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A new study shows that tobacco companies suppressed their own internal research on Polonium-210 - minute amounts of which killed former KGB agent Alexander V. Litvinenko - so as to avoid "waking a sleeping giant" as a Philip Morris memo put it, and that it causes as much radiation exposure as 300 chest X-rays a year, is responsible for 1% of all U.S. lung cancers, and more than 1,600 U.S. deaths and over 11,000 deaths worldwide every year.
The study, by the Mayo Clinic and Stanford University, found that cigarette makers "continue to minimize its [polonium-210's] importance in smoking and health litigation and remain silent on the issue on their Web sites and in their messages to consumers." . . .
Unfortunately, the bill before Congress to give the FDA authority to regulate cigarettes, while prohibiting the use of most arguably-benign flavorings like clove and peppermint, does not require the removal or even any decrease in the toxic gases (like cyanide), more than 40 other cancer-causing chemicals (like benzene), or radioactive substances (like plutonium or uranium).
By coincidence, a study just yesterday showed that the tobacco industry manipulated menthol levels in an effort to attract young children into smoking
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Hoping to lure a new generation of smokers, tobacco companies routinely manipulate levels of menthol so that their cigarettes prove more appealing and less harsh to novice users, Boston researchers reported yesterday.
Scientists from the Harvard School of Public Health scoured thousands of pages of industry documents from the 1980s through 2006 and commissioned laboratory tests of cigarettes to confirm a long-suspected link between menthol levels and marketing strategies.
The researchers found that tobacco companies embrace a Goldilocks approach when launching brands: Add too little menthol, a chemical that has an effect akin to anesthesia, and tobacco retains its intense bite. Add too much, and first-time smokers are overwhelmed. Add just the right amount, and cigarettes become powerfully seductive.
A 1987 internal memo from R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., maker of the Salem brand, which uses menthol, summarized the benefits of low-level menthol cigarettes: "Smoother, more refreshing tobacco taste." Such a product, the memo said, would be a "proven winner" among 18- to 24-year-olds.
Black lawmakers are pushing for more government regulation of tobacco, starting with changes to a House bill that would place a ban on menthol cigarettes. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, three out of four Black smokers buy menthols, making them the most popular type of cigarette among African Americans.
The Congressional Black Caucus, along with the National African American Tobacco Prevention Network and other organizations, is leading the movement to make changes to a provision in the bill, entitled the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, that bans additives like cinnamon, clove and other fruit, spice and candy flavors in cigarettes but exempts menthols. Many believe that the exclusion of menthol from the Act is racially charged since mostly African Americans smoke menthol cigarettes.
The Federal Trade Commission today has taken important action to protect public health by proposing to prohibit tobacco companies from claiming that cigarette tar and nicotine ratings are based on an FTC-approved testing method or that they are endorsed or approved by the FTC. The proposal warns tobacco companies that they risk legal action by the FTC if they use the current tar and nicotine ratings in a way the FTC finds false or misleading. The proposal withdraws an FTC guidance issued in 1966 that permits statements concerning tar and nicotine yields if they are based on a smoking machine test known as the Cambridge Filter Method, commonly called "the FTC method."
While today's FTC action is important, it will not by itself end the tobacco industry's deceptive marketing of "light" and "low-tar" cigarettes and underscores the need for Congress to take comprehensive action by enacting pending legislation to grant the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulatory authority over tobacco products. The FTC's action would not explicitly prohibit the tobacco companies from continuing to make statements regarding tar and nicotine levels and would not immediately ban deceptive cigarette descriptions such as "light" or "low-tar."
Two new studies published online today in the American Journal of Public Health demonstrate the critical need for Congress to enact pending legislation granting the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulatory authority over tobacco products. One study found that tobacco companies deliberately manipulate levels of menthol in cigarettes in ways the authors conclude recruit new, young smokers and satisfy long-term smokers. The second study found that tobacco companies, because of public relations and litigation concerns, suppressed their own internal research about the presence of polonium-210, a radioactive, cancer-causing chemical, in cigarettes and cigarette smoke.
These studies demonstrate how the current lack of regulation allows tobacco companies to manipulate their products in ways harmful to health and to control what is in their products and what they disclose about them. Currently, no government agency has the authority to regulate menthol, polonium-210 or any of the more than 4,000 chemicals in a cigarette. The legislation before Congress would fundamentally change this harmful status quo by granting the FDA authority over the manufacturing and marketing of tobacco products. For the first time, decisions about tobacco products would be made to protect public health rather than to maximize the profits of the tobacco industry.
A new Harvard study claims that the tobacco industry in recent years has manipulated menthol levels in cigarettes to hook youngsters and maintain loyalty among smoking adults. The report could further inflame a controversy over menthol in pending tobacco legislation.
The study by researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health, released Wednesday, concludes that manufacturers have marketed brands to what it called a "vulnerable population" of adolescents and young adults by "manipulating sensory elements of cigarettes to promote initiation and dependence."
Young people, the study said, tolerate menthol cigarettes better than harsher nonmenthol . . .
"Marlboro needed a lower-menthol product that would cater to young smokers' sensory needs, as well as a higher-menthol cigarette for older smokers," the study said.
Since then, Philip Morris's share of the menthol market has increased, and it is currently the second-largest seller of menthol cigarettes in the United States.
A spokesman for Altria, the parent company of Philip Morris, challenged both the hypothesis and the facts contained in the study.
Below is a letter ASH has just written to a leading proponent of the FDA bill concerning two misrepresentations about the lethal racist menthol loophole:
We write to most respectfully correct what appear to be misrepresentations concerning the decision to exempt menthol (and not clove, peppermint, etc.) from additives which would be prohibited in cigarettes under the bill providing for FDA regulation of cigarettes [HR 1108]; a bill which therefore appears at the very least to raise racist implications.
It appears that some have been arguing that menthol - and menthol alone, of all other additives - was chosen to be exempted only because it was the single additive which had already been used in cigarettes, unlike other possibilities such as clove, peppermint, etc. But this is false!
Okay, speaking of the race card, do you remember the story where the AMA or the Food and Drug Administration was going to ban all flavorings in cigarettes except menthol, after they learned that 75% of blacks smoke menthol cigarettes? So they didn't want to ban menthol because they thought it would be racist. Guess what? The country's largest organization of doctors last week refused to challenge a controversial tobacco bill that would ban many flavor additives and cigarettes sold in the US but exempt menthol. So the AMA's gone along with the FDA. . . .
Does Obama smoke menthol? That's the thing. He smokes. He tried to quit, but he got off the wagon, the Nicorette didn't do it for him. I don't know if there's menthol Nicorette. (interruption) He's not authentic, this doesn't apply to him, Mr. Snerdley, because he has no slave blood, so if Obama smokes menthol he's exempt because he's not really black, according to Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Michelle's black because she's got slave blood, but Obama isn't black, not authentic anyway. But it's still made to order for him. I mean here's two powerful agencies, one a government agency saying, "You keep pumping out the menthol, Big Tobacco, keep pumping it out." You draw your own conclusions. *Note: Links to content outside RushLimbaugh.com usually become inactive over time.
The American School Health Association, the National Association of Secondary School Principals and the National School Boards Association today joined together to create one voice to urge Congress to pass H.R. 1108, the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, which would give the FDA authority to regulate the tobacco industry.
These three associations, each formed to assist the Nation's youth, agree that H.R. 1108's restrictions on advertising, marketing and sales of tobacco products to children would dramatically improve the protection of youth's health.
"Children are the most vulnerable and susceptible to advertising gimmicks,"
the Food and Drug Administration monitors much of what Americans consume. But cigarettes, which shorten a smoker's life by 10 years on average, have escaped FDA oversight, largely because of political pressure from Big Tobacco. . . .
The House must vote on the bill soon so it has a chance to pass in the Senate. It's been 44 years since the U.S. surgeon general reported that cigarettes are harmful, and the country shouldn't have to wait another year for independent oversight of Big Tobacco.
Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), America's first antismoking organization, urgently needs YOUR help to prevent the passage of a bill which, as it now stands, contains a lethal "racist" loophole which could lead to the deaths of many African Americans as well as others. ASH has taken no position on the bill as a whole.
Congress is considering the passage of legislation (S.625⁄H.R.1108) described as giving the Food and Drug Administration control over the tobacco industry. In reality, this is very flawed legislation that gives the tobacco industry control over the FDA.
Or, as former HHS Secretary (and former ASH Trustee) Dr. Louis W. Sullivan bluntly stated: "If we're banning things such as clove and peppermint, then we should ban menthol, . . . 'If it doesn't happen, this bill will be discriminatory against African-Americans"
Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) adds that "sacrificing African American children to mollify the largest killer of Blacks in the U.S. is nothing short of grotesque and obscene, and may well be counterproductive and totally unnecessary. . . . passing the bill with the menthol loophole is racist (or at least racially insensitive). "
ASH also objected that "such an exemption was apparently negotiated in secret with a tobacco company to gain its support, and with virtually no input from individuals and organizations with both a special interest and a unique perspective on African Americans, public health, and cigarettes."
So imbued with the tobacco culture was Bailey that in the 1990s -- recently married and expecting his first child -- he took a gamble: Despite all the evidence of health risks and the increasing government efforts to curb smoking and regulate manufacturers, he joined his father in taking the giant step of beginning to make their own cigarettes.
The idea could have bankrupted the family. Instead, it has paid off handsomely. Bailey's "Freedom of Choice" cigarettes are sold from Florida to Delaware. The company, based in this sleepy farm town of 800, is thriving and has expanded into new products, including a smokeless brand.
The Baileys' successful plunge reflects the enduring hold cigarettes have on smokers as well as the lobbying power of the tobacco industry and Congress' sympathy for small business, almost regardless of the product.
The push for stricter tobacco regulation has caused the family some anxious moments -- most recently over the current congressional effort to allow the Food and Drug Administration to subject cigarettes to federal standards intended to reduce the ill effects of smoking.
But now, after some adroit lobbying, the bill has been modified to cushion and delay the impact on small producers. As it stands, the Baileys believe, even FDA supervision would be manageable. . . .
Steven acknowledged, "One could argue, 'What kind of example am I setting? Why am I smoking?' I need to consider that."
If he catches either of his sons smoking before they're 18, he said, "I'll jerk a knot in them."