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In Graphic Warnings Case, Tobacco Lawyers Fight Full D.C. Circuit Review

By ash | Published November 1, 2012

Lawyers for major tobacco companies said Monday they do not want the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to touch a panel’s ruling that went against the government’s controversial graphic warning labels requirement.

A divided three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit in August ruled against the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s requirement that cigarette packs carry graphic images that depict the dangers of smoking. Judge Janice Rogers Brown called the images “inflammatory” and said they were “unabashed attempts to evoke emotion.” The court said the proposed warning images violate the First Amendment.

The U.S. Justice Department wants the full D.C. Circuit to overturn the panel decision. Yesterday, responding to DOJ, lawyers for tobacco companies that include R.J. Reynolds and Lorillard urged the D.C. Circuit not to tangle with the panel decision. Ultimately, the U.S. Supreme Court could be asked for its assessment.

“The proposed warnings will not create more informed consumers and were never intended to,” Jones Day litigation partner Noel Francisco, lead counsel for R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., said in a court filing Monday. Francisco also said the images “had no measurable effect on consumer knowledge of the smoking risks the warnings address.”

DOJ lawyers said in their request that the panel decision failed to recognize the government’s interest in “ensuring that consumers and potential consumers understand the health risks of smoking.”

The tobacco company lawyers, who also include a team from Covington & Burling who represent Lorillard, said in their response that the FDA’s graphic images rule was not meant to further that government interest.

“These warnings do not address any information deficit about the health risks of smoking. Rather, consumers are already aware of the health risks addressed by the warnings,” the tobacco company lawyers said in their papers.

The warning images, Francisco said in court papers, “were not selected based on their ability to increase consumer knowledge. Instead, they were intentionally crafted to attach ‘negative affect’ to cigarettes and convey a message to consumers that smoking is not a legitimate or acceptable personal choice.”

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit rejected a challenge to the requirements, DOJ lawyers said in their petition in the D.C. Circuit.

DOJ lawyers, including Mark Stern from the Civil Division’s appellate staff, said in court papers that the panel decision“boldly declared” that the First Amendment blocks the graphic image regulations because the government failed to show how the photos have directly caused a decrease in smoking rates.

“The government’s interest in effectively communicating the health risks of smoking cannot be overstated,” DOJ lawyers said in the request for a full-court review.

That a particular image evokes emotion, DOJ said, doesn’t make a health warning inaccurate. “The warning that tobacco smoke can harm a smoker’s children evokes emotion because the warning is true, and people do not want to harm their children,” DOJ said.

The full D.C. Circuit hasn’t decided whether it will hear the case. If the government loses, DOJ could decide to ask the Supreme Court to review the dispute.

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Women Who Quit Smoking Live Decade More

By ash | Published October 29, 2012

Women who stop smoking before middle-age live about 10 years longer than women who continue to smoke throughout life, a new study from the United Kingdom finds.

Smoking until middle age does reduce lifespan somewhat — women in the study who smoked until age 40 were about 1.2 times more likely to die over a 12-year period, compared with those who never smoked.

However, those who smoked their whole lives were nearly three times more likely to die over that same time period, compared with those who never smoked.

In other words, women who stopped smoking by age 40 were able to avoid about 90 percent of their excess risk of dying from smoking, the researchers said. And those who stopped smoking by age 30 avoided 97 percent of this risk.

The findings of the study — which involved more than 1 million women born in the 1940s —are similar to what has already been seen in studies of men.

“Women born around 1940 were the first generation in which many smoked substantial numbers of cigarettes throughout adult life,” said study researcher Sir Richard Peto, of the University of Oxford. “Hence, only in the 21st century could we observe directly the full effects of prolonged smoking, and of prolonged cessation, on premature mortality among women,” Peto said.

Participants were enrolled in the study around age 55, and were followed from 1996 to 2011. They completed a questionnaire about their lifestyle, medical and social factors, and were resurveyed three years later. During the 12-year study, about 66,000 participants died.

At the study’s start, 20 percent of the participants were smokers, 28 percent were ex-smokers, and 52 percent had never smoked.

Those who were still smokers at three years after the study began were nearly three times more likely to die over the next nine years than those who did not smoke.

The excess mortality among smokers was mainly due to diseases that can be caused by smoking, such as lung cancer, the researchers said.

The study was published in the journal the Lancet.

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‘Smoking Will Kill Up to a Billion People’

By ash | Published October 29, 2012

Smoking, which is described as the biggestpublic health disaster in the history of the world with its perpetrators likened to terrorists, will kill up to a billion people worldwide this century unless governments across the world stamp down on the half-trillion-dollar tobaccoindustry, cancer experts have warned.

John Seffrin, chief executive of the American Cancer Society, issued this warning while speaking at a high-level forum of the world’s 100 leading cancer experts gathered in the Swiss resort of Lugano.

They said governments must do far more than they have done to control the global tobacco industry, either by raising cigarette prices dramatically, outlawing tobacco marketing or by taxing the multinational profits of the big cigarette firms.

According to scientists, smoking kills more than half of all smokers, mostly from cancer, and yet despite it being the single biggest avoidable risk of premature death, there are about 30 million new smokers a year.

They said that if the current trends continue – with cigarette companies targeting the non-smoking populations of the developing world – then hundreds of millions of people will be dying of cancer in the second half of this century.

Some of the experts attending the World Oncology Forum went further by calling for an outright ban on cigarettes and for the tobacco industry to be treated as a terrorist movement for the way it targets new markets with a product that it knows to be deadly when used as intended.

“We have a major global industry producing a product that is lethal to at least half the people who use it. It will kill, if current trends continue, a billion people this century,” the Independentquoted Dr Seffrin as saying.

“It killed 100 million in the last century and we thought that was outrageous, but this will be the biggest public health disaster in the history of the world, bar none. It all could be avoided if we could prevent the terroristic tactics of the tobacco industry in marketing its products to children.

“There is a purposeful intent to market a product that they know full well will harm their customers and over time will kill more than half of them. The industry needs to be reined in and regulated,” he said.

Worldwide, tobacco causes about 22 percent of cancer deaths each year, killing some 1.7 million people, with almost 1 million of them dying from lung cancer. Yet the numbers of new smokers among the young is rising faster than the numbers giving up.

The latest study into the health effects of smoking, which was published in The Lancet and involved 1.3 million women, showed that tobacco is even more dangerous than previously supposed but the benefits of giving up smoking are greater than expected.

Sir Richard Peto of Oxford University, a co-author of the Million Women study who worked closely with Sir Richard Doll, is also the scientist who first calculated how many people this century will die from tobacco-induced cancers.

“We have about 30 million new smokers a year in the world. On present patterns, most of them are not going to stop, and if they don’t stop, and if half of them die from it, then that means more than 10 million a year will die – that’s 100 million a decade in the second half of the century,” Professor Peto said.

“So this century we’re going to see something like a billion deaths from smoking if we carry on as we are. In Europe we have about 1.3 million premature deaths per year now, of which about 0.3 million are deaths by tobacco. There’s nothing else as big as that.

“If you put all causes together, you wouldn’t get a total that’s half of that caused by tobacco, and tobacco kills more people by cancer than other diseases. Smoking is still the most important cause of cancer… If you smoke a few cigarettes a day, it will be the most dangerous thing you do,” he added

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FCA Video Highlights Tobacco Epidemic

By ash | Published October 25, 2012

A billion people will be killed by tobacco this century. It has been estimated that the tobacco industry makes approximately $6,000 for every death. This must stop! The tobacco treaty is among one of the best tools the world has today to prevent this senseless massacre that hurts the citizens of the world and our economies. More than 150 governments will meet in a few weeks and make decisions that can help stop the tobacco related epidemic. Countries must act swiftly and wisely in order to prevent all of these unnecessary deaths. Let us know what you think of the video and be sure to share it with friends and family.

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Click here to visit the FCA site>

Posted in Blog | Tagged FCA, FCTC, Global News, International News, Tobacco Epidemic, Tobacco Treaty, WHO, WHO’s Tobacco-Free Initiative | Leave a comment

Secondhand Smoke Exposure For Just 20 Minutes Leads To Breathing Impairment, Study FInds

By ash | Published October 24, 2012

It only takes 20 minutes of secondhand smoke exposure before breathing is impaired, a new study shows.

Researchers from the University of Athens, the Hellenic Cancer Society and the Harvard School of Public Health had 15 healthy study participants go inside a chamber meant to simulate a bar or car filled with secondhand smoke particulates for 20 minutes to see how their breathing was impaired.

In just that short amount of time, air flow through the participants’ airways was impeded.

“The observed short-term effects of secondhand smoke tell us that even a short exposure is indeed harmful for normal airways,” study researcher Dr. Panagiotis Behrakis, M.D., FCCP, of the University of Athens, said in a statement.

The new findings were presented at the annual meeting of the American College of Chest Physicians; because the study has yet to be published in a peer-reviewed journal, findings should be regarded as preliminary.

Similarly, a study published in 2007 in the American Journal of Public Healthshowed that cancer-causing NNK — a compound that comes from the smoke of cigarettes — builds up by 6 percent every hour in bar- and restaurant-workers who are exposed to secondhand smoke during their night shifts, TIME reported.

“We were somewhat surprised by the immediacy of the effect and the fact that we could measure the average hourly increase,” study researcher Michael Stark, principal investigator at the Mulmomah County Health Department in Oregon, told TIME.

Earlier this year, a study in theAmerican Journal of Public Healthshowed just how many lives secondhand smoke claims in the U.S. each year: 42,000, Livescience reported.

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Smoking, Diabetes Are Risk Factors for Poor Leg Circulation: Study

By ash | Published October 24, 2012

New research confirms that smoking, diabetes, high blood pressure and highcholesterol levels can all raise men’s risk for poor circulation in the legs, otherwise known as peripheral artery disease (PAD).

According to the American Heart Association, PAD involves a narrowing of the peripheral (outside the heart) arteries, most commonly the vessels of the pelvis or legs. People with PAD are at increased risk for heart attack, stroke or mini-stroke. The condition is thought to affect 8 million to 10 million people in the United States.

The new study included nearly 45,000 U.S. men who were followed for more than two decades. During that time, 537 cases of PAD were diagnosed. Each of the four risk factors — smoking, diabetes, high blood pressure (hypertension) and high cholesterol levels — was significantly and independently associated with a higher risk of PAD.

Ninety-six percent of the men who developed PAD had at least one of the four risk factors when they were diagnosed with theartery disease, noted a team led by Michel Joosten of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School in Boston.

The investigators also found that men who did not have any of the four risk factors were 77 percent less likely to develop PAD than all other men in the study.

The risk of PAD tended to increase the longer a man had both type 2 diabetes and high cholesterol levels, the researchers added.

Two experts welcomed the results of the study.

“This important study is consistent with findings from earlier studies,” noted Dr. Kenneth Ong, acting chair of the department of medicine and cardiology at the Brooklyn Hospital Center in New York City. “It is well done due to its large population and long duration of follow-up.”

Dr. Maja Zaric, an interventional cardiologist at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, who treats many patients with PAD, also noted that risk factors associated with the artery disease are also typically linked to heart disease, but the relationship to PAD seems to be even stronger.

That’s especially true for smoking, Zaric said. “As a matter of fact, one of the study findings reports remote effects of smoking on PAD incidence even 20 years after smoking cessation,” she pointed out. “That should not discourage smokers from abstinence since the PAD risk amongst current smokers appears to be threefold higher than in former smokers.”

Zaric added, “now that the major risk factors for PAD in men have been identified, additional studies with specific clinical endpoints should be done to examine effects of risk factor and lifestyle modification. And not to forget, women should be studied in a similar fashion, as it is shown that presence of PAD amongst female patients had been under-recognized.”

The study was published in the Oct. 24/31 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.

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Five Smart-Phone Apps That Promote Smoking

By ash | Published October 24, 2012

Marketing cigarettes ain’t what it used to be. Gone are the days of Joe Camel billboards and T-shirts or caps branded with cigarette makers’ logos. But Big Tobacco hasn’t given up on getting its message out.

A 1999 settlement banned tobacco companies from advertising outdoors or at stadiums but there’s another grey zone where the definition of an ad remains fuzzy — smartphone apps. According to the latest research from Australia, apps are loosely regulated, sold worldwide, and increasingly popular—all appealing features for cigarette makers. They’re even open to kids.

In their report, published in the journal Tobacco Control, researchers at the University of Sydney searched the Apple and Android app stores with keywords like “smoke,” “cigarette,” and “tobacco,” to see how many promotional apps they could find. They tallied up anything that looked to be pro-smoking — apps showing branded images or info about where to buy tobacco products — even if the product claimed to be an aid for quitting. The final count? More than 100 different mobile-phone applications that appear to promote smoking.

It’s doubtful all the promos come straight from tobacco companies. The researchers, however, believe that some may. Speaking to Bloomberg earlier this week, author Nasser BinDhim said he finds it “suspicious” that smoking apps are typically released by developers who work under nicknames rather than business names, unlike in other industries. TIME selected five of the most creative pro-smoking apps described in the study, so you can judge for yourself:

1) myAshtray

Most apps identified by the Sydney researchers were tools to simulate or mimic the act of smoking. In this one, users click on the screen to drop ash into the virtual ashtray.

Although the app’s download page claims it can be used to help to quit smoking, BinDhim and colleagues felt the messages that users receive when they drop ash into the ashtray might actually encourage smoking behavior. One such message: “Would be even better with a beer in your hand!” The scientists also say there is no evidence that simulated smoking can prevent cigarette cravings.

2) Cigarettes

This app for Android gives tar and nicotine specs, photos of packaging, and a list of global availability for major cigarette brands from all over the world. Helpful, perhaps, if you’re visiting Estonia and trying to figure out which smokes to buy.

Don’t underestimate how global the market for smartphone apps has become. Today there are more than 6 billion mobile phones worldwide and while most of those are not smartphones, the number of smartphone users continues to rise. In rich countries, like the U.S., the U.K, and Australia, more than one third of mobile phones are already app-ready, according to the new study.

3) Puff Puff Pass

In this cartoon game, players click on a character to make the virtual person smoke. You win points for passing the cigarette (or the pipe, or the cigar — you choose) quickly between characters in a designated order.

There’s strong evidence that smoking in movies can encourage kids to smoke more. A cartoon game with lots of smoking may have the same effect.

4) Cigarette Battery Widget

This app uses a cigarette icon to show you how much battery power remains on your smartphone. It’s simple and requires very little engagement from users. But it can still be a constant reminder of cigarettes, and smoking. So far, this app has been downloaded more than 50,000 times.

5) CRA — Cigar Rights of America

Cigar Rights of America is an advocacy group that will petition various local, state, and federal governments to “protect the freedoms of cigar enthusiasts,” according to the group’s website. This app lets users stream audio and video related to cigar regulation, and gives updates on news, events, and ways to get involved with the group.

Given this latest research on the number of smoking promotions now available in app stores, it may not be long before CRA finds itself with a new legal battle to address: the rights of the virtual cigar smoker.

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Who Smokes Most: A Surprising Map of Smoking Rates by Country

By ash | Published October 19, 2012

Nobody lights up like Eastern Europe, where average annual consumption can exceed 2,000 cigarettes per person. The very highest rate is in Serbia (2,861 cigarettes per person per year), according to data from 71 countries compiled by the World Lung Foundation and American Cancer Society. Fourth-place Russia, not far behind at 2,786 cigarettes per person per year, is now finally dealing with its smoking problem.

Proposed new restrictions in Russia — modeled after laws in Western countries that coincided with a drop in smoking rates — would limit cigarette advertising and public smoking in Russia, and more than double excise taxes on cigarretes. A Wall Street Journal article on the Kremlin’s campaign details Russia’s cigarette problem, which costs 400,000 lives and $48.1 billion every year.

The international smoking data is mapped out above. It’s a fascinating bit of comparative data, with some potentially surprising pieces of information:

• The highest rates are all in Eastern Europe. The one Eastern European exception is Romania, which had similarly bleak numbers until it enacted tough anti-smoking laws in 1997.

• The biggest smokers outside of Eastern Europe are South Koreans, Kazakhs, and Japanese, in that order. China’s smoking rate still lags behind Korea’s and Japan’s (1,711 cigarettes per person in China versus 1,958 in Korea and 1,841 in Japan), but China is the world’s largest overall consumer of cigarettes. As the country urbanizes and develops, don’t be shocked if they rise in the rankings.

• A 1998 study of Russian smoking habits found a direct correlation between cigarette and alcohol consumption rates and a direct correlation between smoking and exposure to “Western influences,” such as Western tobacco companies marketing cigarettes as symbols of a “glamorous Western lifestyle.”

• Americans rank right in the middle. The U.S. is ranked 34th in the available data, with about a thousand cigarettes consumed per person per year. We’re about tied with the Israelis, the Australians and the Irish.

• In this data set, poorer countries tend to be healthier. Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia have some of the lowest smoking rates in the world. Indians smoke only 96 cigarettes per year per person. Ethiopians only 46. If Americans smoked like that, cigarette companies would collapse overnight, but health-care costs would drop dramatically as well; direct health-care costs related to smoking in the United States are estimated at $96 billion per year.

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DOJ Spars with Tobacco Companies Over ‘Forced Public Confessions’

By ash | Published October 16, 2012

Tobacco company lawyers are challenging the proposed language of public statements that the U.S. Department of Justice wants cigarette manufacturers to distribute to minimize the chance that the companies will make false claims in the future about the health effects of smoking.

The companies are required by court order to widely disseminate the so-called “corrective statements,” which address topics that include the marketing of cigarettes, addiction and health damage. The language of the statements, which must issue through ads in newspapers, on television networks and in retail displays, remains in dispute. U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler will have the final say on the text of the statements.

The statements are the most publicly visible component of the high-profile injunction issued against tobacco companies following a judge’s conclusion in 2006 that industry leaders participated in a decades-long campaign to dupe consumers about the health risks of smoking. The Justice Department sued the major companies in 1999 under federal racketeering laws.

A lawyer for R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Holdings Inc., Noel Francisco of Jones Day, said during a hearing on October 15 that the statements must be “purely factual and uncontroversial.” Francisco argued that the government wants to appeal to consumers’ emotions, moving beyond factual statements to try to embarrass tobacco companies through what he described as “forced public confessions.” One of the proposed statements says that tobacco companies intentionally manipulated cigarettes to make them more addictive.

Francisco took the lead in advocating for the tobacco companies during the hearing. Beth Wilkinson of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison and Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher‘s Miguel Estrada were in court for Philip Morris USA.

“[W]hile the government may claim that at least some of its proposed statements do not literally compel defendants to utter the words, ‘We lied,’ there can be no question that the proposed statements are subject to that interpretation,” Estrada said in court papers filed in September.

Justice Department lawyer Daniel Crane-Hirsch, who practices in consumer litigation, argued that the corrective statements must prevent and restrain any future fraudulent statements by the tobacco companies. Generic statements about the dangers of smoking that don’t go to corporate liability, he said, are insufficient. “These companies don’t want people to know what they have done,” Crane-Hirsch told Kessler. He later said the tobacco companies “want to erase history.”

In court papers, Crane-Hirsch disputed that one of the proposed statements—”Smoking kills 1,200 Americans. Every day.”—is an improper appeal to emotion. He said the statement is rooted in an unchallenged finding of fact by Kessler, who presided over a nine-month bench trial in the racketeering case.

The lawyers on both sides are also trying to assess the effect a recent decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit will have on the scope and substance of the corrective statements. A divided D.C. Circuit in August struck down a U.S. Food & Drug Administration rule requiring cigarette packages to carry graphic images depicting the hazards of smoking. Francisco said the decision provides a guideline for Kessler to restrict the corrective statements.

The majority on the three-judge panel in the graphic images litigation determined that the images violated the First Amendment. Judge Janice Rogers Brown, writing for the majority, said the “inflammatory images” cannot be deemed an attempt to convey information to consumers. The court said the FDA failed to show that graphic warning images have directly caused a decrease in smoking.

DOJ lawyers last week asked the full D.C. Circuit to rehear that case. “The government’s interest in effectively communicating the health risks of smoking cannot be overstated,” the government said in its petition.

The government said there’s sufficient evidence showing that “cigarette health warnings with graphics are far more effective in communicating health-risk information than are health warnings with text alone.” The tobacco companies are expected to respond to the DOJ petition later this month.

Kessler didn’t say when she would rule in the corrective statements dispute. The judge said she is not bound to accept the proposed language from the Justice Department. She indicated she was inclined to modify the language.

By Mike ScarcellaContact All Articles

The National Law Journal

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Tell Your Representative Not to Take Tobacco Money

By ash | Published October 16, 2012

Below is a sample letter to send to your representative urging them to refuse political contributions from the tobacco industry. To look up your Senator/Representative you can view the ASH campaign contribution map or click here > Senator/Representative

______________________________

Dear Senator/Representative [last name]:

I am writing to express my concern upon discovering that your campaign has received funding from the tobacco industry. I urge you to return these monies immediately, and declare a policy of never accepting political contributions from the tobacco industry or its affiliates in the future.

Tobacco is the leading cause of preventable death in the world today, and is the only product on the market that, when used exactly as intended, kills. About half a million Americans die prematurely each year because of tobacco use, including nonsmokers who die from secondhand tobacco smoke.

Even if these contributions do not influence your voting, they should be refused on principle. There is an irreconcilable conflict of interest between the tobacco industry and public health. Accepting contributions from an industry that intentionally addicts and kills millions flies in the face of your obligations to your constituents.

Respectfully,

[name]

[address]*

*It is very important to include your address in order to verify that you are a constituent

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Big Tobacco Buys Big Political Influence

By ash | Published October 16, 2012

Money is doled out to both sides of the aisle

The tobacco industry has always been a major player in congressional campaigns, but a new online map (ash.org/map) shows just how pervasive tobacco money is in politics. The map, produced by Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), allows you to click on your home district and see how much money your Member of Congress and Senators have accepted.

“Given the destruction that tobacco causes in this country, it is outrageous that so many politicians accept tobacco money,” said Dr. Alfred Munzer, Chairman of the Board of ASH and former President of the American Lung Association. Dr. Munzer, a pulmonologist, has campaigned for decades against tobacco use. “Roughly 80% of my patients suffer from tobacco-related diseases. No politician should share in the ill-gotten profits of the tobacco industry or owe favors to big tobacco.”

In the nearly 50 years since the 1964 Surgeon General’s report linking smoking with cancer and other diseases, the prevalence of smoking in the U.S. has plummeted, but tobacco still claims the lives of roughly 500,000 Americans each year. Smoking rates are still extremely high in some areas, and approximately 3,000 children start smoking every day.

Globally, tobacco is considered an epidemic by the World Health Organization. About 100 million people died from tobacco in the 20^th century, a toll higher than both world wars combined. The WHO estimates that without dramatic action, tobacco will claim one billion lives this century.

“The United States has joined with the rest of the world in calling for serious action about tobacco, and part of that is acknowledging that the tobacco industry is the vector of the disease,” said ASH director Laurent Huber. The U.S. signed on to a UN political declaration last year that recognizes the need to tackle the tobacco epidemic and highlights “the fundamental conflict of interest between the tobacco industry and public health,” the reason why big tobacco should stay away from public policy. Huber added, “The public interest and the interests of the tobacco industry are diametrically opposed. It is simply unethical for politicians to take tobacco money.”

In addition to the massive health costs of tobacco use, there are dire economic implications. Tobacco disease costs taxpayers, including nonsmokers, hundreds of billions of dollars a year. One study estimated the cost to society of each pack of cigarettes at $18. Stronger tobacco control measures would go a long way toward reducing the deficit and saving medicare.

The tobacco industry is bi-partisan when it comes to buying political favors. Dozens of Democrats as well as Republicans gladly accept donations from tobacco corporations, and for decades members of both parties have returned the favor by voting for tobacco interests. After years of effort, Congress finally gave FDA limited authority over tobacco in 2009, but only after Philip Morris, the number one tobacco industry donor, said it was OK. Even now the tobacco industry seeks to undermine the effectiveness of FDA regulation.

# # #

Posted in Blog, Featured News & Events, Press Releases, Related News, Smoke Alarms | Tagged Campaign Contributions, Congress, Domestic News, Eye on Tobacco Industry, Political Map, Senators, Tobacco Money, US News | Leave a comment

Electronic Cigarettes Could be Banned

By ash | Published October 15, 2012

The European Union may be poised to ban the sale of electronic cigarettes, it has been reported.

According to a leaked draft published by Tobacco Journal International, the revised EU Tobacco Products Directive contains a recommended ban on the marketing of all smokeless nicotine-containing products, with the one exception of Swedish snus, unless they are authorised as medicinal products on the basis of their quality, safety and efficacy.

The Electronic Cigarette Industry Trade Association (ECITA) said it had been “greatly alarmed” by the reports, and urged the European Commission to urgently confirm or deny the veracity of the leaked documents.

In a letter to the European Commission, ECITA president Katherine Devlin said: “As we understand it, the Commission will now have completed the Impact Assessment for this consultation process. This will no doubt have indicated the significant economic growth of the electronic cigarette industry, and your own Eurobarometer survey clearly demonstrates how significant the positive impact on public health could be, if electronic cigarettes remain widely available to smokers.

“It is crucial that the proper regulatory standards are in place, but this cannot be achieved through medicinal regulation. The costs are too high, and the restrictions on the flexibility and appeal of the product are too great, so all the considerable public health benefit potential would be lost.”

Imperial Tobacco, which recently bought into a third-party electronic cigarette business last month, said it was aware that a working version of the EU Tobacco Products Directive proposals had been leaked. “We are expecting the final, formal proposals to be published by the end of the year and we will be in a better position to comment at that time,” a spokeswoman said.

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New Website Highlights Tobacco Lobbyists’ Campaign Contributions and Gifts to Oklahoma Lawmakers

By ash | Published October 1, 2012

OKLAHOMA CITY, OKLAHOMA (October 1, 2012)A new website with searchable databases of all campaign contributions and gifts from tobacco lobbyists to members of the Oklahoma State Legislature was announced today. The website www.tobaccomoney.com was developed in Oklahoma and is gaining national attention for helping to educate the public on how the tobacco industry influences policymaking. The website encourages state legislators and legislative candidates in Oklahoma to sign a pledge to not accept campaign contributions, meals, or other gifts from any tobacco company political action committee (PAC) or from any individual registered as a lobbyist for a tobacco company or tobacco trade association.

“The tobacco industry is seeing a major return on its investment in Oklahoma’s political system,” said Robert McCaffree, MD, Co-Director of the Oklahoma Tobacco Research Center. “There’s a clear correlation between tobacco industry contributions and the suppression or opposition of legislation intended to reduce tobacco use in our state, particularly among legislators accepting campaign contributions from tobacco company PAC’s.”

Since 2006, Oklahoma state legislators now in office have accepted $242,719 in campaign contributions, meals and other gifts from current tobacco lobbyists and tobacco company PAC’s. Separately, over $50,000 has been accepted by various statewide House or Senate election committees. The highest total amount taken since 2006 by any individual representative is $6,298 and by any individual senator is $11,239. Nine representatives and 11 senators have accepted a total of $3,000 or more.

“The more light we can shine on industry efforts to stop meaningful tobacco prevention measures, the less effective those efforts will be,” says Laurent Huber, executive director of Action on Smoking & Health (ASH). A national leader in the fight on tobacco, ASH is focused this election year on political contributions. “Oklahoma’s website is a model we hope to help replicate in all states, said Huber.”

According to the Oklahoma Ethics Commission, there are 11 individuals currently registered to lobby the Oklahoma legislature on behalf of tobacco companies or tobacco industry trade associations. The tobacco lobbyists and listings of their clients are shown on the website.

“For decades, we’ve watched tobacco lobbyists manage to kill bills they oppose and pass bills they support,” said Doug Matheny, the website’s author. “Even if it never influenced legislation, money distributed by tobacco lobbyists should be refused as a matter of principle. Accepting money or gifts from representatives of an industry that addicts young people to deadly products is inconsistent with Oklahoma values. Most tobacco lobbyists in Oklahoma take direct orders from companies that federal courts recently found guilty of racketeering.” Matheny is the former director of tobacco prevention at the Oklahoma State Department of Health. He retired in February 2011 after 28 years of service.

“Speaking on behalf of physicians now starting practices in Oklahoma, our legislators need to take a stand for health,” said Chris Sudduth, MD, MPH of Tulsa. Dr. Sudduth is Chair of the Oklahoma State Medical Association Resident and Fellow Section. “These powerful tobacco lobbyists and their money should be rejected. Business as usual must change.”

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Posted in Press Releases, Related News | Tagged Campaign, Eye on Tobacco, Eye on Tobacco Industry, Oklahoma, Tobacco Money, U.S. News | Leave a comment

Top 5 Recipients @ tobaccomoney.com

By ash | Published October 1, 2012

New website tobaccomoney.com highlights campaign contributions and gifts from tobacco lobbyists to members of the Oklahoma State Legislator. Here is a listing of some of the websites top 5 recipients:

Top Recipients of Tobacco Lobby Money in the Oklahoma House of Representatives*

State Repre sentative	Campaign Contributions from Tobacco Lobbyists	Campaign Contributions from Tobacco Company PAC’s	Meals & Other Gifts from Tobacco Lobbyists	TOTAL
Randy Terrill	$2,850	$3,250	$198	$6,298
T.W. Shannon	$1,600	$3,700	$332	$5,632
Mike Jackson	$2,650	$1,000	$1,501	$5,151
John Trebilcock	$1,450	$2,250	$507	$4,207
Mike Sanders	$3,200	$500	$297	$3,997

* Since January 1, 2006

Top Recipients of Tobacco Lobby Money in the Oklahoma Senate*

State Senator	Campaign Contributions from Tobacco Lobbyists	Campaign Contributions from Tobacco Company PAC’s	Meals & Other Gifts from Tobacco Lobbyists	TOTAL
Rob Johnson	$6,700	$3,500	$1,039	$11,239
Brian Bingman	$3,500	$2,500	$1,046	$7,046
Dan Newberry	$4,250	$2,500	$146	$6,896
Patrick Anderson	$5,250	$500	$233	$5,983
Don Barrington	$4,650	$1,000	$67	$5,717

* Since January 1, 2006

Health & Economic Impact of Tobacco in Oklahoma*

Number one cause of preventable disease and premature death, killing an estimated 6,000 Oklahomans each year.
For every person who dies from tobacco use, another 20 are suffering with at least one serious tobacco-caused disease.
The vast majority of tobacco users become addicted as young people. If current trends continue, an estimated 87,000 Oklahoma youth alive today will ultimately die early from smoking.
Most current tobacco users in Oklahoma want to quit and have tried many times.
Every pack of cigarettes sold costs Oklahoma’s economy an estimated $7.62 in medical expenses and lost productivity caused by premature death and disease.

* Source: Oklahoma State Plan for Tobacco Use Prevention and Cessation (http://www.ok.gov/health/Disease,_Prevention,_Preparedness/Tobacco_Use_Prevention_Service/)

Federal Racketeering Conviction of Major Tobacco Companies*

On August 17, 2006, Philip Morris, Altria, R.J. Reynolds, Brown and Williamson, Lorillard, American Tobacco, and British American Tobacco Company were found guilty in U.S. District Court of racketeering and conducting a conspiracy. The decision noted that they have not ceased engaging in unlawful activity and that “their continuing conduct misleads consumers in order to maximize Defendants revenues by recruiting new smokers (the majority of whom are under the age of 18), preventing current smokers from quitting, and thereby sustaining the industry.”
On May 22, 2009, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit issued a unanimous opinion upholding the District Court judgment.
On June 28, 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear appeals in the case, thereby allowing the federal racketeering conviction to stand.

* Source: U.S. D epartment of Justice (http://www.justice.gov/civil/cases/tobacco2/index.htm)

ABOUT TOBACCOMONEY.COM

The purpose of tobaccomoney.com is to help expose and eliminate the influence of the tobacco industry in the Oklahoma State Legislature through public awareness and by encouraging the refusal of all campaign contributions and gifts from all registered tobacco lobbyists and tobacco company PAC’s. No disrespect towards any individual person is intended. The databases on the website are compiled using information available to the public from the Oklahoma Ethics Commission. For more information, please contact Doug Matheny at contact@tobaccomoney.com or 405-474-8381.

Posted in Blog | Tagged Campaign, Eye on Tobacco, Eye on Tobacco Industry, Oklahoma, Tobacco Money | Leave a comment

Smoking Makes People Poorer

By ash | Published September 25, 2012

A new report comes to some startling conclusions about the up-front economic costs of smoking. Nationwide, the average smoker spends 14% of income on cigarettes. In New York, where taxes are among the highest, low-income smokers spend a staggering 25% of their money on their addiction!

Cigarette costs add up to about $7400 a year for a New Yorker with a two pack-a-day habit. Here are some suggested alternatives for spending that kind of money:

Lease a 5 series BMW, and have enough left over for gas.
A sailing vacation in the Galapagos for you and your spouse, every year (or you could go somewhere different each year).
Start a college fund for your 4 year old. Private university tuition would be completely covered when they turn 18.
VIP seats for you and a friend at every Super Bowl.

Next time> the retail cost is only the tip of the iceberg for what cigarettes cost us

Posted in Blog | Tagged Smoking Cost, U.S. News | Leave a comment

CDC Studying Anti-Smoking Ad Outcome

By ash | Published September 24, 2012

The CDC is trying to find out how well a $54 million campaign of emotional ads to scare smokers into quitting worked, researchers said.

During the 3 months that the ads aired on TV, radio, and social media, calls to a national quit line more than doubled and hits on the smoking cessation website smokefree.gov tripled, according to Nancy Rigotti, MD, of Massachusetts General Hospital, and Melanie Wakefield, PhD, of the Cancer Council Victoria in Australia.

Whether the boosted short-term response will translate to a lower smoking prevalence remains to be seen, and the CDC is watching closely. It has sponsored an ongoing longitudinal study of 5,000 adult smokers and 2,000 adult nonsmokers who completed online surveys a month before the campaign launched and immediately after it ended.

The stars of the ads were former smokers who were now living with the consequences of smoking — particularly the stoma, which turns voices robotic.

“Emotive personal testimonials and narratives are powerful strategies for reaching and influencing the broad population of smokers,” the researchers wrote. “Emotionally laden stories show the risks of tobacco use in a far more potent way than abstract information can.”

The idea was to “increase smokers’ sense of personal vulnerability to serious disease and increase their sense of urgency for quitting,” they wrote.

In the survey, respondents were asked questions about their awareness of the campaign, as well as their attitudes toward smoking cessation and secondhand smoke exposure.

Nonsmokers also were asked if they had encouraged friends or family members to quit. Survey results are expected by the end of the year, the researchers wrote.

The public health literature is on the CDC’s side, Rigotti and Wakefield wrote, with strong evidence that mass-media education campaigns can have an impact on behavior, particularly when it comes to smoking.

They warned that the campaign’s brief 3-month run will probably limit its effects. CDC said it will run another 3-month campaign in the first quarter of 2013.

Funding for the ad series, titled “Tips From Former Smokers,” came from the Affordable Care Act’s prevention and public health fund. The $54 million pricetag was an “unprecedented” amount spent on tobacco control in the U.S., the researchers said — though they warned that it “pales in comparison to the $27 million spent daily by the tobacco industry to market its products.”

FDA also has gone graphic with its anti-smoking initiatives, including a plan to make warning labels on cigarette packs much more intimidating. The new graphic labels were supposed to appear this month, but implementation was halted due to ongoing litigation with the tobacco industry.

See this article at its original location>

Posted in Related News | Tagged Advertising, CDC, Plain Packaging, Tobacco Ads | Leave a comment

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