Movies which portray characters who smoke could soon be controlled by an automatic 18 rating while showing in Liverpool.
The main effect of films is to enroll new smokers from among young adults. Movies encourage them to experiment, and once they start experimenting with cigarettes other factors take hold. Movies create the expectation that smoking will turn out okay.

Liverpool Primary Care Trust (PCT) wants to prohibit young people from exposure to smoking actors because they can attract children in starting smoking.
The researchers analyzed the data on 5,300 participants, under 18 years old which smoke in Liverpool, half of whom were influenced by films.
If this legislation will be approved, then the council could urge 18 classifications under the Licensing Act 2003.
The city council decided to approve this new low, and people in the city have been urged to engage in a consultation, which starts in August.
Under the new plan, classic films which portray smoking characters would be unaffected and the policy would only be related new dismisses.
Nevertheless, films about historical figures and those which show a “clear and unambiguous description of the dangers of smoking” would be exempt.
Councilor Malcolm Kelly, chair of the patenting and gambling committee, said: “We were given a presentation earlier this year by the PCT in which they spoke about the high level of young people who smoke in Liverpool and that study showed that young people are more likely to smoke if they were influenced by seeing their favorite stars smoking in films. However, we want to get the views of a wide range of organizations and the public in general before we decide whether to go ahead with this idea.”
Government guidance said that the authorities should only cancel the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) if there are “very good local reasons”.
In its report to the council, Liverpool PCT said the city’s smoking influence was “excessively high” at 29%. The national level is 22%.
It added that research from several countries suggested that smoking in movies was “the most effective of the social influences which lead young people into smoking”.
British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) spokeswoman Sue Clark told, “We have done our own consultation with the public and we specifically asked them about whether smoking in films should be a classification issue – we were told it shouldn’t”.

A club owner is fighting the city of Milford because he said he wants to open a private, hookah club and they are not allowing it due to health concerns.

Since the “customer is always right,” Sam Karout, who owns “Olive Tree Middle Eastern” restaurant in Milford, decided to take a chance on a new business idea.

“Many customers stop by asking about the hookah, if they could smoke a hookah, so the idea crossed my mind,” he said.

“Hookah” is a unique process to smoke flavored tobacco through a water pipe with a long flexible tube. But Sam’s venture is, for now, up in smoke thanks to a visit from the Milford City Health Department.

“Determined that it was unsafe. An unsafe practice, a public health nuisance. No different than cigarette smoking,” said Milford Health Director Dennis McBride.

“I was very angry because I worked so hard since the opening, May 15th, doing lot of complimentary invitations, opening night, cost me a lot of money, working very hard,” Sam said.

Sam contends that he has done nothing wrong since he claims his club is private. Now, his more than $150,000 investment sits as empty as the hookah’s on the countertop waiting to be used.

“Unfortunately, there was a misunderstanding by the Health Department by misinterpreting the law. They thought it was for public, it’s just for members,” he said.

But Sam’s lawyer has already filed an appeal with the city and he is hoping the aromatic flavor of his many tobaccos will fill the room with happy customers, since he still believes they were right in the first place.

“We are not harming society in anyway,” said Sam.

Sam said he hopes he can open this weekend because he is under the assumption that during the appeals process, he can serve his club members.

Dr. Dennis McBride, Milford’s Health Director, said he hopes the action taken today sets a precedent to shutting down other “Hookah” clubs in the interest of public health.

© Wtnh

John McLellan, the lead singer and guitarist of the band The Clintons, doesn’t like smoking, nor does he like to play gigs in bars that allow smoking.

“I like to write fun, goofy songs,” he told a group of students Wednesday at the reACT Teen Summit at Carroll College.

With guitar in hand, he sang them a tune from The Clintons’ recent album “Have Another,” called “She’s a Chimney.”

The song portrays the songwriter’s crush on a woman who smokes – “sucks on heater” – and has a “second-hand accessory.”
McLellan is one of dozens of speakers at the three-day event, which aims to educate students about corporate tobacco companies’ marketing tactics. His session was about songwriting.

“If you want to be a songwriter, actively listen to songs you like and ones you don’t, so you can identify what it is you like or don’t,” he said.

McLellan told the students that writing music is about telling stories about how we relate: to each other, to the environment, to ourselves.

Dani Smith, 17-year-old from Columbus, attended the session on American Indian tobacco use. “We talked about their culture and how it’s manipulated and exploited,” she said.

Smith was upset by the way corporate tobacco uses images of young children in American Indian settings to sell their products.

Tobacco companies use children at powwows, for example, in their advertising campaigns, she said. “It was disturbing.”

Smith said she learned that tobacco is used in American Indian culture for traditional purposes only.

“(Corporate tobacco companies) reach into their private lives and exploit them,” she said. “Now they don’t know it’s only used from traditional purpose, and instead it’s a part of the lifestyle.”

Smith is a member of the teen group and serves on the state board of the Montana Tobacco Use Prevention Program, of which reACT is a part.

Erin Kintop, reACT youth empowerment coordinator, said the entire event was planned and organized around teen suggestions.

“They give us topics and we make it happen,” she said.

Kintop said reACT itself is a completely teen-led movement. What works to reach youths is peer mentoring, she said.

She said if MTUPP can provide a cool outlet, take a different focus on messaging beyond, for example, health risks, it effectively reaches teenagers.

“They aren’t thinking about getting cancer at 40 right now,” Kintop said.

This is Zachary Dieziger’s second year with the core team. A high school junior from Kalispell, Dieziger enjoyed the session about new tobacco products.

He said many girls at his school use the Virginia Slim purse pack. “It’s a box of 20 cigarettes that fit perfectly into a purse,” he said. “A lot of girls at school have them to get them past watching eyes.”

The session also touched on the latest tobacco products – pellets, twisted sticks and film strips that are made from finely ground, flavored tobacco and melt in the mouth.

“It’s how they are responding to the Clean Indoor Air Act,” Dieziger said. “And they are making it easier for teens to use.”

Dieziger admitted she once tried a cigarette.

“I hated it,” he said. “I have no clue why they do it.”

Dieziger believes the summit will make a difference.

“The idea is we can pull away ideas from here and take them back to our communities,” he said.

© Billingsgazette

Despite the recession, global candy consumption is growing. In many countries, the industry giants must battle small players for market share

If you’ve ever tried to find a Snickers bar in Saigon or Hershey’s Kisses in Paris, you were out of luck. While such American favorites as Coca-Cola (KO), Big Macs, and Marlboros can be bought in just about every major city in the world, Americans looking to satisfy a sweet tooth overseas must choose from among such exotic brands as Flake, Freddo, and Curly Wurlys.

The global confectionery market accounted for $150 billion in retail sales in 2008, according to international market researcher Euromonitor. And it’s a market that has grown steadily over the past five years at a 5% compound annual rate. The U.S. is the world’s largest candy consumer, spending more than $8.8 billion on various sweets last year, a 2% increase over 2007. On average, Americans consume about 25 lb. of candy per capita annually, according to the Census Bureau.

The rest of the world likes its sweets, too. As industry experts will tell you, confectionery is broken up into three categories: chocolate, nonchocolate, and chewing gum. Chocolate is by far the largest, with a 55% of the total, while gum holds only a 14% stake but is the fastest-growing segment.

Switzerland is the reigning chocolate champ, where per capita consumption is 25 lb. a year. Britain comes in second, eating 19.4 lb., and Belgium third at 19.1.

Chewing away cravings

So what are the chocolates and candies that people like to eat most around the world? As June is national candy month, BusinessWeek in celebration collaborated with Euromonitor to compile a list of the world’s top 25 best-selling candy brands by country. The results were fascinating. For example, did you think that truffes au chocolat were the most popular candy in France? If you did, you were wrong. The winner is Hollywood chewing gum.

One of the reasons behind the surge in gum sales is the tough anti-tobacco stances that many governments around the world are taking, especially in countries such as France and Italy where smoking remains widespread. Increasingly unable to smoke indoors or looking for a cigarette alternative, many smokers are taking up chewing gum.

The global economic downturn may have caused many consumers to cut discretionary spending, but candy proves to be an exception. Nielsen categorizes candy as among the top five recession-proof foodstuff categories, alongside seafood, dry pasta, beer, and pasta sauce. “People have a special relationship with candy, especially those who have grown up with it,” says Michael Allured, publisher of Manufacturing Confectioner, a trade magazine. “It’s comforting and relatively inexpensive.”

Sweets skirmishes

The candy business is dominated by global giants. For years Britain’s Cadbury (CBY) battled it out for the top spot with Nestlé (NSRGY) based in Vevey, Switzerland. But the April 2008 acquisition by privately held Mars of Chicago chewing gum maker Wm. Wrigley Jr. for $23 billion propelled Mars from No. 5 in 2001 to No. 1 in 2008.

Emerging markets have seen particular growth in recent years, leading some multinationals to more aggressively penetrate these markets in an effort to increase their market share. Yet while the biggest companies and brands enjoy supremacy in multiple markets—Cadbury’s Dairy Milk chocolate bar, for example, is the best-seller in Australia, Britain, and India—they still enjoy only a 42% market share worldwide. That leaves smaller, local manufacturers like Hsu Fu Chi International in China and Tiger Brands (TBSJ.DE) in South Africa to enjoy dominant market share in their home countries.

© Businessweek

Cigarettes are now under federal control and maybe that will cut down on the incidence of smoking. The Food and Drug Administration will be able to reduce – but not eliminate – nicotine content, further constrain advertising, and prohibit flavorings that attract young smokers.

Yet no one I know who smokes, or smoked, was ever seduced into the habit by advertising or candy-flavored cigarettes. I didn’t even know there were candy-flavored cigarettes, a concoction as appealing to me as candy-flavored coffee.
Mark Wilson/Getty ImagesU.S. President Obama speaks about tobacco legislation in the Rose Garden at the White House on June 12, 2009 in Washington, DC.

“Kids today don’t just start smoking for no reason,” said President Obama when he signed the bill.

“They’re aggressively targeted as customers by the tobacco industry. They’re exposed to a constant and insidious barrage of advertising where they live, where they learn and where they play.”

Maybe that was Obama’s experience; It wasn’t mine. I smoked for 43 years before quitting in 2002. I was addicted, and I’m sure that was the intent of the people who made Marlboros, but the Marlboro Man didn’t exist at the time — and I certainly didn’t relate to him. The first and only time I was on a horse I was scared silly; I’ve never had a tattoo and think Stetsons are silly.

It started with my parents. They smoked until long after I was an adult. Chesterfields. Unfiltered. I know advertising didn’t lead me to smoking because, back then, television advertising of cigarettes was permitted and Chesterfields were represented by a pair of dancing girls in cigarette pack costumes.

You could only see their legs. Long, beautiful legs — and they certainly had an impact on me, but not what ad folks expected. My pre-teen imagination reacted in horror to the idea the lovely contents of those dancing cigarette packs would be set afire and turned into smoke. I could barely watch. I could never smoke Chesterfields.

But to see the two most important adults in my life smoke regularly in our home conditioned me — not necessarily to smoke — but not to think odd the idea of sticking stuffed paper in my mouth and setting it aflame.

So, when the real Seducer finally got to me, I had no problem at all with trying my first cigarette.

His name was Chip, the tallest, best-looking kid in eighth grade. Girls were attracted to Chip the way politicians are attracted to cameras. He also had a gorgeous, artistic sister, and parents straight out of “Father Knows Best” — and they didn’t smoke.

Mostly in hope of meeting girls, I became Chip’s friend. We’d roam the neighborhood and invariably he would attract a knot of admirers. One day, a small group of pre-teeners started to follow us and I bet that, if we split up, they would follow me, not him. We agreed to meet back at my house.

I arrived alone and unfollowed. Chip showed up later, gracious in triumph. The girls, he said, were not very interesting. But then he reached into his pocket, took out a pack of cigarettes, deftly flicked his wrist to pop one up from the pack, took it in his mouth and lit it with a shiny flame-thrower I would later learn was a Zippo lighter.

“Here,” he said, repeating the wrist flick but, this time, in my direction.

All the FDAs on Earth could not have stopped me from sliding that cigarette the rest of the way out of Chip’s pack, putting it into my mouth and lighting it up. It didn’t taste like candy; It was awful. I choked, but I was an immortal young boy irrevocably crossing one more line into adulthood, with Chip as my Virgil.

No advertising persuaded me. No flavoring. Just parents who set a bad example and good old-fashioned peer pressure.

I finally quit because of a different sort of pressure. Not from those who exiled me outside to smoke. Nor those who banned smoking in my office or in restaurants. But from my kids. They nagged me and my son — whose birthday is Friday — even devised a bizarre plan to interrupt his doctoral studies to become a weight lifter if I didn’t quit.

When I began smoking, I was 13. The Surgeon General’s report hadn’t yet been published and, even if it had, I would have ignored it. Teenagers live forever and, since Byron, believe there is romance in a short life.

But, when I quit, I was 55, and I knew I wasn’t going to live forever, I knew there is nothing romantic about death – and I had a lot more to live for than I had 42 years earlier. That was a far greater incentive to quit than anything dreamed up in Trenton or Washington.
© Nj

It’s been almost 12 years since Joe Camel retired. A legal settlement in 1998 prohibited the cool iconic cartoon character from being used in packaging and advertising. It turns out that Joe Camel was becoming as recognizable to kids as Mickey Mouse.

On Monday, President Obama signed into law sweeping legislation that puts the FDA in charge of the marketing and sale of tobacco products. The new law also gives the FDA the power to regulate what’s put in those products, including not only nicotine, but also candy and fruit flavorings marketed toward young people.

In 2006, R.J. Reynolds, the makers of Camel cigarettes, agreed to stop selling flavored cigarettes with names like “Twista Lime” and “Mocha Taboo.” Now, all tobacco companies will have to put an end to the subtle practice of luring new, mostly young smokers, with flavorings and fancy packaging. Keeping tobacco out of the hands of young people is the most important part of the new bill.

On Monday, when Obama signed the bill, he said: “The decades-long effort to protect our children from the harmful effects of smoking has emerged victorious.” The most important issue in the new legislation, he said, is to reduce the number of new smokers in the future.

On Tuesday, however, in a White House press conference, Obama admitted that he was struggling with kicking the habit himself, saying “I’m 95% cured.” He was responding to a reporter’s question on the subject.

The reporter, Margaret Talev of McClatchy Newspapers, framed her question like this: “As a former smoker, I understand the frustration and the fear that comes with quitting. But with the new law that you signed … regulating the tobacco industry, I’d like to ask you a few questions … How many cigarettes a day do you smoke? Do you smoke alone or in the presence of other people?” She then went on to ask Obama if the new law that he signed on Monday “should help you quit. If so, why?”

Obama’s response: “The new law that was put in place is not about me. It’s about the next generation of kid’s coming up.”

The new law that gives the FDA the authority to ban all cigarettes from having candy and fruit flavors takes effect this October. The law will also put an end to marketing practices by tobacco companies such as sponsoring sporting and entertainment events using tobacco logos or brand names, or giving away clothing or promotional items bearing the logo or brand name of a tobacco company.”

Years ago, Camel had a T-shirt promotion. I still have the shirt with a giant picture of Joe Camel on the front. It was pretty cool at the time. President Obama, like Joe Camel, is a cool and iconic character. We don’t need images of him smoking. He’s a role model to kids, and it’s counterproductive. And yet, after yesterday’s news conference, in between talking about the economy, health care, nuclear proliferation and global warming, Obama was talking about his own nicotine habit.

He admitted that although he has backtracked on the smoking issue, he does so in private. So why bring it up in the first place? Most news sources, however, ran with the story. That seems fair. After all, once it was brought up, it was a legitimate news story. However, some Web sites ran photos of Obama smoking.

There’s the famous one from the Time magazine college photos of a young Obama looking cool with a cigarette dangling from his mouth. Then there’s the undated one that ran as part of a story at Examiner.com, with the caption, “Obama takes a Presidential smoke break.”

Other photos have surfaced from the past, and although some are obviously photo-shopped, some are real. The one that popped up yesterday in the Examiner looks real and it looks recent. Is there really a good reason to run it? Images of the President smoking should not be made public.

Barack Obama is bigger than Joe Camel ever was. Maybe even bigger than Mickey Mouse.

© Tothecenter

The Board of Health wants to introduce a new anti-smoking amendment, but they wants the the public’s opinion first.
New Yorkers are being called upon to give their opinion in a public hearing on July 30 on a new Health Code amendment that would put graphic anti-smoking warnings wherever tobacco products are sold. The warnings would include images depicting the adverse health effects of smoking and information on how to quit.

The measure, which is expected to be voted on in September, would require the city’s 12,000 tobacco retailers to display these large “point-of-sale warnings and cessations messages” at eye-level wherever tobacco products are displayed and at the point of purchase is made, such as a cash register. It is also described as the first regulation of its kind in the nation.

According to the Health Department, these displays will force the customer to see the health effects of smoking and visually contemplate their tobacco purchase. They say the signage also promotes a greater understanding of the toll tobacco takes on the body and encourage current smokers to quit.

“While the tobacco industry spends billions of dollars every year to glamorize smoking, we will show New Yorkers the harsh realities,” Health Commissioner Dr. Thomas Farley, stated, “These warning signs will help persuade smokers to quit and show children why they shouldn’t start smoking.”

But Mohamed Shody, mignight manager of midtown Manhattan’s Omniall Deli said to PIX News, “It’s never going to stop people from buying cigarettes because the smokes cannot quit immediately. It takes a long time. And, by the way, I’m a smoker too and it’s not going to affect me.”

The new signs also targets the city’s youth population. Most smokers start taking puffs during their adolescence and by age 19. According to the Health Department, two-third of that group become daily smokers.

Nearly 2 million of the city’s 8.3 million residents are under the age of 18, according to the Department of City Planning.

The city recorded its lowest adult smoking rate in 2008, with only 15.8% of New Yorkers smoking. But the Health Department says that there are still 950,000 New Yorkers who smoke.

About 7,400 New York City residents die from tobacco-related illnesses each year, which is more than the death toll of AIDS, homicide, suicide and drug-related deaths combined.

“Smoking continues to be the leading cause of preventable death in New York City,” Farley said.

The proposal is the latest from New York City’s ongoing campaign to help New Yorkers quit smoking.

The Health Department’s television ad campaign, for example, include commericals with children, surgical procedures and testimonials from a man who was left with a hole in his throat from throat cancer and a woman who had to have her fingers amputated.

© Wpix

After years of relentless struggles against smoking addiction in America, The FDA recently was entitled to regulate tobacco products, meaning that menthol cigarettes, preferred by the overwhelming majority of African Americans and in general almost 12 US smokers, could be outlawed like other flavorings in tobacco products.

The Senate approved the legislation providing the Food and Drug Administration with the authority to oversee tobacco products, and President Obama pledged to sign it into law within next weeks.

In conformity to the bill, flavorings, including, chocolate, vanilla and cherry would be prohibited as they are claimed to lure teenagers to pick up the pernicious habit. However, menthol flavor was exempted from that list. It needs to be mentioned here that menthol cigarettes account for almost 30 percent of all cigarette sales across the nation.

The FDA would have to perform numerous researches on menthol cigarettes and the impact on the consumers’ health and especially on African and Hispanic Americans. The research results should be published at least within a year. After performing the tests, the FDA could theoretically prohibit menthol flavoring, however, many anti-smoking advocates are pessimistic about that.

Prof. Jeffrey Wilkin of the American Cancer Foundation said he has been skeptical that menthol would be outlawed.

Jon Fredericks of the National Smoking Prevention Program said they sought to prohibit menthol flavoring but legislators promised to vote against such bill.

Fredericks added that tobacco companies managed to impact on some lawmakers to get a compromise concerning menthol cigarettes.

According to a reliable source of the upper Chamber of Congress, the FDA could prohibit menthol flavoring shortly after completing all the corresponding tests.

The source said the legislators outlawed other flavorings because they appealed to minors seducing them into smoking.

However the FDA wanted more time to investigate the consequence of outlawing menthol-flavored products, stated Larry Cohen of the American Heart Institute.

He said the legislators were worried that smokers addicted to menthol cigarette would switch to black market to obtain precious menthol smokes.

Nevertheless, whether The Food and Drug Administration ban menthol cigarettes or impose other restriction, it would inevitably hit Lorillard Inc, the leading menthol cigarette maker in the US, whose top brand Newport is the best-seller among menthol cigarettes.

Lorillard spokesman has already named the latest tobacco regulation bill as the “Altria Protection Act” stating that it protects Altria dominance on the cigarette market and prohibits invention of new reduced-harm tobacco products.

However, Lorillard promised to give the FDA all the necessary information to help investigating menthol features.

According to annual statistics by the Department of Public Health, almost 20 percent of adult African American population is regular smokers, with the majority of them preferring menthol cigarettes.

African American smokers are more likely to suffer from health complications related to smoking than other groups, yet it could be explained by fewer possibilities to access good health care.

There is almost no scientific prove that menthol cigarettes are more hazardous than regular-flavored cigarettes, but anti-smoking advocates claim menthol flavor conceals the strength of tobacco, what makes smoking them more difficult to give up.

With unprecedented support, Congress recently passed the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, which aims to protect children and teens.

However, some store owners, smokers and even a few non-smokers aren’t so sure the reasons are valid.

The act, which President Barack Obama, a former smoker himself, signed on Tuesday, allows the Food and Drug Administration to regulate the tobacco industry, eliminate the sale of candy and fruit-flavored cigarettes and cigars, force judgement on menthol cigarettes within a year and reduce tobacco advertising to text only ads.

Lawmakers justify the act by citing the numbers of tobacco-related deaths per year, the possibility of reducing health care costs and the tobacco industry’s need for a new market, in other words: American youth.
“Kids today don’t just start smoking for no reason,” the president said. “They’re aggressively targeted as customers by the tobacco industry. They’re exposed to a constant and insidious barrage of advertising where they live, where they learn, and where they play. Most insidiously, they are offered products with flavorings that mask the taste of tobacco and make it even more tempting.”

Said UNL sophomore music major Zach Smith: “The only way for tobacco companies to continue turning a profit on the oldest drug in America is to advertise to a younger audience so the nicotine can take hold earlier.”

The FDA will have the power to delve into what exactly is going into tobacco products and control it.

“(If) the FDA can control the amount of harmful carcinogens in cigarettes, that would be a tremendous step forward toward healthier lives for all Americans, smokers and nonsmokers alike,” Smith added.

Conversely, some see this as an infringement on rights.

“I have a right to potentially endanger myself,” said Grant Anderson, a Nebraska Wesleyan University student who rarely smokes but feels strongly about his rights.

“Why else are we still allowed to own motorcycles? And why can’t I smoke a candy-flavored cigarette while I ride that motorcycle through a ring of fire? Guns are dangerous, too. Next thing you know, they’ll be taking away our right to own guns because of that. What we need to do is educate people better, and let them make their own choices.”

Store owners also have a negative take on this act.

“Yeah, it’ll hurt business. Lots of people get the grape cigars and the strawberry ones. They like those flavors. And if they get rid of menthols, it’ll ruin everything,” Arik Cox, a manager at Kabredlo’s, said.

Menthols will not be included in the initial ban until it can be proven that the justification for getting rid of them is not racist. Seventy-five percent of black smokers smoke menthols.

Ted Wright, owner of Ted’s Tobacco doesn’t think the justification behind the act is valid.

“I think it’s lousy,” he said. “Kids aren’t using these products; I don’t see it. It’s an adult product. You can’t buy it until you’re 18, and I hardly even see 18-year-olds in here, usually thirties or up.

“It’s all an agenda. They use the kids to demonize the industry. Really, they could regulate alcohol for the same reasons. There are a lot of things that they could regulate before tobacco. This is just one more government interference where they already interfere a lot.”

Ted’s Tobacco will no longer be able to sell clove, vanilla, chocolate or cherry cigarettes after the ban is enacted, but the other products should remain.

While senior psychology major Noah Cypher doesn’t necessarily support or condemn the act, he does feel that the causes of underage smoking are not being addressed in this act.

“I think the reasons behind it are more peer pressure and screw the system rather than, ‘Ooo! I want to smoke something that tastes like candy!’ We need to address the real reasons behind using the drug itself. We need to be against usage, not flavor.”

All in all, the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act has polarized the community with those for it heralding it as a great advance and those against it bemoaning its reasons.
© Statepaper

Congress passed a bill that increases requirements for warnings on cigarette packages and dramatically limits the ways that the tobacco industry can target teens. The legislation requires cigarette packages to display warnings that cover at least 1/2 of the front and back of the package. “Point of sale” advertising is limited to adults-only venues.

The law also bans flavored cigarettes, and stops companies from billing cigarettes as “light.” Cigarette advertising is banned within 1000 feet of schools and playgrounds, and tobacco companies are forbidden from being sponsors of sports or entertainment events. Though the bill is not perfect, we applaud Congress for taking decisive action to stop young people from becoming smokers.

According to the Center for Disease Control, 20 percent of American highschoolers have smoked a cigarette in the past month. Ninety percent of smokers start before 18, according to one health official. The time is right to take action to stop young people from starting. The health risks of smoking are well-documented. Now we need to combat the impression of smoking as attractive.

Reducing the availability of products that are attractive to young potential smokers (like flavored and “light” cigarettes) and limiting the exposure young people have to tobacco ads will be a significant step in the right direction. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the new law will reduce youth smoking by eleven percent and adult smoking by two percent over the next ten years.

The director of the Tobacco Research Network described the bill as “a historic step changing the nature of tobacco in society forever.” It sets a precedent not only in its limits on sales and advertising but in allowing the Food and Drug Administration to regulate tobacco products for the first time.

The law comes over forty years after the U.S. surgeon general first called smoking a health hazard. The FDA could force tobacco companies to remove some of the cancer-causing substances in cigarettes, or deter users through bad-tasting additives. An effort to introduce a bill similar to the current one failed in 1994. These restrictions took far to long to become law, but now that they are, will have a significant positive impact.

The new legislation has its limits. It is unlikely that adult smokers will be deterred by the absent of cherry or orange flavored smokes, and tobacco companies will undoubtably come out with other code words to take the place of “light.”

Most people are well aware of the dangers of cigarettes, but the new law seems well equipped to serve its goal of stopping young people from starting to smoke. The US government has been slow to see the light in the regulation of smoking, lagging behind European countries that already require extensive warning labels. It’s about time that Congress is finally catching up.

© Copyright: Dailyillini

Two years ago, Oregon legislators banned smoking from bars, expanded smoke-free workplace laws and passed a big tax on cigarettes to pay for health care for uninsured kids.

But this year, the state’s budget problems have stolen the spotlight and another attempt to raise taxes on cigarettes is dead.

The outcome is a sharp contrast to the beginning of the session, which saw a bevy of bills targeting cigarettes, smokeless and chewing tobacco – and smoking in general. The tobacco lobby, which spent a record $12 million to persuade Oregon voters in 2007 to kill the last cigarette tax proposal by the Legislature, scored some more victories this time around.

“The question was how many tax bills would we be able to take,” says Rep. Mitch Greenlick, D-Portland. “We were battling uphill from the beginning.”

Besides the cigarette tax, however, Rep. Carolyn Tomei, D-Milwaukie, and others said lawmakers got some small wins against tobacco this session.

“We did a lot in 2007,” says Tomei. “We passed some really good legislation, and now we’re just finishing up.”

For one, Congress and President Barack Obama increased the federal tax on cigarettes by 60 cents this spring. With that increase, the average price of a pack of cigarettes is $5.02. Of the $5.02, $1.01 is federal tax and $1.18 is state tax.

Democrats worried about too many tax increases. Legislators feared a cigarette tax hike would end up before voters again.

Mark Nelson, a lobbyist for R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., calls the cigarette tax failure “the big victory” of the session.

Sen. Larry George, R-Sherwood, disputes the reach of the tobacco bills passed this session and says that bills such as the vending machine ban “are bills seeking headlines.”

“They don’t make a lot of public policy sense,” he says, adding that few of them were proved necessary with data. George disagrees with taxes on beer and cigarettes because he says they target working-class Oregonians.

“You don’t hear about a wine tax, do you?” he says. “That’s why these things are dying.”

Nelson says the Senate lacked the votes to pass the cigarette tax increase. Even if it did, he says, the tobacco industry would have taken the measure to the voters.

In November 2007, voters rejected the “Healthy Kids” plan, a measure to amend the state constitution that would have raised a tax on a pack of cigarettes by 84.5 cents to cover the cost of health insurance for children.

This year, Rep. Sara Gelser, D-Corvallis, says it was more a matter of circumstance – not lobbying – that killed the 60-cents-a-pack tax.

“In the end, this was not the right session for the tobacco tax,” she said. “We pursued other things. It’s not about anything the tobacco industry or the tobacco lobby did.”

Nelson and Gelser do agree on something: The cigarette tax bill is likely to return in February.

Most tobacco bills that did pass this session either limited minors’ access to tobacco or addressed the rising popularity of smokeless tobacco.

With the smoke-free workplace laws, tobacco companies have increasingly marketed smokeless products. Philip Morris USA, R.J. Reynolds and others target the young audience with candy-tasting flavors and in cell phone-shaped dispensers.

Portland is one of three test markets for smokeless tobacco because of its young, hip reputation and its free-sample-friendly laws, according to Dr. Mel Kohn, acting public health director for Oregon.

With the passage of the moist snuff bill, smokeless tobacco will be taxed by weight, with a $2.14 minimum per container. Under the law, tobacco companies must abide by youth marketing restrictions or pay an additional 40 cents a can.

Bill Phelps, a spokesman for Altria, the parent company of Phillip Morris USA, said the company testified in favor of this change.

In Oregon, statistics show that young people buy smokeless tobacco at a higher rate than adults. According to state reports from 2007, nearly 4 percent of Oregon adults used smokeless tobacco, as did more than 8 percent of Oregon 11th-graders.

Dana Kaye, executive director of the American Lung Association of Oregon, calls smokeless tobacco “the wave of the future” for the tobacco industry as indoor clean air laws are passed around the country.

Statistics show youths taking up smokeless tobacco at a higher rate than adults.

“Raising the price of cigarettes is a way to get people to quit and help prevent kids from starting,” Kohn says, deeming it the “biggest disappointment” of the session.

George says that it is a slippery slope to punish people through taxes “for bad choices” because eating fast food and skiing can be dangerous, too. A Centers for Disease Control study reports that young adults are two to three times more sensitive to price changes than other adults.

“I’ll never give up on the tax,” Kaye says. “We haven’t seen the end of their marketing, which means you haven’t seen the end of our legislative work.”
© Oregonlive

Citing safety as the reason for the legislation, a new Indiana law taking effect July 1 will require all cigarettes sold in Indiana to burn out more quickly when left unattended in an effort to reduce the number of smoking-related fires.

Cigarettes are the No. 1 cause of fatal residential fires in the country, killing approximately 800 people annually. One-quarter of victims of smoking-material fire fatalities are not the smokers whose cigarettes started the fire; 34 percent are children of the smokers, 25 percent are neighbors or friends, 14 percent are spouses or partners and 13 percent are parents.

Last year, there were 138 smoking-related fires in Indiana, leading to four deaths, 11 injuries and $3.4 million in property damage, according to the National Fire Incident Reporting System. In 2005, NFIRS showed that 124 reported smoking-related fires occurred. Those fires caused two civilian deaths, 16 civilian injuries and five firefighter injuries with property loss at almost $1.5 million.

The new design of cigarettes contains the same amount of tobacco as before but force a smoker to inhale to get the flame through two strips of paper incorporated into the cigarette. The two (or sometimes three) thin bands of less-porous paper act as “speed bumps” to slow down a burning cigarette. If a fire-safe cigarette is left unattended, the burning tobacco will reach one of these speed bumps and self-extinguish. The change in design isn’t expected to change cigarette prices. The law doesn’t apply to cigarettes that consumers roll themselves.

“The cigarettes are made from the same blend of tobacco as regular cigarettes,” Jim Greeson, Indiana state fire marshal and Indiana Department of Homeland Security Division of Fire and Building Safety director, said. “The only difference to the consumer is they need to puff it more often or relight it.”

Indiana’s law was signed in March 2008. Forty-eight states either have similar laws in place or will have new regulations in effect by August 2010.

To know which cigarettes are fire safe, check the UPC code for either the marking “FSC” (most common); a heavy black line above the UPC; a diamond symbol; or the letters FS, LIP or RIP.

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