Tobacco.org

MERCER: We've really come a long way now 

Once or twice during my freshman year in college, my roommate's father brought me a carton of luxury British cigarettes.

Thrilled by the elegant boxes, I smoked the cigarettes with gusto. Today, that would be like someone's dad randomly picking wild mushrooms in the woods, carrying them to the dorm and saying, "Here, these look great. They may be deadly, but eat up." . . .

But it's a sign of how far we've come that usually anti-regulation Republicans back tobacco regulation. Here's Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas: "One might ask, as a conservative: Why would one support more regulation rather than less? Well, because of this split personality the federal government has in dealing with tobacco -- recognizing it is a deadly drug, recognizing marketing often targets the most vulnerable among us, and recognizing the fact that it kills so many people and increases our health care costs not only in Medicare but in Medicaid … ."

Despite all the education about the dangers of smoking, lung cancer kills more women than any other form of cancer, including breast cancer. I finally quit smoking for good about 1995. No ad or cool British packaging could tempt me now. My friend Laurie wasn't so lucky. She and I both loved smoking, and we puffed through many a late-night dorm discussion of poetry and politics. Lung cancer claimed her at 52.

When I see a smoker, I see someone who just hasn't quit yet.

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Malawi’s Tobacco Price Rises 64 Percent at Sale, Nation Says 

Tobacco prices in Malawi, Africa’s largest exporter of the Burley variety, rose 64 percent during a sale yesterday, the Nation reported, citing data from the Limbe auction floors.

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EDITORIAL: Butt out: Finally, the FDA gets broad powers on tobacco 

It has been 45 years since the U.S. surgeon general warned that smoking tobacco causes lung cancer, yet cigarettes today remain the single-largest cause of preventable death in the nation. . . .

Although smokers may be the only people paying the per-pack price for cigarettes, everyone shares the higher medical costs attributable to smoking, and nonsmokers also share the health risks -- 30 percent of employees are not covered by laws that require smoke-free workplaces and 22 million children aged 3 through 11 are exposed regularly to second-hand smoke.

Thanks to Congress and President Barack Obama, who struggles as a former smoker, public health has finally won its long fight against Big Tobacco.

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Menthol Exception In US Tobacco Bill Draws Critics' Fire 

The future of menthol cigarettes, smoked by 12 million Americans and 75 percent of African-American smokers, could be the next flashpoint in a decades-long campaign against smoking in the United States.

Last week, Congress passed a bill giving the Food and Drug Administration the power to regulate tobacco products, a move that includes the banning of Indonesian clove cigarettes.

President Barack Obama is expected to sign it into law soon. The bill also outlawed o ther flavorings like chocolate an d cherry that can attract young people to start smoking, but excluded menthol, by far the most popular flavoring, accounting for around 27 percent of the cigarette market.

Under the bill, the FDA must study the medical effects and marketing of menthol and its impact on blacks, Hispanics and other groups and report within 18 months. In theory, the FDA could then move to ban menthol cigarettes but some anti-smoking activists are skeptical the agency will do so.

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Japan Tobacco plans price hike  

Japan Tobacco Inc, the world's third-largest tobacco firm, said it is likely to hike its domestic cigarette prices within the next three years to secure a profit amid a steadily shrinking market.

Like other developed nations, Japan's smoking population has been declining due to growing health awareness, hitting Japan Tobacco, a former state monoply which controls 65 percent of the domestic cigarette market.

There has been growing speculation that Japan Tobacco would hike its cigarette prices for the first time since July 2006 after it set a target of keeping its core profit from its domestic tobacco business steady for the three years through to March 2012.

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KARL ZIOMEK: It's hard to blame officials for trying to regulate the tobacco industry  

Not everyone agrees with more and more federal regulation, however.

One of our staff writers, Rene Cizio, ran an Internet blog Saturday about the impending legislation and the response was mixed.

Some people, while recognizing the harm of tobacco use, consider legislation against it infringing on their rights. One responder asked openly what the government was going to attack next: alcohol, sugar, etc.? He also noted the hypocrisy of banning smoking in some public places (restaurants, for instance) while letting it remain in others (casinos, for example), all because money does a lot of talking. Actions like these give the critics more and more ammunition against the "big government" policies of Obama's new administration.

But is it really government intrusion? Or is it just righting a longtime wrong? Is it right to let hundreds of thousands of people die each year because they have been lured into a horrible habit by a woefully under-regulated industry?

I guess Tobacco Road is going to know what Motown feels like when the government gets involved.

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EDITORIAL: Wait and see: Only time will tell if new tobacco rules will have an impact  

The danger of tobacco use has been known and taught for decades, yet every day 3,500 more young people light up. While these efforts have just about halved the percentage of adult smokers, one in five Americans over the age of 18 still smoke. Significantly, the American Lung Association reports that 20 percent of high school students were current smokers in 2007.

Despite public ostracism and onerous tax rates that have driven up the cost of tobacco products, that 20 percent hasn't deviated much in two decades. The effectiveness of these new measures will be measured by the success they have in reducing that rate.

One final reason to take a wait-and-see approach to these changes was the votes in the House and Senate -- 307-97 and 789-17 respectively. When votes are that lopsided, an issue is either very, very popular or it has been watered down with loopholes that render it meaningless.

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Local entrepreneur touts benefits of new smokeless, tobacco-less E-cigarette  

Smoking is back -- it's legal.

As long as it's an Elxtro Vapor Cigarette.

Elxtro is a company started by 26-year-old Valparaiso resident Marc Smith. He got the idea after his mother saw a commercial for an electronic cigarette, or "e-cigarette" and promptly ordered $400 worth.

"I got into the business," Smith said. "I did all the research and contacted the manufacturers." . . .

Smith said he has exclusive arrangements to sell his product in several other Westfield malls and plans to launch in the West Coast and Florida as well. He has bartenders in Chicago demonstrating the cigarette behind the bar, hopes to vend the product at cancer treatment centers and gas stations and plans to take the E-cigarette to the stage.

"My next target is theater," he said.

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Reynolds Says North Carolina Tax Plan Imperils Jobs (Update2)  

Reynolds American Inc. said North Carolina Governor Beverly Perdue is putting manufacturing jobs at risk with her proposal to raise cigarette taxes by $1 a pack.

“We want more jobs, not taxes,” Daniel Delen, chief executive officer of Reynolds’ R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. unit, said today during a rally in Raleigh, North Carolina’s capital. “Taxes cause direct job losses.”

More than 400 Reynolds employees gathered to urge legislators to reject raising cigarette taxes in the state that grows the most tobacco in the U.S. and is home to Reynolds and Lorillard Inc.

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'Cannabis alters human DNA'  

The researchers add that the ability of cannabis smoke to damage DNA has significant human health implications especially as users tend to inhale more deeply than cigarette smokers, which increases respiratory burden. "The smoking of 3-4 cannabis cigarettes a day is associated with the same degree of damage to bronchial mucus membranes as 20 or more tobacco cigarettes a day," the team adds.

"These results provide evidence for the DNA damaging potential of cannabis smoke," the researchers conclude, "implying that the consumption of cannabis cigarettes may be detrimental to human health with the possibility to initiate cancer development."

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Smokers can take cancer risk test 

Zealand researchers said Tuesday they have developed the world's first test to measure the risk for individual smokers and ex-smokers of developing lung cancer.

The test combines results of DNA analysis with other risk factors such as age, diseases such as bronchitis and emphysema and family lung cancer history, said University of Auckland associate professor Robert Young.

"All smokers face an increased risk of developing lung cancer, among a host of other serious health problems, but for some individuals the risk is much greater than for others," Young said.

"With this test, doctors will be able to identify those at greatest risk while there is still time to help."

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Report on US tobacco control policies and use finds stark contrasts in progress among states 

The United States is becoming a nation of haves and have-nots when it comes to tobacco control, according to a comprehensive publication on cigarette smoking prevalence and policies in the U.S. that was released today.

The new report, "Cigarette Smoking Prevalence and Policies in the 50 States: An Era of Change -- the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation ImpacTeen Tobacco Chart Book," was presented today at the National Conference on Tobacco or Health meeting in Phoenix.

It was prepared for the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation by researchers in the University at Buffalo Department of Health Behavior in UB's School of Public Health and Health Professions and at the Roswell Park Cancer Institute. Researchers from eight other institutions also contributed, including the University of Illinois at Chicago, the National Cancer Institute and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

The report includes individualized data on smoking behaviors for all 50 states as well as a discussion of national trends revealed by the data.

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• North Carolina Tobacco Farmers Find Friend in Sen. Hagan  

To hear Sharp rant is to understand why Kay Hagan, North Carolina's new senator, joined Richard Burr (R-N.C.) and 15 other senators to become the only Democrat to vote against the tobacco bill. And if any tobacco farmer has Hagan's ear, it is Sharp.

Last year, when Hagan was a little-known candidate running in an uphill battle to unseat Republican Elizabeth Dole, she campaigned at Sharp's farm. The fiscally conservative tobacco farmers along the I-95 corridor here make up a constituency that often helps swing statewide elections, and they backed Hagan strongly.

Hagan, 55, is no stranger to tobacco. A former lawyer and bank executive, she spent summers as a child stringing the leaves on her grandparents' farm. In the state legislature, she represented Greensboro, the headquarters of Lorillard Tobacco, which employs about 2,500 workers there.

To call Hagan merely a defender of the "golden leaf" industry would be an understatement. She is among tobacco's fiercest backers. In 2005, as co-chairman of the state Senate's appropriations committee, she helped shave back an increase in the cigarette tax from the 45 cents a pack proposed by the governor to 30 cents. During last year's campaign, Hagan received $19,200 from the tobacco industry, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

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UPDATE: Lorillard Plans $750M Debt Sale; 1st Since Spinoff  

Lorillard Tobacco Co. (LO) announced plans for its first debt sale - $750 million of senior notes - since its spinoff last year from holding company Loews Corp. (L).

Proceeds could go toward purposes including repurchasing stock, said Lorillard, whose market value is $11 billion.

Moody's Investors Service and Standard & Poor's Ratings Service rated the company two and one notches, respectively, above junk territory.

"Lorillard is well-positioned as the third-largest U.S. cigarette manufacturer with a dominant position in the menthol category, leading market share and significant brand equity for its Newport cigarette brand," Moody's senior credit officer Janice Hofferber.

But S&P credit analyst Mark Salierno played up the fact that Lorillard is in an industry with falling sales and high lawsuit risks

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Lorillard Announces Inaugural Offering of Debt Securities 

Lorillard, Inc. (NYSE: LO) announced today that pursuant to its previously announced plans, it has commenced through its main operating subsidiary, Lorillard Tobacco Company, a $750 million underwritten public offering of senior notes. The net proceeds from the offering will be used for general corporate purposes, which may include, among other things, the repurchase, redemption or retirement of our common stock, additions to working capital and capital expenditures.

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