Jump to full article: Sydney Morning Herald (au), 2010-07-25
Author: STEVE DOW
Intro: Australia will be urged to ban or reduce heavily menthol in cigarettes if the US recommends a crackdown on the cigarettes.
A 12-member US panel is considering whether menthol makes smoking more addictive, and its findings could spell disaster in Australia for Alpine cigarettes and imported brands such as Kool, Virginia Slims and Salem.
Anti-tobacco campaigners argue that menthol coats the throat with a ''mild anaesthetic'' and encourages young people, especially women, to take up smoking. . . .
University of Sydney professor of public health Simon Chapman said Australia had failed to regulate any tobacco additives and tobacco company chemists could add any legal substance.
Internal tobacco company documents had shown its chemists were adding ammonia, for example, which speeds up the rate nicotine penetrates the brain, helping to hook users, he said.
The companies were hiding the ammonia and other agents under the benign term ''processing aids'', said Professor Chapman, who was the 2008 NSW Premier's Cancer Researcher of the Year.
These let them ''cover up the secret formula of their brands''. He called on the federal government to force the companies to disclose fully cigarette additives by displaying all ingredients where tobacco was sold, and in packets.
''The real issue here is whether it is sensible to allow tobacco companies to add ingredients that will make tobacco products more palatable to young smokers when they're first starting off,'' he said.
The push coincides with Australia preparing to become the first country in the world to force generic packaging on tobacco companies.
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