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• 3 counties work to get smoke-free apartments 

Three metro counties will spend about $204,000 from state health-improvement grants over the next two years to help apartment landlords and renters make their buildings smoke-free.

They start the effort with a survey showing that half of local renters would consider moving to a smoke-free building, including 16 percent of smokers.

"We know that many people want to live in smoke-free environments, and we know that can improve public health," said Lisa Mueller, who administers the state grants for Hennepin County.

Hennepin, Ramsey and Dakota counties, as well as Minneapolis, are pooling part of their state grants to hire the nonprofit Association for Nonsmokers Minnesota to advise them on voluntary non-smoking efforts in multi-unit housing.

The association used part of that grant money to conduct the renters survey. It was conducted by Wilder Research and released to coincide with the annual Great American Smokeout, a stop-smoking effort started in 1974 in Minnesota.

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• Pub ban stubs out smoking at home  

A ban on smoking in bars and pubs has prompted many New Zealanders to stop smoking at home, Ministry of Health research shows.

Next month will mark six years since the passing of smoke-free legislation that bans smoking in indoor work environments such as clubs, casinos, bars and restaurants. It came into force one year later, in December 2004.

A ministry expert on tobacco, Dr Ashley Bloomfield, says one of the positive spin-offs of the law has been that the number of smoke-free homes has dramatically increased. He attributes the trend to a change in attitude - "People started thinking, `I can't smoke in the pub so I won't smoke in my home'."

A report evaluating the law's effectiveness and impact across various sectors shows exposure to second-hand smoke in the home decreased from 20% in 2003 to 9% in 2006. And the cultural shift, which has seen smoking become less socially acceptable, has seen smoking rates fall year on year.

The research, he says, also shows "the overall economic impact [of the legislation] was not a negative one".

But Josh White of the Hospitality Association of New Zealand says there is no doubt the law has had a negative impact on licensed premises. "Everyone that's tried to survive has had to put a smoking area in at their own cost."

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VIDEO: Smoking Ban To Go To Public Vote In 2010  

Smokers will have at least another year of smoking in the bars in South Dakota.

That's because a circuit judge ruled yesterday that opponents of South Dakota's smoking ban have gathered enough petition signatures to put the measure to a statewide public vote.

After testimony ended in a two-day trial, Circuit Judge Kathleen Trandahl found that opponents of the ban had collected 2,244 more signatures than they needed to force a public vote.

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San Marcos' Smoke Signals 

"Behavior modification takes time," said a San Marcos city employee during a November 11 city council meeting. The behavior they would like to modify is to prevent smokers from lighting up in nondesignated areas and flicking their butts in city parks. In 2008, San Marcos city councilmembers tried to do just that when they approved an ordinance banning smoking on park trails as well as establishing designated areas where smokers could spark up.

So far, local health organizations and some councilmembers say the ordinance has been a success. Proof of that success took place at Woodland Park one Saturday afternoon in August. That day, volunteers searched the park for cigarette butts, finding a total of 74 butts tossed in planters, on sidewalks, parking lots, and on the grassy hills. A small number considering a similar event two years earlier, when volunteers collected 926 butts at the same location.

And while some claim the decrease is proof the ordinance is working, councilmember Chris Orlando isn't convinced. Orlando believes modifying the behavior is taking too much time. Instead of focusing on modifying the behavior, Orlando would like to modify the ordinance by removing the designated areas and turning the entire park, as well as a hundred-foot area surrounding it, into a smoke-free zone.

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Smoking lounge rules on Long Beach Council agenda  

Smoke 'em if you got 'em - but only with a ventilation system and not if you're serving any food or beverages - may become Long Beach's new policy for the city's recently legalized smoking lounges.

Oh, and don't invite any of your friends - we're happy with the eight cigar lounges and four hookah bars that we have now, thank you - might also be added to the policy.

That last caveat could become the biggest challenge as the City Council tackles how to regulate smoking lounges Tuesday. The council's Economic Development and Finance Committee voted to recommend new smoking lounge regulations last week, but committee members were concerned about a proliferation of new lounges.

City attorneys and city staff said the city has limited legal right to restrict the number of lounges.

"Once we open this up, I think that there is the potential for other legitimate businesses to qualify under the regulations, and I think that is a consideration the council has to weigh," Director of Health and Human Services Ron Arias told the committee Wednesday.

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City Commissioners will look at smoking ban  

A statewide ban on smoking in bars that went into effect Oct. 1 has created complications for bar owners and customers, City Manager Greg Doyon said last week.

He told city commissioners that the ban has prompted complaints from some residents that it is not being strictly enforced.

He said the Cascade County Tavern Association has its own concerns about the ban. Several taverns have built outbuildings or patios away from their buildings to try to provide customers with a place to puff.

City commissioners will discuss issues surrounding the ban, and hear from association executive John Hayes in a work session at 6 p.m. Tuesday in the Gibson Room of the Civic Center, second floor, 2 Park Drive S.

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• $2 billion in tax revenue up in smoke 

One in two cigarettes smoked in Ontario is illegal, robbing provincial and federal coffers of more than $2 billion a year and raising concerns about children gaining easy access to tobacco.

"There's absolutely no doubt that there's an incredible amount of revenue lost both in the province of Ontario and Quebec and to the federal government as well," provincial Community Safety Minister Rick Bartolucci said in an interview.

A study for the Canadian Tobacco Manufacturers' Council found that illegal cigarette purchases in Ontario have climbed to 48.6 per cent, followed by Quebec with 40.1 per cent. . . .

Originating on First Nations reserves, the contraband smokes are readily available in most towns and cities.

"People have to understand the severity of buying, of making ... and what damage it does do," said Bartolucci.

But how do we know? Enter the squad of "butt pickers."

In a separate investigation last month, the National Coalition Against Contraband Tobacco collected by hand 19,770 cigarette butts near 110 high schools, and discovered 30 per cent were illegal.

The coalition, which was launched by the Canadian Convenience Stores Association, whose members lose an average of $115,000 in sales annually due to illegal cigarettes, analyzed 14,064 butts from 75 Quebec high schools and concluded 45 per cent were contraband.

Because each legal cigarette has a distinctive marking on the filter, investigators are able to pinpoint hot spots for untaxed and unregulated smokes.

Ontario and Quebec represent about 95 per cent of illegal tobacco sales in Canada, and about 33 per cent of cigarettes sold in Canada are contraband, according to the manufacturers' council study. . . .

The major source of that supply is the Akwesasne native reserve that straddles Ontario, Quebec and the State of New York. Ten cigarette manufacturing plants on the U.S. side pump out billions of cigarettes annually.

"We know that perhaps 95 per cent of the contraband in Canada originates in illegal operations located on four First Nations reserves, the most important of which by far is the U.S. side of Akwesasne near Cornwall, Ont. There is also Kahnawake near Montreal, Tyendinaga near Belleville, and Six Nations near Brantford," said Cunningham.

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Letter _Web version__ Stop Internet sales of tobacco products  

Illegal sales of tobacco products are costing our nation and states billions in lost revenue. Increases in federal and state government excise taxes have created an explosion of illegal tobacco product sales over the Internet, and such purchases are evading federal, state and local taxes.

How is this happening? Remote sellers typically sell untaxed or low-taxed cigarettes over the Internet or by mail or telephone to consumers without paying the taxes owed to the states. Indiana is losing significant tax revenue because of this illegal practice, and consumers are often unaware that they are personally liable for any applicable unpaid taxes.

Fortunately, there is a potential solution in the Senate known as the Prevent All Cigarette Trafficking Act of 2009. This legislation closes a number of gaps in federal law regulating "remote" or "delivery" sales of cigarettes and smokeless tobacco products and prevents anyone underage from obtaining tobacco products remotely.

In 2000 there were only about 40 domestic Internet sellers of cigarettes, but by 2006 there were more than 770 Web sites selling cigarettes to U.S. smokers, and nearly half of these sites were based outside the United States. . . .'

I encourage our U.S. senators, Richard Lugar and Evan Bayh, to support and co-sponsor the Pact Act of 2009 because it is an important opportunity to further protect the legitimate channels of distribution for cigarettes and smokeless tobacco in Indiana.

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‘Vaccine’ helps smoker blow off cigarettes  

Leslie Cook was losing control of her life one cigarette at time, 20 cigarettes a day.

The 53-year-old Boston real estate lawyer spent nearly half her life smoking, and nothing - not patches, gum, gurus or drugs - loosened the grip of nicotine.

"I just felt like it owned me. It controlled me," said Cook, who finally kicked the habit in 2007 with the help of an experimental vaccine called NicVax, which took away the pleasure of nicotine.

"I don't miss it to this day," said Cook, who participated in a clinical trial at Massachusetts General Hospital testing the drug.

Buoyed by the success of the first trial, MGH researchers are looking for more smokers like Cook who are willing to join in the third and final phase of a clinical trial testing the crave-curbing vaccine. Last week, researchers enrolled 50 smokers.

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Cigarette, oxygen bottles fuel fire that destroys couple's Port Townsend duplex  

A cigarette and oxygen bottles combined to fuel a fire that destroyed a home early Wednesday morning, leaving its two residents homeless.

The fire, accompanied by explosions heard from miles away from the home at 1068 Cedar St., destroyed Unit B of a single- story duplex. . . .

Jay Reynolds, who was on oxygen for a health condition, often would get up in the night, light a cigarette and step outside to smoke it, Keplinger said fire investigators determined.

Early Wednesday morning, he apparently lit a cigarette, stood up to go outside and passed out or had a seizure, she said.

"He fell to the floor and pulled a tube on the oxygen tank loose," Keplinger said.

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• Cancer hits Tennesseans hard  

Tennesseans die of cancer at the fifth-worst rate in the nation.

What kills them most frequently is cigarettes, but a powerful mix of misinformation and denial also drives up the death count.

A Tennessean examination that included dozens of interviews with doctors, cancer experts and patients across the state found health professionals frequently encounter people who have ignored symptoms for months or even years before going to a doctor. A lack of urgency or confusion about routine cancer screenings, coupled with misconceptions about treatment and even a fatalistic acceptance of the disease, leads to cancers being diagnosed too late to be treated successfully.

"There's a personal value system, a thought process that says, 'It can't be me,' and an incredibly complicated health system," said Mary Jane Dewey, director of the state Health Department's sole free cancer screening program. "Even people with insurance can't understand their policies."

Lung, breast, prostate and colorectal cancers are the most commonly diagnosed in the state. In the 2001-05 reporting period, more Tennesseans died from lung cancer — 20,629 victims — than from the other three combined. . . .

But money can be an issue. The Tennessee legislature put $10 million into smoking prevention and cessation programs for the first time for the 2007-08 fiscal year, but then halved that the following year. This year, the state's tobacco control program is running on a $1.5 million budget, all but $300,000 of that from a Centers for Disease Control grant.

The money pays for the state's 1-800-QUIT-NOW line, which matches smokers with counselors to help them quit, and literature.

But anti-smoking advocates look most longingly at the state's $4.8 billion settlement with tobacco companies, which it began receiving in annual payments in 1999. The legislature voted to put the money into the general fund; none into anti-smoking programs. Tennessee has collected $1.9 billion to date.

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Lung cancer leading cause of cancer death in women 

Blount Memorial Cancer Center Director Carmen McCloud says the Cancer Center had 86 female patients who suffered from lung cancer in the last two years. She said smoking caused 90 percent of those lung cancer cases. Thursday is Great American Smokeout Day, which is a good time to think about giving up tobacco products, she says.

"The Great American Smokeout is a day to stop smoking and change your life. On Thursday, free information on how to quit smoking will be available in the hospital's outpatient lobby between 7 a.m. and 3 p.m.," McCloud adds.

According to the American Cancer Society (ACS), within 20 minutes of quitting smoking, blood pressure drops to normal, pulse slows to normal and the temperature of your hands and feet increases to normal.

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Great Falls residents complain smoking ban isn't enforced 

Smoking in Montana's bars, casinos and restaurants was forbidden Oct. 1, but some Great Falls residents are complaining the prohibition isn't being enforced.

That's prompted the Great Falls City Commission at a meeting Tuesday to again take up an issue many had thought resolved last month.

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Smokers take heat for dumping cigarette butt 

Smokers have been driven like outcasts to the front of offices, hospitals and restaurants so that they don't taint other peoples' lungs.

Now they're under fire for another environmental scourge: cigarette-butt litter.

The dead filters -- dark after use with scores of chemicals and heavy metals -- clutter landscaping, litter office entrances, line gutters and wash into streams.

A monthlong initiative in Hillsboro Village this fall, complete with signs and cigarette-butt receptacles, reduced the cigarette trash by about 40 percent, according to the Metro Beautification and Environment Commission. The effort was made possible by a $1,500 grant.

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Death of mother and children in house fire a 'total shock' to neighbors 

The neighbors were able to convince the little girl to jump into their yard to safety as the house was destroyed by flames. Kennetha Gay, and two other children, 3-month-old Kenron Treadwell and 4-year-old Mirrisa Gay perished in the blaze. A 6-year-old boy walked out the back door unharmed.

Tina Tackett, another neighbor, said the deaths have rocked the normally quiet residential street in the city's east side. "They were some of the nicest, kindest people you'll ever meet in your life," Tackett said. "It's a total shock." . . .

Firefighters suspect Kennetha may have fallen asleep on a downstairs couch while smoking, sparking the blaze. She got out of the home only to run back inside to try to save her children. She couldn't escape the fire a second time.

Tacket and the Allens said the smoking scenario is uncharacteristic of Kennetha, who was a doting mother. "I don't believe it," said Janis Allen. "She was an excellent mother."

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