Tobacco.org

• Office Of Tobacco Control annual report shows compliance with smoke- free workplace legislation at highest ever level  

The Office of Tobacco Control's (OTC) 2008 Annual Report shows the compliance level with the smoke-free workplace legislation is 97%. This is the highest level of annual compliance since the introduction of the measure in 2004.

Published today (Monday, June 22nd), the report shows that in relation to smoke-free workplace legislation:

- 97% of workplaces were compliant in 2008, based on the results of the National Tobacco Control Inspection Programme in co-operation with the HSE;

- 25,350 inspections were carried out by Environmental Health Officers (EHOs); . . .

- There were 23 cases taken for sales to minors offences, resulting in 19 convictions.

Speaking on the report, Éamonn Rossi, OTC Chief Executive said the 97% compliance level demonstrated the huge success of smoke-free workplaces and showed the strong public support for measures to protect the public from the serious ill effects of smoking.

"Five years after its introduction, we are delighted with how workplaces and the public continue to support this public health measure. The introduction of the legislation can without doubt be called a success and we must now carry that success forward and continue to be a world leader in tobacco control."

Jump to full article »

• Cigarette tax increased to cut smoking 

The government has raised consumption tax on cigarettes by between 6 and 11 percent to curb smoking and add revenue to State coffers.

The tax hike took effect on May 1 but was made public over the weekend along with a levy of 5 percent imposed on cigarette wholesalers, according to a statement by the State Administration of Taxation.

The tax has not yet been passed on to smokers and it is unclear how much of the increase tobacco companies, wholesalers and retailers will absorb.

"The move will not only increase government revenue but also save the lives of millions," Li Ling,a professor at the National School of Development at Peking University, told Xinhua News Agency.

The Chinese Association of Tobacco Control said in a statement yesterday: "Efforts to increase the tobacco tax and lift tobacco prices have proven the most effective in reducing smoking among smokers of all income levels. It will prevent young people from smoking and encourage more smokers to quit the harmful habit."

Jump to full article »

• Record compliance with smoking ban 

Compliance with the workplace smoking ban reached an all-time high in 2008, according to the Office of Tobacco Control's (OTC) annual report, which was published today.

Last year, 97 per cent of workplaces were compliant with the ban, the highest level of annual compliance since the introduction of the ban in 2004.

A total of 25,350 inspections were carried out in workplaces around the country by environmental health officers in 2008.

Twenty-four cases were brought under the Public Health (Tobacco) Acts resulting in 19 convictions. In addition, 23 cases were taken for failure to comply with the sales to minors legislation, result in 19 convictions.

A total of 562 calls were made to the smoke-free compliance line, the report shows.

Jump to full article »

• Intensive smoking-cessation program can double quit rate in cardiac patients 

Cardiac patients were twice as likely to successfully quit smoking if they received intensive in-hospital counseling plus follow-up support vs only minimal in-hospital counseling, in a recent study [1].

Among patients hospitalized for CABG or MI who were smokers, 54% who received the intensive counseling protocol vs only 35% of patients who received minimal support were confirmed nonsmokers one year after discharge.

Unfortunately, counseling patients about quitting smoking--which research has shown can greatly reduce the risk of a subsequent cardiovascular event--is often neglected by cardiologists, author Dr Ellen Burgess (University of Calgary, Calgary, ON) told heartwire. . . .

The study is published in the June 23, 2009 issue of the Canadian Medical Association Journal.

Jump to full article »

• Inspired by a Children’s Game, Santa Monica Fights Smoking 

Although the amount of money devoted to antismoking campaigns is a fleck in an ashtray compared with the billions spent by Big Tobacco, the ads that try to unsell cigarettes strive to be every bit as creative as those on the other side -- or perhaps more so, given how much more difficult it is to break a habit than form one, particularly when a product contains addictive ingredients.

For instance, the American Legacy Foundation, whose ads seek to disclose the “Truth” about smoking to teenagers and young adults, is bringing out a campaign that carries the theme “Do you have what it takes to be a tobacco executive?” . . .

the New York City Department of Health has garnered attention for an aggressive campaign to fight smoking. And the New York State Department of Health is running ads that urge consumers to ask supermarkets to end their sales of tobacco products.

Another local campaign of note is coming from Santa Monica, Calif., which has long been in the vanguard in the battle against cigarettes. The campaign, which carries the theme “Smoking doesn’t belong here,” adapts the children’s game of “One of these things is not like the others” to remind residents and visitors to obey the city’s far-reaching no-smoking laws. . . .

A brainstorming session yielded the idea to borrow from “Sesame Street” the learning game of “one of these is out of place” as the basis of the campaign, Mr. Burke says.

“In talking about the visuals, the patterns of shapes,” he adds, “we came up with matching them up with the iconic Santa Monica references.”

Jump to full article »

• Majority Disapproves of New Law Regulating Tobacco 

y 52% to 46%, more Americans disapprove than approve of the new law expanding the federal government's power to regulate the manufacturing and marketing of tobacco products. Opposition is especially strong among smokers.

These results are based on a new Gallup Poll, conducted June 14-17. . . .

Even as fewer Americans are smoking today than in the past, and as those who do smoke report smoking fewer cigarettes, the public appears somewhat reluctant to back policies aimed at further reducing the prevalence of smoking. A slight majority disapproves of recent legislation that gives the federal government more power to regulate tobacco, and the vast majority opposes the most extreme anti-smoking policy of a total ban on smoking in the United States.

The precise reasons for Americans' lack of support for anti-smoking policies are unclear. However, it may be that Americans place a higher value on allowing people the freedom to choose to smoke over the public health benefits that would come from reducing smoking even further.

Jump to full article »

The precise reasons for Americans' lack of support for anti-smoking policies are unclear. However, it may be that Americans place a higher value on allowing people the freedom to choose to smoke over the public health benefits that would come from reducing smoking even further.
Gallup seems to have fully absorbed the tobacco industry's 50-year "choice" mantra.

• VIDEO: Obama lauds anti-smoking bill, acknowledges it is difficult to quit 

Standing in the Rose Garden with a number of lawmakers and other guests, Obama declared: "It is a law that will save American lives."

Obama himself has struggled to quit smoking. He acknowledged in his comments how difficult it can be to quit the habit.

"Today, change has come to Washington," said Obama. "This legislation is a victory for bipartisanship."

Jump to full article »

• WAXMAN BEATS BIG TOBACCO.  

This weekend I read Waxman's forthcoming legislative memoir (a burgeoning and exciting genre), written with the assistance of Atlantic reporter Joshua Green, The Waxman Report: How Congress Really Works. It's a very useful primer on congress and the long battles Waxman has led on behalf of a variety of key progressive causes. You also learn, strangely enough, that Waxman was one of the first members of congress to undertake the now common practice of donating to his colleagues' campaign funds in an effort to keep around representatives he saw as effective and curry favor. For all Waxman's idealism, you can't say he isn't savvy.

Waxman began his attempts to regulate tobacco in the early 1980s, with oversight hearings featuring Captain Kangaroo, and continued his work through then-Representative Dick Durbin's controversial 1987 amendment to ban smoking on airplane flights shorter than two hours, Waxman's own groundbreaking 1994 hearings where tobacco executives lied under oath, Newt Gingrich's torpedoing of a 1998 tobacco regulation compromise, and finally President Bush's threat to veto this bill last July that left it hanging...until today.

It says something about Waxman's tenacity and how political change comes about in the face of entrenched interests that it has taken nearly thirty years to achieve federal regulation

Jump to full article »

• Obama signs anti-smoking bill, cites own struggle 

President Barack Obama cited his own long struggle to quit the cigarettes he took up as a teenager as he signed the nation's strongest-ever anti-smoking bill Monday and praised it for providing critically needed protections for future generations.

"The decades-long effort to protect our children from the harmful effects of smoking has finally emerged victorious," Obama said during the sun-splashed Rose Garden signing ceremony.

The bill marks the latest legislative victory for Obama's first five months. Among his other successes: a $787 economic stimulus bill, legislation to expand a state program providing children's health insurance and a bill making it easier for workers to sue for pay discrimination.

The president has frequently spoken, in the White House and on the campaign trail, of his own struggles to quit smoking. He did so again during the ceremony, bringing it up while criticizing the tobacco industry for marketing its products to young people.

"I know — I was one of these teenagers," Obama said. "I know how difficult it is to break this habit."

Jump to full article »

The decades-long effort to protect our children from the harmful effects of smoking has finally emerged victorious. . . . I know — I was one of these teenagers. I know how difficult it is to break this habit.
President Barack Obama, as he signed the FDA bill Monday during a Rose Garden signing ceremony.

• Fact sheet and expected attendees for today's Rose Garden bill signing 

Today, President Obama will sign historic legislation granting authority over tobacco products to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Some of the key elements of this legislation include:

* New Center for Tobacco Products: FDA will create a new Center for Tobacco Products to oversee the science-based regulation of tobacco products in the United States.

* Banning Candy-Flavored Cigarettes: By October 2009, cigarettes will be prohibited from having candy, fruit, and spice flavors as their characterizing flavors. . . .

Stage Participants:

• ROERTY: Tobacco Regulation Opens Better Communications Opportunities  

Swedish Match North America is a Richmond-based company that has been in the smokeless tobacco business in the United States for more than 100 years -- our brands include Red Man chewing tobacco and Timber Wolf and Longhorn moist snuff. . . .

Swedish Match supports meaningful and effective regulation of its tobacco products, believing that manufacturers and regulators should provide consumers with information about tobacco products, so that consumers can make educated choices about which products to purchase.

It is our belief that the FDA bill, which we supported, calls for a regulatory scheme that, if appropriately implemented and administered, would allow adult tobacco consumers to make such choices. . . .

Swedish Match is prepared to work closely with retailers to make sure that adequate, visible shelf space is maintained to allow adult tobacco consumers to make educated choices about which product they want to purchase. By doing so, our company believes that retailers have the greatest opportunity to experience continued growth of the moist snuff category.

In summary, while Congress has completed its work on federal tobacco legislation, the FDA will have to go through an extensive process to establish the specific rules that govern the production, sale, and marketing of smokeless tobacco, cigarettes and roll-you-own tobacco.

Jump to full article »

• Political News Gallup Poll Finds Most Americans Disapprove Of New Tobacco Regs  

According to the poll, 52 percent of Americans disapprove of the new law, which will give the FDA the power to reduce nicotine in tobacco products, block labels that advertise cigarettes as "low tar" or "light," and the authority to ban flavorings such as menthol.

The bill also requires tobacco companies to place large graphic warnings on cigarette cartons.

The poll found a higher disapproval rate among smokers (69 percent) and people with lower levels of education, but found that 62 percent of postgraduates approve of the bill.

There were also differences in approval by party affiliation; 54 percent of Democrats polled approved of the new legislation, while 62 percent of Republicans polled disapproved.

Jump to full article »

• POTUS Events: Approving Tobacco Regulation 

At 2:00 p.m., Obama's expected to sign the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Act from the Rose Garden at the White House. The Food and Drug Administration will receive new authority to regulate tobacco goods.

Jump to full article »

• Big Tobacco Spends Less On Lobbying 

What a difference a decade has made in the tobacco wars — at least to judge by the lobbying expenditures.

Ten years ago, with a bill providing for new tobacco regulation and a cigarette tax pending in the Senate, tobacco companies spent nearly $60 million to fend it off. Lobbying firms benefited handsomely, with multimillion-dollar payments going to Verner, Liipfert, Bernhard, McPherson & Hand, then home to a pair of former Senate majority leaders, Democrat George J. Mitchell of Maine (1980-95), and Republican Bob Dole of Kansas (1969-96); Barbour, Griffith & Rogers, whose name partner Haley Barbour went on to become the current GOP governor of Mississippi; and Baker, Donelson, Bearman & Caldwell, whose most prominent lobbyist was yet another former Senate majority leader, Tennessee Republican Howard H. Baker Jr. (1967-85).

But as Congress this month cleared legislation to grant the Food and Drug Administration authority to regulate tobacco, K Street’s haul, over the preceding 15 months, turned out to be less than half of what tobacco clients spent to defeat the 1998 legislation.

The decline is due mainly to corporate mergers and industry disunity.

Jump to full article »

• PNG businesses slam flourishing black market trade  

Business groups in Papua New Guinea say they are alarmed at the amount of counterfeit goods being smuggled into the country from Indonesia.

They say that not only do sales of cheaper black market goods hurt PNG manufacturing, but the Government loses taxes, and some products may be unsafe for consumers.

There is a flourishing and lucrative trade in smuggled goods, including babies' nappies and cigarettes, at street markets in Papua New Guinea.

PNG's only cigarette maker and distributor, British American Tobacco (BAT), told Radio Australia's Pacific Beat program cigarettes made outside the country have been packaged to look like leading brands.

BAT corporate affairs manager George Panao says the cigarettes do not meet local standards and the Government is losing excise revenue that could go to development projects. . . .

Police Inspector Sakawar Kasieng, of Vanimo's Sandaun province, says police believe the cigarettes are made in Indonesia

Jump to full article »