Tobacco.org

AUDIO: Many Decisions Remain Over Tobacco Regulation  

"Our goal is to design the best products that we can and then, under federal authority, make them available to adults who do not quit."

Bill Phelps, a spokesman for Philip Morris

"I would say if you're going to try to make this the first step to lead to bigger and better things in the future, then you need to not tie FDA's hands."

Michael Siegel, Boston University School of Public Health

All Things Considered, June 12, 2009 · It's been 45 years since U.S. Surgeon General Luther Terry made what at the time was an earth-shaking announcement -- that smoking causes cancer. That began decades of debate over tobacco and what the government should do about it that this week culminated in a new milestone: Congress passed legislation that gives the Food and Drug Administration the authority to regulate tobacco. . . .

With years of rule-making and assessments still ahead, it's difficult to predict how stringent the FDA's regulation of tobacco will be. That uncertainty is unsettling for many on both sides of the nation's tobacco debate.

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Tobacco Control Media Events Calendar 

July 4—Independence Day

* Ideas for Independence Day—"Celebrating Freedom from Addiction"

August

August 26—Equality Day

* Equality Day (Sample News Release)

* Sample Letter to the Editor on Women’s Equality Day and Smoking

November

November 19—American Cancer Society's (GASO)

* Great American Smokeout (GASO)

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• Frequently Asked Questions 

CS2day Program Overview and Partners 

The CS2day initiative is supported by an educational grant from Pfizer

CS2day Program Overview and Partners

CS2day integrates current science with a thorough assessment of physician/healthcare professional needs into innovative and traditional educational formats. These formats include a wide landscape of educational offerings, from conferences at local and national levels to Web-based, print, CD -ROM , and interactive cases to television formats and hand-held tools. Performance improvement projects focus learning on improving individual and system practices.

CS2day builds on the “Lessons Learned” from the dissemination of the 2000 Public Health Service Tobacco guidelines. Updated 2008 guidelines will form the foundation for key messages and measured outcomes that ultimately lead to an overall decrease in smoking rates in the United States. Each physician and healthcare professional is encouraged to participate in multiple CS2day educational programs to reinforce learning. The project utilizes Moore’s evaluation scale to assess outcomes from knowledge acquisition to population health.

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S.770 - Medicare, Medicaid, and MCH Tobacco Cessation Promotion Act of 2009  

A bill to amend titles V, XVIII, and XIX of the Social Security Act to promote cessation of tobacco use under the Medicare program, the Medicaid program, and the maternal and child health services block grant program. . . .

Bill status:

Read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance.

Introduced:

4/01/2009

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Congress grants FDA oversight of tobacco  

The Southern Baptist Convention has passed tobacco-related resolutions dating to 1932. A 1984 resolution urged churches and other SBC entities to encourage Southern Baptists not to use tobacco. It also called on Southern Baptist farmers not to raise tobacco but to grow another crop when feasible. In 2005, the SBC adopted a resolution urging an increased effort to reduce smoking by teenagers.

The ERLC's Land was one of the leaders of a religious coalition that supported the legislation the last several years. Other organizations in the 25-member Faith United Against Tobacco included the United Methodist Church, American Baptist Churches USA, National Council of Churches, Seventh-day Adventists, Presbyterian Church (USA), Christian Methodist Episcopal Church, Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism and Islamic Society of North America.

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• Tobacco group launches lawsuit  

New Tobacco Alliance Committee has launched a $500 million claim against the Canadian and Ontario governments for their alleged part in the destruction of the local tobacco growing industry.

Ontario MP Randy Hillier, who was the guest of honour at a barbecue hosted by Oxford-Norfolk-Elgin Landowners barbecue at the Purdy farm in Courtland on Saturday, announced the launch of the lawsuit. In the past, Hillier – who is now running for the leadership of the provincial Progressive Conservative Party – has supported tobacco farmers by appearing at numerous rallies when he was the head of the Ontario Landowners Association.

The press release outlining the lawsuit blames the governments over the last decade for trying “to tax cigarettes out of the market. The predictable result is that instead this has created a black market which delivers cigarettes to Canadians at one-third the price of legal cigarettes.”

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EDITORIAL: Breaking the habit 

Some people may think eating red meat, for instance, isn’t the most healthy choice, but it pales by comparison with the 400,000 people who die every year from tobacco-related diseases, according to government figures. Those deaths represent individual tragedies as well as a $100 billion national price tag to provide health care for people with tobacco-related illnesses.

In a nation built on individual freedom, Americans still will be free to smoke, but the legislation passed Friday may make cigarettes at least a little less attractive to smokers and especially to young people who haven’t yet decided to take up the habit.

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ROUNDTABLE: FDA oversight of tobacco  

EDITORIAL: Our View: A long-overdue attempt to regulate tobacco  

Naturally all of these changes were fought by the tobacco companies, save for the biggest, Philip Morris corporate parent Altria Group. The leaders of the latter didn't embrace them out of the goodness of their hearts, but because they think they'll keep the same percentage of a dwindling market of smokers regardless of the regulations. Still, fewer Americans are lighting up each year, and the latest moves are expected to shave youth smoking by 11 percent over a decade.

Given that smoking companies, many southern lawmakers and other politicians flush with campaign cash from Big Tobacco managed to stand in the way of such regulations for decades, the votes here - 307-97 in favor in the House, 79-17 in the Senate - provided not only a welcome surprise but a real exclamation point. Obviously this is a law whose time has come.

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KELOLAND Reacts To Possible Tobacco Regulation 

People in KELOLAND are on both sides of debate over the potential regulations.

Some people say the government is stepping out of bounds, and that smoking doesn't need to be so heavily regulated.

"With everything that they've talked about and all. You go to the doctor, and they tell you smoking is bad for you. We're adults. If that's our right, our choice, let us do it," Michele Christensen of Sioux Falls said.

But others agree with parts of the tobacco legislation, especially when it comes to advertising aimed at teenagers and children.

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EDITORIAL: Tobacco's days  

From the earliest days, in countless ways, tobacco built North Carolina. The business and its profits erected everything from humble flue-curing barns to soaring Duke Chapel, and from the coast to the mountains tobacco-growing shaped a landscape of auction barns, warehouses, cigarette factories, even whole towns. Tar Heel generations, black and white, followed one another into the broiling fields, the leaf-laden barns and the red-brick factories. It was a living, good for many, grand for some, and a way of life. Is it over? . . .

The change is a good one, particularly the focus on youth. . . .

Old habits die hard. For generations North Carolina politicians have protected tobacco, even sought to boost its prospects here by exporting addiction abroad.

That, of course, was how the whole thing got started, roughly 400 years ago. North Carolina colonists cashed in on tobacco shipped to England. As in Virginia, then the greater tobacco producer, much of the pre-Civil War labor was done by slaves. The bright leaf curing process -- discovered in 1839 by a slave in Caswell County -- eventually brought North Carolina tobacco to the top rank and created the cigarette industries of Durham, Winston and elsewhere.

The rest is history. . . .

our state's fields are still first in production, even as tobacco's share of our economy falls. More dislocation lies ahead, but FDA regulation is unlikely to put the industry out of business in North Carolina, and less smoking will surely be good for America.

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EDITORIAL: Triumph of common sense 

tobacco addiction is a costly vice for everyone. The price for the treatment of diseases or losses in the workforce is close to $100 billion. Add to this the pain experienced by families and the patients suffering from cancer, strokes, respiratory and heart problems.

Finally, common sense has prevailed, and very soon a product as addictive and harmful as tobacco will be regulated.

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Roll Call: House, Senate OK regulation for tobacco products  

TOBACCO REGULATION: Voting 307 for and 97 against, the House on June 12 gave final congressional approval to a bill (HR 1256) launching Food and Drug Administration regulation of tobacco products . . .

A yes vote was to send the bill to President Obama.

Yes: G.K. Butterfield, D-1; Bob Etheridge, D-2; David Price, D-4; Melvin Watt, D-12; Brad Miller, D-13

No: Virginia Foxx, R-5; Howard Coble, R-6; Mike McIntyre, D-7; Larry Kissell, D-8; Sue Myrick, R-9; Patrick McHenry, R-10; Heath Shuler, D-11

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EDITORIAL: Feds are tackling tobacco  

Certainly, no one should argue with the measure's provisions aimed at dissuading young people from smoking. Candied and flavored cigarettes that are popular among teenagers and young adults will be banned, and promotions aimed at youth will be severely restricted.

We've long held the position that whether one wants to smoke or not is an individual choice. But young people do not have the maturity or life experience yet to make an informed choice to start a habit that may well lead to serious health consequences later in life.

In fact, it's been 45 years since the surgeon general first warned that tobacco can cause lung cancer. Millions of Americans have chosen to take up smoking or continue smoking despite that possible death sentence.

Although this legislation gives the FDA more power than it ever has had over tobacco, the choice of whether to smoke or not remains with individual adults. Some of them undoubtedly will continue to light up -- and that's still their prerogative to do so.

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