Tobacco.org

• Merseyside | Smoking actors 'to be rated 18' 

Films featuring characters who smoke could soon be handed an automatic 18 rating while showing in Liverpool.

Liverpool Primary Care Trust (PCT) wants young people banned from exposure to smoking actors because of research suggesting they influence children.

An estimated 5,300 under-18s smoke in Liverpool, half of whom were influenced by films, the PCT claimed.

If the policy is approved, the council could enforce 18 classifications under the Licensing Act 2003.

The city council has stressed a decision is yet to be made, and people in the city have been urged to engage in a consultation, which starts in August.

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EDITORIAL: FDA on the case to stop smoking  

Although the nation's smoking rate has been in decline, one and five Americans still smoke and more than 400,000 of them die each year from smoking-related diseases. Kudos go to the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, medical groups and other advocacy groups for their insistence on tougher regulations.

The new tobacco bill gives America a chance to finally kick the habit.

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• Croat cafe owners want smoking ban to be optional 

Croatia's cafe and restaurant owners launched a petition on Wednesday to modify a law banning smoking in public, saying it is crippling businesses already weakened by recession.

The government enforced the law on May 6, much to the displeasure of Croatia's one million smokers.

They make up a third of the 4.4 million population in this European Union candidate country, where cigarettes had been taken for granted for years.

The guild of cafe and restaurant owners organised the signing of a petition in all major towns. It will ask the government to allow smaller premises to choose if they want to cater for smokers or non-smokers.

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专家建议：室内公共场所工作场所全面禁烟 

本报北京6月17日电（记者范又）6月16日，在新探健康发展中心召开的"加速实现100%无烟环境"研讨会上，中国疾控中心流行病学首席专家曾光研究员、首都医科大学崔小波教授等多位公共卫生专家建议，在学校、网吧、餐馆、机场等一切室内公共场所和工作场所全面禁止吸烟。

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在烟盒上印折寿致癌警示 

近日，中国卫生部门呼吁世界最大规模的控烟宣传———在全国每年约1千亿盒卷烟的包装上，印上折寿、自残、致癌、畸形胎儿等健康警示图形。

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卫生专家呼吁加速实现北京“100%无烟环境” 

新华网北京６月１６日电（记者张展鹏 桂涛）中国公共卫生专家在北京１６日召开的“加速实现１００％无烟环境”研讨会上表示，目前北京在网吧、餐馆、学校等公共场所禁烟状况令人担忧，呼吁加速实现“１００％的无烟环境”。

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• FDA wrinkles its nose at electric cigs  

Moss, who lives in Durham and once smoked three packs a day, wasn't bothered by the lack of studies on the e-cigarette.

"It's unproven," he said, "but I have no fear because I'm not smoking cigarettes."

E-cigarettes are available online as well as in a number of gas stations and at least one mall in the Triangle.

Earlier this year the U.S. Food and Drug Administration began cracking down on the import of the devices, stopping shipments at the border. Most e-cigarettes are manufactured in China.

"Basically, we don't have any data on these products," said Karen Riley, an FDA spokeswoman. . . .

Jed Rose, director of the Duke Center for Nicotine and Smoking Cessation Research, said his lab has done some testing of e-cigarettes that focused on the way they deliver nicotine. E-cigarettes don't deliver all the cancer-causing agents that tobacco cigarettes do, but it's not clear exactly what they put in the user's body.

When asked whether e-cigarettes were safer than tobacco-filled ones, Rose said the required studies have yet to be done: "That's a tough question to answer without safety data." . . .

Moss said he used to spend more than $600 a month for cigarettes for himself and his wife. The e-cigarette habit costs only about $150. And because the vapor has almost no smell, he has smoked his e-cigarette in a movie theater as well as on an airplane.

If e-cigarettes are declared illegal, he said, "we'll go underground like anything else."

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LETTER: Deutsch: Tobacco bill's consequences 

Hard as it may be to believe, a bill which, as I write, has just been passed by the Senate and is on the way to a President who is eager to sign it, will clearly have effects opposite to those which it is said to have been designed to produce. The bill authorizes the FDA to require that the nicotine content of cigarettes be lowered. Let me explain how this would increase the sales of cigarettes, require smokers to pay more for their habit, and increase the incidence of cancer caused by smoking. . . .

Many studies have shown that nicotine addicts smoke until they have absorbed enough nicotine to satisfy their craving. This means that they will smoke more cigarettes if the cigarettes contain lower concentrations of nicotine. This, in turn, means that they will be subjected to more of the "tars" (the cancer-causing ingredients of the smoke) in their attempt to get their usual dosage of nicotine (the ingredient responsible for heart disease).

Thus they will buy more cigarettes, maintain their exposure to heart disease and increase their chances of developing cancer and thus their overall chance of dying. And for us nonsmokers, the effect will be to increase our exposure to second-hand smoke.

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Ho-Chunk Nation v. Wisconsin Department of Revenue  

At issue is whether the land on which the relevant sales took place satisfies that portion of the statute. The land was approved for purchase in August 1982 and formally accepted by the United States government on January 31, 1983. The question on which this case turns is at what point a particular parcel of land "was designated . . . trust land" for purposes of Wis. Stat. § 139.323.

¶2 The court of appeals determined that land cannot be held in trust until formal acceptance occurs and that in order to satisfy the tax refund statute's requirements, land must be held in trust on or before January 1, 1983. Because formal acceptance of the property in question here did not occur until after that date, the court of appeals held that the claim for a refund was properly denied. This was the same result that had been reached by the Wisconsin Department of Revenue (DOR), the Wisconsin Tax Appeals Commission (the Commission), and the circuit court. The Ho-Chunk Nation sought review.

¶3 For the reasons set forth below, we affirm. "[R]eservations or trust lands" are also referred to in the sentence preceding the provision in question; a sensible reading of the statute (Wis. Stat. § 139.323) requires that the two references be read as identifying the same land. The grammatical construction of the sentence itself lends further support to our holding because "was designated" precedes both "a reservation" and "trust land" and means the same thing about each. Given that there is no basis in the federal regulations for recognizing a preliminary, unofficial status for reservations or trust lands, there is likewise no basis for reading this statute as intending to apply to land that has received only preliminary informal approval.

¶4 We therefore hold that in this context the phrase "was designated a reservation or trust land" is necessarily read as referring to the applicable formal process that must occur in order for land to be a reservation or trust land. Because the proper authorities had not completed the necessary steps for the property in question to be designated a reservation or trust land on or before January 1, 1983, and because that is required in order to qualify for the tax refund, the claim was properly denied.

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Court nixes Ho-Chunk's bid for cigarette tax refund 

The Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that the state does not owe an Indian tribe thousands of dollars in cigarette tax refunds.

The Ho-Chunk Nation was seeking a partial refund on cigarette taxes collected by the state at its Dejope Gaming property in Madison for parts of 2003 and 2004.

The tribe argued it was owed the money under a state law allowing tribes to get refunds on 70 percent of cigarette taxes collected on tribal lands designated before Jan. 1, 1983. The exact amount the tribe was seeking wasn't immediately clear. Had it prevailed, the tribe was expected to seek similar refunds for other years.

The Supreme Court ruled 4-3 Tuesday that the five-acre gaming property was not formally designated as tribal land until Jan. 31, 1983, when the deed was approved.

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MORFORD: Your wonderful totally bogus freedom  

Some people are outraged that the FDA might now step in and restrict smoking even further. Some people don't want more crackdowns on the free 'n' happy use of tobacco. Why? Because smoking bans are abusive and invasive. People hate them. Check that: smokers hate them; everyone else thinks they're pretty great and long overdue and hey, check it out, my clothes don't reek anymore after five minutes in a bar. Nice.

Even now, smokers feel they are the last, great persecuted group on the planet. They feel they are unjustly shunned and mocked and made to go far, far away to enjoy their toxin of choice, unless they are shoved inside a sad little glass box at the airport like some sort of exotic animal zoo display from the depths of 1976. Look over there, kids! Sickly, yellowish people who smell awful and enjoy phlegm! Don't stare, Timmy. . . .

Do not misunderstand. I am no fan of hissing, hyperactive lawmaking, of more agencies and rules and insidious bureaucracies, of unchecked powers given to our megalomaniacal politicians to probe and peek and control. Far from it. But I'm also not much of a fan of the silly hypocrisy of bogus outrage, the feigned indignation, the puling and ranting about what we ourselves happily agreed to construct.

Freedom doesn't mean wanton wasteful, lawless, screw-'em-all behavior whenever you feel like it because Jesus and your drunken id said it was OK. It means being able to see the nature of that pool we all built together, to dive in deep, sink and spit and maybe sometimes nearly drown, and still come up laughing. Doesn't it?

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BAT buys Indonesian cigarette maker 

British American Tobacco said on Wednesday it had acquired a majority stake in an Indonesia clove cigarette maker for $494m, as the company seeks growth in emerging markets to offset slowing sales in mature economies.

The deal, which values Bentoel Internasional Investamal at $580m, would allow BAT to enter Indonesia’s big kretek market, or clove-flavoured cigarettes that are consumed by nine in 10 Indonesian smokers.

It would lift BAT’s market share in the world’s fifth-biggest tobacco market by volume from 2 per cent to 9 per cent.

BAT’s main rival Philip Morris International is the leader with a market share of about 27 per cent, mainly through its Sampoerna unit, which it bought for $5bn in 2005.

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EDITORIAL: On FDA regulation of tobacco 

The nation is left with an oddity: a Washington health agency charged with overseeing a deadly product. But the strictures are remarkable for their sweep.

Pushed along by ever-sharper public demands, Congress has turned on an industry that once ruled Washington via lobbyists, contributions and long-tenured legislators from tobacco states.

The new law won't mean anything unless the regulations drive down tobacco use and keep teenagers from taking up the habit. One prediction from an anti-smoking group: that the 20 percent of adults who presently smoke will drop to 5 percent in 20 years - a wish come true.

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• ANA Mounts Suit to Block Tobacco Legislation  

Nearly a half-dozen entities, including the Association of National Advertisers, are aiming to block legislation passed last week to give the Food and Drug Administration regulatory control over the packaging, manufacturing and marketing of tobacco products.

In a lawsuit that's also expected to include tobacco companies and the American Civil Liberties Union, the groups will argue that marketing and advertising restrictions laid out in the bill fail to comply with free-speech protections provided by the First Amendment. . . .

The ACLU sent a letter to all senators prior to last week's vote, which read: "In the absence of a much more substantial narrowing of the advertising restrictions in a manner directly tied to the goal of reducing youth smoking, we urge the removal of the advertising restrictions set forth in Section 102 of the bill."

The ANA sent a similar letter. Dan Jaffe, exec VP-government relations at ANA, said he expects one of the tobacco companies to take the lead. "It is likely that some of the tobacco companies will challenge some of the legalities of these restrictions and the ANA will have to decide how to go forward. But we will play a role," Mr. Jaffe said. "This creates a substantial precedent that will affect other marketing categories." . . .

From a political perspective, it makes sense for the ANA to take somewhat of a backseat, as its interest isn't in protecting tobacco but preventing a such a precedent from spilling over to other less-polarizing advertisers. . . .

"The advertising provisions were carefully crafted to address a very substantial need -- the marketing of the most dangerous product sold in the U.S.," Mr. Myers told Ad Age. "If there is any commercial speech that it is constitutional to restrict, it is the type of tobacco marketing covered by this legislation, in light of the significant record of the way the tobacco industry has marketed in a misleading way and to youths. The reality is, this bill has been debated intensely in the last two Congresses, and no objections were raised until Congress voted on final passage."

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KATE MOSS Model's 100-a-day cigarette habit  

Kate Moss insists on keeping 100 cigarettes nearby at all times. The supermodel - who is dating The Kills rocker Jamie Hince - loves smoking so much she reportedly makes her personal assistant leave a packet of her favourite Marlboro Lights on every table in her home before she goes to bed.

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