MIAMI — A jury in northwestern Florida awarded a staggering $23 billion judgment late Friday against the country’s second-largest tobacco company for causing the death of a chain smoker who died of lung cancer at the age of 36. The company, the R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, promised a prompt
Eric Crosbie, MA, Mariaelena Gonzalez, PhD, and Stanton A. Glantz, PhD ABSTRACT Noncommunicable diseases result from consuming unhealthy products, including tobacco, which are promoted by transnational corporations. The tobacco industry uses preemption to block or reverse tobacco control policies. Preemption removes authority from jurisdictions where tobacco companies’ influence is weak
LIMA, Peru — A protracted legal battle in an obscure World Bank tribunal over the principles of market competition in a South American backwater. Even by trade dispute standards, this one sounds arcane — the perfect cure for insomnia perhaps. But before you nod off, here’s a triple shot of
In 2013, New York City passed a law (Local Law 1021-A-2013) that sets a minimum price for cigarettes sold in the city. The law also prohibits the use of coupons or promotional discounts to lower that price. Tobacco companies challenged the law on the grounds that it violated their First
What Makes Tobacco Different? In recognition of the World Health Organization’s World No Tobacco Day on May 31, 2014, Action on Smoking and Health certified 193 Senators and Representatives “Free from Tobacco Money.” This certification was given to all U.S. Senators and Representatives who have not accepted campaign money from
Quick—what’s the biggest health risk for gay men? No, it’s not AIDS. And no, it’s not being clubbed by a horde of knuckle-dragging, tobacco-juice-chin-dribbling, conservative troglodytes. Good guess, but the correct answer is smoking. The latest Center for Disease Control (CDC) statistics show that 20.5 percent of heterosexuals and 30.8
Today, the World Health Organization and Alzheimer’s Disease International released the statement below, in conjunction with this Fact Sheet linking tobacco as a risk factor for dementia. New evidence reveals that smokers have a 45% higher risk of developing dementia than non-smokers. “This newly-identified link between smoking and dementia provides
Between 2005 and 2012, Uruguay instituted a set of strong tobacco control policies. By 2012, the government had banned nearly all advertising, promotion and sponsorship of tobacco products, prohibited smoking in all indoor enclosed public places and workplaces, mandated rotating graphic warning labels covering 80 percent of the front and
TRENTON, New Jersey — New Jersey might become the first state in the nation to raise the legal age to purchase tobacco products and electronic cigarettes to 21. The state Senate on Monday passed a bill that would raise the minimum age. The measure awaits action in the Assembly. Full
Tobacco giant Philip Morris International (PMI) wants to challenge new EU rules on tobacco to see if it can get the stricter labelling requirements changed. The Marlboro manufacturer on Friday (27 June) said the EU’s new tobacco products directive “appears to ban truthful and non-misleading claims on the packaging of
According to a recent study by the US. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, U.S. workers are continuing, and slightly increasing, their use of smokeless tobacco products. Smokeless tobacco (snuff and chew tobacco) are known to cause oral, esophageal and pancreatic cancer. The study did not include other smokeless
Adult smoking rates have dropped from 42% in 1965 to 21.3% today, but the rate of decrease is slowing, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC’s) latest issue of Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR),released online June 24. The report also found use of cigars and smokeless
The World Health Organisation says a number of countries across the Pacific are considering following in Australia’s footsteps and introducing plain packaging of cigarettes. The WHO is set to join governments across the region in a major drive to make the Pacific tobacco free within 10 years. The WHO Pacific
Doctors in the U.K. will vote on Tuesday as to whether to support a “campaign to ban forever the sale of cigarettes to any individual born after the year 2000.” It’s an appealing thought exercise for public health types: Smoking rates declined steadily in the late 20th century as the
Over the last five decades, the tobacco industry has engineered cigarettes to be more addictive — and has also made them more dangerous. Smokers suffer from higher risk of lung cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) todaycompared to 1964, when the very first Surgeon General’s report on cigarettes was
The Australian federal Treasury has entered the debate over cigarette sales, publishing previously secret information that shows sales falling since the introduction of graphic health warnings and plain packaging. The Treasury collects data on sales per stick in order to levy tobacco excise, but has until now withheld it from
A legal challenge to a new law aimed at keeping New York City tobacco prices sky high has gone up in smoke. Manhattan federal Judge Thomas Greisa on Wednesday sided with the city in a lawsuit filed in January by tobacco companies and trade groups representing cigarette retailers. Greisa in
“I think we have seen this movie before,” Senator Richard Blumenthal said. “It is called big nicotine comes to children near you and you are using the same kinds of tactics and promotions and ads that were used by big tobacco and proved so effective” In a hearing Wednesday afternoon
New Jersey reached a deal to obtain almost $92 million for its general fund by pledging the remainder of its revenue from the national tobacco settlement to investors. The bolstered payment pledge made trading prices on bonds linked to the agreement more than triple from March 3. Full Article>
The Australian’s ‘exclusive’ story on plain packaging is just plain wrong. Watch more here>
Electronic cigarettes, promoted as a healthier alternative to tobacco, are getting powerful new backers with an unhealthy reputation: big tobacco companies.The development points to ways Big Tobacco is moving to turn the young e-cigarette market to its advantage. Full Article>
Electronic cigarettes may be closer to smoking cessation devices than regular smokes and regulators are keeping “an open mind” on their potential health benefit, said the top U.S. official overseeing their use. In comments that may boost the developing $3 billion e-cigarette market, Mitch Zeller, head of the Food and
The Republic of Ireland has become the first country in Europe to try to pass a law banning the sale of branded cigarette and tobacco packets. The proposed legislation would force tobacco firms to use plain packaging, removing all logos and trademark colours from cigarette packets. Read Full Article>
HRW documents the shocking conditions on tobacco farms in the US, where child workers are exposed to nicotine, toxic pesticides and other dangers. Human Rights Watch’s recent report, Tobacco’s Hidden Children: Hazardous Child Labor in US Tobacco Farming, documents conditions under which children – ages seven to 17 – work
22nd Century Group, Inc. (NYSE MKT: XXII ) today announced that on June 9, 2014 the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) issued a Notice of Allowance to the Company for technology that reduces nicotine in tobacco by suppressing expression of the NBB gene by itself and in combination with
