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Employees, patients and visitors smoked their last cigarettes at Henrico Doctors' and Bon Secours Richmond hospitals yesterday.
Using today's Great American Smokeout campaign as a kickoff point, the hospitals are becoming tobacco-free campuses inside and out.
HCA Inc.-owned Henrico Doctors' campuses going smoke-free today include Retreat, Forest and Parham. HCA's Chippenham and Johnston-Willis hospitals went tobacco-free in 2008. John Randolph will go smoke-free later.
The Bon Secours Richmond's hospitals banning all tobacco products inside and out are Memorial Regional, Richmond Community, St. Francis and St. Mary's.
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December first, a new statewide smoking ban takes effect. Restaurants and bars must go smoke-free or provide a separate room for smokers. Will this help or hurt local restaurants?
Restaurants are allowed to let customers smoke only in a separate room that has its own ventilation, so that smoke does not drift into the main dining room. They can also allow smoking on outdoor patios.
At Calabash Seafood in Mechanicsville, a club and restaurant where patrons can currently smoke, they're building a new smoking section: an enclosed patio.
"We're going to put in some heating and some ceiling fans and try to make it as comfortable as we can for them," said owner Dennis Smith.
Owners Dennis and Janet Smith say they're spending about $20,000 to build the smoking patio and remodel their indoor restaurant and lounge, which will be smoke-free. They believe it will pay off.
A proposal to build a new medical school and health sciences center at King College in Bristol, Tenn., received a major funding boost on Oct. 29 when the Virginia Tobacco Indemnification and Community Revitalization Commission granted $25 million to the enterprise.
Plans to build the medical school were announced about a year ago by the college president. It is expected to cost $100 million to $150 million to complete, with an opening possible in 2012.
The grant stipulates that the medical school be constructed in Virginia. The twin cities of Bristol, Tenn., and Bristol, Va., abut each other on the Tennessee-Virginia state line, with King College falling on the Tennessee side.
If you're trying to quit smoking, what's the best approach? A new study from the University of Wisconsin Center for Tobacco Research and Intervention compared six therapies to determine what was most effective. . . .
Dr. Aldo Alamo with Lewis-Gale Physicians said most people who are nicotine addicted will need some kind of help.
The most recent study tested six therapies on 15-hundred adults, who smoked at least 10 cigarettes a day. They also received counseling sessions.
Six months later, the most effective treatment turned out to be the nicotine patch and lozenge combination.
Here is a breakdown of the percentage of people still smoke-free six months out.
Placebo 22.2%
Bupropion 31.8%
Bupropion + lozenge 33.2%
Nicotine Lozenge 33.5%
Carilion New River Valley Medical Center and HCA's two New River Valley Hospitals--Montgomery Regional and Pulaski Community-- are demonstrating a commitment to providing a clean and healthy environment by becoming tobacco-free campuses. Beginning January 1, 2010 patients, visitors and employees are being asked to refrain from using tobacco products when visiting these hospitals, as well as other facilities, including physician practices and outpatient centers, that are part of HCA's and Carilion's health systems in the New River Valley.
"The use of tobacco products, especially smoking, harms nearly every organ of the body. As providers of healthcare, we want to do our part in encouraging healthy lifestyle choices and eliminating harmful behaviors," says Don Halliwill, president of Carilion New River Valley Medical Center. "We appreciate the support and participation of our community as we launch this new initiative."
Hoping to improve local health and limit health-care costs, the New River Valley's hospitals are joining together and joining a growing number of businesses that limit tobacco use.
Representatives of HCA and Carilion announced Wednesday morning that their hospitals, physician practices and outpatient centers throughout the New River Valley would go tobacco-free Jan. 1 for employees and guests.
Those facilities include Carilion New River Valley Medical Center near Radford and HCA's Montgomery Regional Hospital in Blacksburg and Pulaski Community Hospital in Pulaski.
Carilion Giles Community Hospital will be tobacco-free when it opens in the spring.
Fourteen people have been charged with illegally purchasing 77 million contraband cigarettes from undercover agents in Virginia and smuggling the cigarettes to New York.
Two are also accused of paying an agent posing as a hit man to kill a husband and wife whom they believed had stolen from them.
The indictments handed up Thursday in federal court in Alexandria are the culmination of a yearlong investigation.
Cigarettes seem to be the target in an increasing number of thefts as the prices and taxes on them rise. The Super Val U break-in is one of at least three reported thefts of multiple cartons being investigated in the New River Valley in the last month.
One pack of brand-name cigarettes can cost more than $5 at Super Val U, including a federal tax of $1.01 and a state tax of 30 cents per pack. A carton can cost more than $50.
Still, that's cheap when compared with prices in most states. According to the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids, Virginia's statewide cigarette tax is the second lowest in the country.
New York City residents pay the highest cigarette taxes, with state and local taxes adding up to $4.25 to a pack.
Federal prosecutors in Alexandria charged 14 people Thursday with paying money or trading guns and drugs to purchase 388,000 cartons of contraband cigarettes intended for sale in New York. . . .
Two people were also charged with agreeing to hire a hit man to kill a man and his wife who were believed to be stealing some of the cigarettes.
NEWPORT NEWS - The good news for Jarry K. Ratliff is that he might avoid the $25 fine he faces for smoking in a local McDonald's last week.
The bad news? He still faces armed robbery, abduction and gun charges that could land him in prison for a long time.
Ratliff, 27, a McDonald's employee, was discovered as a fugitive Oct. 26. That came after a Newport News police officer at the drive-through of McDonald's, on Jefferson Avenue in Denbigh, spotted Ratliff lighting up a cigarette inside.
In issuing Ratliff a smoking summons, Officer Matthew Andreoli and Sgt. Daniel Butler ran Ratliff's name through a national database of fugitives, finding he was wanted in an armed robbery outside a Norfolk motel in 2004.
Virginia voters were outraged that the legislature took four years to enact the widely popular ban on smoking in restaurants. I hope Peninsula residents have a long memory in the case of Del. Tom Gear.
Gear chaired the six-member subcommittee which peremptorily killed this measure for three straight years and kept it from a floor vote. When a compromise finally enabled the legislature to bypass Gear's subcommittee, he continued to oppose it vocally and even blasted House Speaker William Howell for relenting and allowing a fair vote on it.
When legislators openly and arrogantly defy the clear wishes of their constituents, it is time to show them the door. I urge all voters who value health above the interests of Big Tobacco to defeat Del. Gear.
VIRGINIA BEACH--The state-wide smoking ban is just around the corner. On Dec. 1 most bars and restaurants will be required to have a non-smoking section, but some restaurant owners are finding creative ways around the restrictions.
At Poppa's Pub in Virginia Beach, owner Randy Estenson has spent months trying to construct a non-smoking section. He's worked with the Virginia Beach Department of Health to design the new room. This week a contractor started closing it off.
"It's been a very big hassle," said Estenson. "I spent a lot of time and effort trying to get everything approved before I actually did construction."
As required by the law, the non-smoking section will be walled off, have a separate ventilation system and a door to the outside. But the room is only 13 x 15, which is about 6% of the entire bar and restaurant. It has about 4 tables in it and a television.
At about 11 p.m Monday, Jarry K. Ratliff, 27, took a break from his job at the McDonald's on Jefferson Avenue in Denbigh to light up a cigarette inside the restaurant.
Unfortunately for him, that happened to be when Newport News police officer Matthew Andreoli was going through the restaurant's drive-through.
Andreoli also knew about a new statewide ban on smoking in restaurants. . . .
He and two other men are accused of robbing two people outside an Ocean View motel in August 2004.
The officers then arrested Ratliff, who faces two counts each of robbery and abduction, four counts of using a gun in a felony and one count of conspiracy -- plus the smoking charge, punishable by a $25 fine.
WYTHEVILLE, Va.--About 20 Southwest Virginia projects received more than $30 million in awards today from the Virginia Tobacco Indemnification and Community Revitalization Commission.
The lion's share--$25 million - was awarded to the proposed King College medical school.
"We see this as a game changer," commission Executive Director Neal Noyes said when presenting the plan to the Southwest Virginia Economic Development Committee.
Health advocates are calling on all Virginia restaurants and other workplaces to go completely smoke-free following the release of a landmark report by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) that concluded smoke-free laws reduce the number of heart attacks and save lives.
The IOM report, released Thursday, also found that there is conclusive evidence that secondhand smoke causes heart disease and heart attacks, and there is compelling evidence that even relatively brief exposure to secondhand smoke may cause heart attacks. The IOM is one of the most prestigious scientific authorities in the U.S. and part of the National Academy of Sciences.
Virginia, on December 1, will implement a new law that restricts smoking, but allows restaurants to have separately ventilated smoking rooms. Health advocates said the IOM report underscores why restaurants should go completely smoke-free, rather than creating smoking rooms, so they do not put the health of any employees or customers at risk by subjecting them to hazardous secondhand smoke.