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Pub landlord jailed over smoke ban to make MP bid  

A Lancashire landlord jailed after failing to pay fines when customers smoked in his pubs is set to stand for Parliament at the forthcoming General Election.

Smoke ban martyr, rebel and baccy happy landlord.

These have all been used in the tabloid press to describe Chorley publican Nick Hogan, who was jailed after failing to pay fines when customers smoked in his pubs.

Dad-of-two Nick, whose family runs the Swan with Two Necks in Chorley's Hollinshead Street, served 12 days of a six-month prison sentence before people from around the world clubbed together to pay off his fines and court fees of more than £10,000.

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• 7,729 booked for ignoring smoking ban 

A total of 7,729 persons were found smoking in public areas where smoking was prohibited since the ban was introduced in mid-September 2004, Home Affairs Minister Carm Mifsud Bonnici said in reply to a parliamentary question.

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Smoking Bill Would Ban Lighting Up In Eateries  

You can still light up at Heroes, you just have to go outside to the deck, but if senator Vivian Figures is successful, anyplace place in Alabama that sells food would have to be smoke free.

"It actually makes me cough and get teary eyes, shortness of breath. That's what it does to me," Figures says of how she reacts to second-hand smoke.

Those legendary smoke-filled rooms at the state capitol? She says, they were real. "It actually escalated to asthma, where I had an asthma attack on the floor of the Senate one night."

She says that is why Figures fought for and helped pass the law creating smoking sections in restaurants. Last week, she introduced Senate Bill 541, which would completely ban smoking in restaurants and restaurants with bars. The law wouldn't apply to stand alone bars and lounges. She says there is not enough support for that.

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Smoking rebel will now stand for Parliament  

A CONTROVERSIAL pub landlord who was jailed for not paying fines imposed for defying the smoking ban is to stand for Parliament.

Nick Hogan, who was released from prison last week after his debt was paid by supporters, has been selected as a candidate by the UK Independence Party (UKIP) to represent Chorley, where he and his wife Denise are in charge of The Swan With Two Necks pub.

The former boss of the Swan and Barristers in Bradshawgate, said: “UKIP is pro-choice and that I why I am standing for them.

“Smokers are treated like second class citizens by this government, which is out of touch with public opinion. I have had letters from people across the whole country and that has given me a real morale boost.

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Supervisors to make smoking ban expansion official  

The Board of Supervisors takes a second and final vote Tuesday on legislation -- introduced by Supervisor Eric Mar -- that would increase the number of no-smoking areas in San Francisco.

The ban expansion, which was 2½ years in the making, went too far for some and not far enough for others. It was unanimously approved by the board during its first vote. The legislation was amended leading up to that vote at least 17 times in an effort to address business concerns.

The ban expansion makes it illegal to smoke in "service waiting areas," such as ATM, telephone and movie theater lines. It also bans smoking in common areas of residential buildings

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• salina.com - an online service of the Salina Journal 

Parkinson said the bill stands for fundamental change "that will have the result of saving thousands of Kansans' lives in the future. People who might be against what we've done, we're going to save their lives, maybe their kids' lives, maybe even their grandkids' lives. You don't get a chance to do that very often."

In his remarks, Parkinson cited Roth and Democrat Lisa Benlon, D-Overland Park, as key advocates for the measure in the House. They helped lead a bipartisan coalition, together with numerous health advocates -- doctors, nurses and health professionals.

"Would the Legislature do the right thing or yield to the tobacco industry?" Parkinson asked. "When tested in this way, this year, Kansans won, the special interest groups lost, and Kansans got the clean air that they deserve."

The sky didn't fall

Parkinson said the research is quite clear that thousands of people die due to exposure to secondhand smoke, and new research is exposing stronger links between heart attacks and strokes.

What wasn't clear from banning smoking in most public places was the effect it would have on businesses, the governor said. So it was really great to have Salina pass a comprehensive indoor clean air ordinance banning smoking.

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• Bid goes up in smoke  

Hundreds of inmates at Canada's biggest prison, calling themselves "scum of the earth," have failed in a strange bid to join a court battle over smoking.

The federal court of appeal will hear an appeal this morning by the Correctional Service of Canada. It is seeking to overturn another court decision of last October that tossed out the prison service's smoking ban.

Corrections Canada banned smoking by convicts inside buildings and on the property of the country's 58 penitentiaries in May 2008.

The nearly 600 convicts at Warkworth Institution, a medium-security prison 100 kilometres west of Kingston near Campbellford, wanted to join the court fight. They filed more than 130 pages of unusual material with the court, invoking the Bible and the Magna Carta, and citing doc-u m e nt s they obtained from Buckingham Palace. . . .

The appeal is scheduled for 9:30 this morning.

It involves Corrections Canada and 19 inmates imprisoned in Quebec who won the smoking ban reversal last year. The group includes notorious mobsters, gang members and killers.

They complained that the total ban led to anxiety, weight gain and ill-health. The decision overturning the ban was suspended until the appeal was heard.

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Club To Appeal Smoking Ban  

The first appeal of the state's new smoking ban may come to health officials as soon as next month, County Attorney Mark Payne said Monday.

Payne told the Guilford County Board of Health that Gate City Billiards Country Club in Greensboro is expected to test the new law which bans smoking in restaurants and bars. The establishment wants to claim private club status, Payne said. The new law requires an appeal to the health board following several citations.

"We have less than a dozen establishments who are repeat offenders and this one wants to test the law with an appeal," Payne said. "The billiards club changed its name, adding country. The law exempts country clubs as a subset of private clubs. This club does not meet the private club criteria."

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• 13 China colleges to offer anti-smoking courses 

Thirteen Chinese medical colleges will introduce smoking control courses into their curriculum amid efforts to help raise public awareness about the dangers of smoking.

It will be the first time that Chinese universities have offered such courses, Shen Huahao, vice dean of the School of Medicine, Zhejiang University, said Tuesday.

The school is among the 13 medical colleges, including Peking Union Medical College and medical schools at Peking University and Fudan University. . . .

At least 6,500 students were expected to take the courses each year, for them to complete a five year anti-smoking education program, Shen said.

"We hope to increase smoking control efforts, starting from in schools," he said. "We'll train the medical students so they know the dangers of smoking."

More than half of Chinese male doctors are smokers

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UPDATE Governor signs ban on toylike lighters 

Cigarette lighters that look like toys would be banned, under a bill signed into law Monday by Gov. Haley Barbour.

The law takes effect July 1 and prohibits the sale of novelty lighters.

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"Boys Clubs" Corner the Market on Lifting the Smoking Ban  

When it comes to the District's smoking ban, the only folks who seem to be able to skirt the issue appear to be members of "boys clubs."

D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty signed legislation to lift the smoking ban last week so the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick could puff away at their 82nd Annual Dinner on Wednesday night at the Capitol Hilton. It was only the second time the ban has been lifted that we know of, and both times have benefited all-male events. . . .

Longtime organization member Bill Edwards was mum on the ban, but did offer some insight into the Friendly Sons. Membership is limited to 200, and new members are selected only when a member leaves.

For this dinner, each member can invite two guests.

"You do the math," Edwards said. "Members are from all walks of like and include doctors, dentists and bankers."

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Senate passes ‘Termination Era’ PACT Act; tribal leaders will continue fight  

Handing big tobacco corporations a huge victory, the U.S. Senate has passed the Prevent All Cigarette Trafficking Act - an act tribal leaders say is an attack on tribal sovereignty and economies that will devastate Indian tobacco businesses across the country.

The PACT Act passed by unanimous consent without a vote or a hearing late the evening of March 11. The act bans the shipment of cigarettes and certain tobacco products through the U.S. Postal Service, cutting off the only remaining delivery service for Indian retailers who do business through Internet sales. A few years ago, former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer, who was ousted in a prostitution scandal, "persuaded" private carriers such as Federal Express and UPS to "voluntarily" stop shipping tobacco products. . . .

The bill will now move back to the House for a vote, before being sent to President Barack Obama for passage. Tribal leaders are calling on Obama to send the bill back to Congress for an amendment that explicitly exempts sovereign Indian nations from the act.

The PACT Act passed without a single Senator objecting, said Lance Morgan (Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska), CEO of Ho-Chunk, Inc. and partner at Fredericks, Peebles & Morgan.

"So it comes down to Obama. He is an adopted Crow and he says all the right things, but this is real and not the campaign trail.

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AUDIO: UCSD Researcher Finds Cigarette Ads Targeted Teen Girls 

A new study from UCSD finds a 2007 marketing campaign for Camel cigarettes was effective in encouraging teenage girls to smoke. The ads apparently violated a tobacco industry agreement that prohibited companies from targeting kids.

The ads for Camel No. 9 ran in five of the most popular magazines among teen girls, including Glamour and Vogue.

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Camel No. 9 cigarette ads are a big hit with teenage girls: study 

Fashion magazine ads for Camel No. 9 cigarettes scored such high marks with girls ages 12 to 16 that a year after they appeared, 22% of the girls in a new survey listed Camel as their favorite brand of butt, according to USA Today.

Nearly half of the 1,036 tweens and teens in the study, published online in Pediatrics, could name a favorite cigarette ad. Nonsmoking teens who can identify a favorite ad are 50% more likely to take up smoking as other kids, says the study. Some 80% of smokers start lighting up before age 18.

Camel No. 9 was launched in 2007, and promotional giveaways featured berry-flavored lip balm, cell phone jewelry, wristbands and purses, according to the study. The ads for the cigarette ran in magazines like Vogue, Glamour and Cosmopolitan.

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Radiation May Help Those With Inoperable Lung Tumors 

A carefully targeted and powerful regimen of radiation therapy kept early-stage lung tumors stable in patients who had inoperable cancers.

Almost 56 percent of patients who underwent the therapy, called stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT), were still alive three years after their treatment, according to preliminary findings from a study published in the March 17 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, a themed issue on cancer.

By contrast, only about 25 percent to 30 percent of patients who receive conventional fractionated radiotherapy survive that long.

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