobacco company north of Montreal that, police allege, avoided about $5-million in taxes by selling its product through a network of corner stores in southern Quebec.

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• KEIZER: Dope cafes smoke out the real threat 

IN order to understand Dutch drugs policy, it is necessary to understand something of the Netherlands itself. Universally regarded as the "gateway to Europe", the Netherlands is one of the most densely populated countries in the world and trade and transport have traditionally been key industries.

The Dutch have a strong belief in individual freedom and in the division between the church (in other words, morality) and state. We believe in pragmatism. At the same time, the Netherlands is characterised by a strong sense of responsibility for collective welfare; it has an extremely extensive system of social facilities available to all. . . .

the coffee shops are still operating in an administrative no mans land. Sales of cannabis "at the front door" are not legal, but they are tolerated, and purchases "at the back door" do not fall under this policy of tolerance. In practice, this means that the coffee shop owner is forced to buy the cannabis on the illegal market. This remains an awkward situation.

All the same, the mayors, police chiefs and politicians of the Netherlands still continue to support the concept. Their argument for doing so is that it is better to control half of the problem than nothing at all.

Closing the coffee shops would certainly lead to an increase in dealing on the streets, in private homes and in school playgrounds, which would be accompanied by hard drug sales. --Professor Robert Keizer is senior drug policy adviser to the Dutch Ministry of Health and co-ordinator of the Dutch National Drug Monitor

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