The Associated Press

PENSACOLA, Fla. –

Escambia County will have a tobacco-free hiring policy starting in October.

All applicants for county jobs are currently required to take a drug test, which will be expanded to include testing for tobacco use. Any applicant testing positive for tobacco will not be eligible.

Officials say the policy is aimed at improving the health of employees and to get the county’s health insurance costs under control. It’s one of several policies county commissioners approved this week.

The county also is enacting a 50-foot smoking ban from the entrance or exit of any county building on Oct. 1. In two years, no county employee will be allowed to smoke anywhere on county property.

July 27, 2008 - Sunday Gazette Mail

The World Health Organization estimates that cigarettes will bring agonizing early death to 1 billion people around the planet during the 21st century.

The World Health Organization estimates that cigarettes will bring agonizing early death to 1 billion people around the planet during the 21st century.

Two concerned American billionaires who care about humanity teamed up last week to try to save some of the nicotine victims.

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg joined with retired Microsoft guru Bill Gates in pledging $500 million to halt smoking everywhere. Bloomberg will add $250 million to $125 million he already gave for the crusade. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation promised $125 million more. (Both men grew rich from computers: Gates by creating operating systems, Bloomberg by providing online financial data to Wall Street firms.)

Their joint effort will urge all governments to raise tobacco taxes sharply, ban smoking in public places, outlaw advertising to teens and free giveaways of cigarettes, start intensive warnings about tobacco danger, and offer nicotine patches to people trying to quit.

The drive will focus on five heavy-puffing countries: China, India, Indonesia, Russia and Bangladesh. The New York Times commented:

“It promises to be a struggle. Cigarettes are not only highly addictive and supported by huge advertising campaigns, they are also an important source of income for many foreign governments. In some countries, tobacco is a state-owned monopoly, and low- and middle-income countries collect $66 billion a year in tobacco taxes. About 5 percent of countries in the world have any anti-smoking measures like those the campaign envisions.”

That’s dismaying. Such governments are drug-peddlers, just like U.S. cigarette firms, reaping profits from people’s nicotine addiction, ignoring the terrible health toll caused by smoking. The Times noted that “waves of lung cancer deaths … typically begin about 40 years after smoking takes hold in a society.”

In an editorial titled “Stub out that weed forever,” Britain’s Economist said:

“Despite decades of work by health campaigners, more than 1 billion people still smoke today. Smoking kills up to half of those who fail to quit puffing, reducing their lives by an average of 10 to 15 years. The World Health Organization says more than 5 million people a year die early from the effects, direct or indirect, of tobacco.”

Billionaires Bloomberg and Gates deserve public gratitude for attempting to save lives. Oxford University epidemiologist Richard Peto summed up:

“I reckon this will avoid tens of millions of deaths in my lifetime, and hundreds of millions in my kids’ lifetimes.”

By SARA KUGLER

NEW YORK (AP) — Microsoft founder Bill Gates and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg are pooling their piles of money to pour $375 million into a global effort to cut smoking.

The billionaire philanthropists, who have a combined worth of more than $70 billion, said Wednesday that the money will help efforts in developing countries where tobacco use is highest. There are more than 1 billion smokers worldwide.

The $250 million from Bloomberg and $125 million from Gates will support projects that raise tobacco taxes, help smokers quit, ban tobacco advertising and protect nonsmokers from exposure to smoke, their foundations said. It will also aid efforts to track tobacco use and better understand tobacco control strategies.

“Bill and I want to highlight the enormity of this problem and catalyze a global movement of governments and civil society to stop the tobacco epidemic,” Bloomberg said in a statement.

Bloomberg, who built his fortune from the financial information company he founded in the 1980s, is adding to an anti-smoking initiative he funded with $125 million in 2006.

That money goes toward tobacco-fighting campaigns in low- and middle-income countries, most specifically China, India, Indonesia, Russia and Bangladesh. The Bloomberg foundation is also conducting a survey to better understand smoking in those countries.

When Bloomberg first announced that $125 million gift, he said at the time that he believed smoking was a public health issue that was largely ignored by philanthropists. He said he hoped publicizing it would bring more attention from other major foundations.

Gates said Wednesday that $24 million of his gift will go directly toward Bloomberg’s efforts that are already underway.

The remaining money will be used by his foundation to begin its own anti-tobacco work, including preventing tobacco use from increasing in Africa.

“Tobacco-caused diseases have emerged as one of the greatest health challenges facing developing countries,” Gates said in a statement. “The good news is, we know what it takes to save millions of lives, and where efforts exist, they are working.”

Bloomberg, a former smoker who quit about 30 years ago, has crusaded against smoking as mayor. In his first term he banned smoking in bars and restaurants and his health department has an aggressive, ongoing campaign to help New Yorkers kick the habit.

Tobacco tax hike could raise price of cigarettes to 500 yen per pack

The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) Research Commission on the Tax System is discussing a major increase in tobacco tax for fiscal 2009 that could raise the price of cigarettes in Japan by 200 yen a pack, despite fierce opposition from the tobacco industry.

The price of a pack is almost certain to go up by at least five yen per cigarette, and a raise of 10 yen per cigarette is also on the table, which would push the price of a 300 yen pack of 20 cigarettes up to 500 yen.

While a price increase to 500 yen would force more people to give up and drive down cigarette sales, central and local government tax revenue is still projected to rise by about 1.5 trillion yen over the approximately 2.2 trillion yen predicted for fiscal 2008. An increase to 1,000 yen per pack has been all but nixed after it was felt that this would significantly decrease tax revenue.

Japan Tobacco and tobacco farmers and retailers have already denounced any tax increases as a devastating blow to the tobacco industry. The LDP is toying with the idea of sugaring the pill for farmers by using some of the extra revenue to pay for subsidies, but debate on the size of the tax increase — unavoidable as far as the commission and the Ministry of Finance are concerned — could last until the end of the year.

Proposed uses for the extra revenue include setting funds aside for an increase in the government’s contributions to basic pensions that is planned for fiscal 2009.

(Mainichi Japan) July 19, 2008

Published: Saturday, 19-Jul-2008 - Child Health News

Babies exposed to cigarette smoke before birth or during the first months afterwards run a greater risk of developing asthma and allergy. This according to a doctoral thesis from the Swedish medical university Karolinska Institutet.

It is a well known fact that babies are harmed by tobacco smoke in numerous ways, but it has always been difficult to separate the effects of the mother smoking during pregnancy and passive smoking after birth. Dr Eva Lannerö’s doctoral thesis now provides new detailed knowledge on how exposure to tobacco smoke early in life influences the risk of developing allergy and asthma respectively.

The thesis, which is based on the so called BAMSE study, shows that smoking during pregnancy increases the chances of the child developing asthma. The study showed that children of mothers who had smoked while pregnant ran double the risk of developing asthma before the age of four. There was also a clear correlation between the number of cigarettes smoked and the risk of developing asthma.

Her thesis also shows that passive smoking in early childhood increases the risk of allergy. Four-year olds who were exposed to tobacco smoke when they were two months old had IgE antibodies (allergy antibodies) against one or more allergens in the blood more often than their coevals from non-smoking homes. The strongest correlation was observed for antibodies against cat allergens, which were twice as common in these children.

“This is particularly worrying as cat allergens are almost everywhere and are hard to avoid,” says Dr Lannerö. “We can’t say how many, but some of these children will definitely develop chronic asthma.”

Dr Lannerö’s studies also show that smoking during pregnancy is least common amongst the higher educated. Of the 4,000 interviewed mothers, 7 per cent of those with university-level education said that they had smoked while pregnant, as opposed to 20 per cent of those who had opted out of tertiary or secondary education. The data applies to mothers of children born between 1994 and 1996.

The BAMSE study is a project in which 4,100 Swedish children born between 1994 and 1996 have been monitored from birth in order that scientists can learn more about the impact of different environmental factors on the development of childhood allergy.

Thesis: ‘Parental smoking, wheezing and sensitisation in early childhood‘, Eva Lannerö Institute of Environmental Medicine (IMM), Karolinska Institutet.

Tobacco-related diseases kill 1m every year

Minnie Chan - Updated on Jul 18, 2008

More than 65 million mainland teenagers have been affected by second-hand smoke, and about 1 million people die from smoking-related diseases every year, the Ministry of Health said yesterday.

Because of the 350 million smokers in the mainland - one-third of the global total - at least 540 million people have become ill because of second-hand smoke, ministry spokesman Mao Qunan said as part of a promotion for tobacco and smoking control.

“Among the 130 million young people, 15 million are regular smokers, and 40 million others had tried smoking,” Mr Mao said, citing this year’s report. “So far 65 million teenagers have suffered from second-hand smoke.”

He pointed out that more than 100,000 mainlanders had died from second-hand smoke and that smoking-related diseases had killed about 1 million annually.

“Many studies forecast that the death toll of smoking-related diseases would double by 2020 to 2 million people a year, and that the cumulative number would be 100 million by 2050, with half of them dying between 35 and 69.”

He blamed fashionable tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship in public places for the increase in the number of young smokers.

With almost 2 trillion cigarettes sold every year, the central government introduced restrictions in 1995 to ban all tobacco advertising.

However, indirect tobacco advertisements and footage of popular idols on TV and movies that imply that smoking is mature and sexy had lured more teenagers to smoke, Mr Mao added.

Chen Weiqing, of Sun Yat-sen University’s School of Public Health in Guangzhou, said the lack of health education in schools and homes was also a key reason young people smoked.

“We found many teenagers had not realised that smoking is harmful because teachers and parents do not pay too much attention to smoking control,” he said. “Indeed, teenagers [find it] very easy to buy cigarettes on the streets due to the lack of prevention and loose restrictions.”

Professor Chen, who studied 3,000 students aged 13 to 15 in Guangzhou from 2005 to last year, said he found only 5.5 per cent of the teenagers continued to smoke after taking part in a three-year experimental workshop on smoking control.

“Many students refused to smoke or go near others who smoke after witnessing the deaths of white mice from smoking in our experimental workshops,” he said. “I suggest that our government introduce a smoking control experimental course … into our educational system.”

ABC News Posted Fri Jul 18, 2008 2:25pm AEST
Updated Fri Jul 18, 2008 7:21pm AEST

Smoking inside Territory pubs and clubs will be banned from 2010. (Reuters: Morris Mac Matzen )

The Territory government has announced its long awaited timeframe for banning smoking inside clubs and pubs, saying new restrictions will come into place from the start of 2010.

The ban will not include outdoor areas where food and drink is not directly served.

Minister Chris Burns says the ban will start in 2010 so businesses will have time to do building work or make other adjustments for the changes.

“Venues need time to carry out works on their rooms and venue to accommodate this change. That’s the advice that we’ve had from industry.

“So we’re prepared to work with industry and allow them some time to do those works, to allow for that change.

“But certainly we foreshadow that if venues want to go before that date then we will be supporting them.”

The Northern Territory is the last place in the country to ban smoking in bars.

Mr Burns says the move reflects public pressure and he is also hoping the smoking changes will end the Territory’s less than prestigious winning run of the Dirty Ash Tray award, given by the Australian Medical Association to the jurisdiction with the worst smoking habits.

State Opposition Gaming and Racing spokesman Matt Conlon has welcomed the move but has labelled it an election stunt because it will not come into effect for 18 months.

“Are they actually approaching some of these licensee’s and actually entering into some sort of negotiation?” he said.

“There’s been no funds set aside or there’s no announcement in this particular announcement as to how much the whole thing is going to cost.”

The indoor smoking ban in all pubs and clubs has been met with mixed support.

The Australian Medical Association’s Dr Rob Parker says its about time.

“It’s very embarrassing for year after year to be brought up as the government that’s done the least amount for smoking policy or smoking health related issues,” he said.

He also says it should have taken six months to impose the ban instead of 18 months.

However the Australian Hotels Association says some pubs and clubs could lose up to 40 per cent of their revenue.

The Association’s Mick Burns says businesses will have to build special smoking areas if they are going to protect profits.

“The large majority of pubs and clubs they either have or will need to make amendments or make changes to their premises to properly facilitate these announcements,” he said.

The Territory Government has also announced a cap on the number of poker machines in the Territory to 1,190.

There will be no new poker machine licenses handed out.

The State Government is also looking into buying back liquor licenses across the Territory.

New Study Finds Tobacco Companies Concealed Data on Radioactive Material in Cigarettes

Polonium-210 in Cigarettes May Kill Thousands Worldwide Each Year

Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids

Washington, D.C. – A study published online today by the American Journal of Public Health finds that tobacco companies have suppressed research and information on the presence of the deadly radioactive poison, polonium 210 (PO-210), in tobacco and tobacco smoke. Estimating that polonium-210 in cigarettes may annually cause the deaths of some 11,700 people from lung cancer worldwide, the study finds that for more than four decades, tobacco companies have known PO-210 is present in tobacco and tobacco smoke. The industry suppressed information about PO-210 out of concern that it would cause public relations and litigation problems and to avoid “waking a sleeping giant,” as one industry official stated.

Summarizing prior research, the study states, “It is estimated that smokers of 1.5 packs of cigarettes a day are exposed to as much radiation as they would receive from 300 chest X-rays a year. PO-210 has been estimated to be responsible for 1% of all U.S. lung cancers…. PO-210 may be responsible for more than 1,600 deaths in the United States and 11,700 deaths in the world each year.”

Polonium-210 received significant media attention in 2006 when it was found to have been used in the fatal poisoning of former KBD agent and Russian dissident Alexander Litvinenko. That poisoning sent health officials across Europe and the former Soviet states to isolate the source and contain potential areas of deadly contamination.

“This study provides another important example of how tobacco companies willfully mislead the public about the dangers of their deadly products and cannot be trusted to tell the truth about their products,” said Damon Moglen, International Advocacy Director for the Campaign For Tobacco-Free Kids. “The bottom line is that smoking kills and before taking a puff, people deserve accurate information about the many poisons in cigarettes, including radioactive polonium-210, and the many diseases caused by tobacco use. Governments must take action to protect their citizens from this deception.”

Governments can effectively combat the tobacco industry’s manipulation, and reduce tobacco use, by ratifying the world’s first public health treaty and implementing a set of interventions recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO) called MPOWER. These interventions, proven to be effective and inexpensive, include:
• Monitor tobacco use and assess the impact of tobacco prevention and cessation efforts;
• Protect everyone from secondhand smoke with laws that require smoke-free workplaces and public places;
• Offer help to every tobacco user to quit;
• Warn and effectively educate every person about the dangers of tobacco use with strong, pictorial health warnings and hard-hitting, sustained media campaigns;
• Enact and enforce comprehensive bans on tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorships and on the use of misleading terms such as “light” and “low-tar;” and
• Raise the price of tobacco products by significantly increasing tobacco taxes.

There are 157 countries that have committed to implementing these interventions by signing the health treaty, the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. According to the WHO, tobacco use is the leading cause of preventable death in the world today. Unless nations act now, tobacco will kill one billion people worldwide this century.

The new study, entitled “Waking a Sleeping Giant: The Tobacco Industry’s Response to the Polonium-210 Issue”, was conducted by researchers at two prestigious institutions in the United States, the Mayo Clinic and Stanford University. The study analyzed internal tobacco industry documents and industry testimony and found that tobacco companies attempted, but ultimately choose against, removing PO-210 from their tobacco products. Research on the dangers of PO-210 was also stopped as tobacco companies feared the data would ignite a firestorm of public concern.

The study also found that tobacco companies “continue to minimize its [polonium-210’s] importance in smoking and health litigation and remain silent on their Web sites and in their messages to consumers.” The study analyzed internal documents, court testimony and trial depositions from tobacco companies including British American Tobacco, Philip Morris, R.J. Reynolds, Lorrillard, Liggett, Brown and Williamson, American Tobacco and others.

Bangkok Post - July 14, 2008 - Apiradee Treerutkuarkul

Thailand’s comprehensive efforts to control tobacco use have been praised by the World Health Organisation (WHO), which plans to use Thai policy as a model for improved anti-smoking campaigns in low and middle-income countries.

Thailand and Brazil are two countries being studied regarding bans on tobacco consumption and advertising, said Armando Peruga, a coordinator for the WHO’s Tobacco Free Initiative.

The WHO launched its “Mpower” project to help countries ratifying the Framework Convention of Tobacco Control (FCTC) achieve their anti-smoking schemes.

Very few countries have been able to put into practice tobacco bans mainly due to a lack of capacity building.

The treaty, adopted by all 195 countries, requires restrictions on all forms of tobacco advertising, trade, sponsorship and promotion, in addition to protection from exposure to tobacco smoke, effective taxation policies, pictorial health warnings on packaging and an end to duty free sales of tobacco products.

Member countries have to enforce controls against the promotion of tobacco products within five years after the FCTC took effect in 2005.

The planned study on the Thai anti-smoking effort was unveiled after a team of WHO experts met Thai officials during a three-day visit, which ended on Wednesday.

The experts discussed the pros and cons of the anti-smoking strategy.

The study will focus on six main topics - the epidemic smoking situation, tax policy, smoke-free environments, treatment, package and labelling, and a ban on advertisements.

A report on Thailand’s work is scheduled to be released in November.

The WHO finished its survey in Brazil last May and plans to study Turkey’s anti-smoking efforts next year.

Dr Peruga said he was hopeful that a review would enhance the anti-tobacco campaign in Thailand and other countries since smoking is not only a health problem but also an economic and social problem.

Thailand introduced a smoking ban in indoor areas of bars and pubs last year.

It’s time for Congress to make regulation a reality.

Saturday, July 12, 2008; Page A12 - The Washington Post

FROM ASPIRIN to zucchini, the Food and Drug Administration monitors much of what Americans consume. But cigarettes, which shorten a smoker’s life by 10 years on average, have escaped FDA oversight, largely because of political pressure from Big Tobacco. That could change soon, thanks to a long-overdue bill the House is scheduled to vote on in the next few weeks that would give the agency authority to regulate the tobacco industry. Legislators should make the bill a priority so it has a chance to pass before Congress adjourns on Aug. 10.

The bill would allow the FDA to require a detailed disclosure of cigarette ingredients and to instruct tobacco companies to remove additives harmful to smokers. The bill also would place restrictions on marketing tobacco to youths, make health warning labels more explicit, eliminate descriptions such as “light” or “mild” that misrepresent the hazards of smoking and ban fruit-flavored cigarettes intended to ensnare young smokers. The bill would impose a fee on tobacco companies to fund staff positions at the FDA to oversee the industry.

The most significant obstacle facing the bill, besides Congress’s desire for a summer vacation, is that it would not ban the use of menthol additives. Menthol softens the harsh taste of cigarettes, which may make it easier for smokers to become addicted. Menthols are the cigarette of choice for three-fourths of African American smokers, compared with one in four white smokers. This is one reason black men get lung cancer at a rate 50 percent higher than white men do.

One organization, the National African American Tobacco Prevention Network, has withdrawn its support for the bill as a result. William S. Robinson, the group’s executive director, emphasized that his organization did not oppose the legislation but said the bill discriminates against blacks. We understand Mr. Robinson’s concerns and believe the FDA should consider banning menthol promptly if the bill passes. Lawmakers failed to include a ban on the additive out of political necessity; that allowed the bill to earn the support of numerous Republican legislators along with that of tobacco giant Philip Morris.

The bill will probably pass overwhelmingly in the House, but it faces a stiffer challenge in the Senate. Fifty-seven senators, including 12 Republicans, have signed on as co-sponsors. This is three votes short of the 60 needed to overcome a filibuster. If this remains so, lengthy debate and other parliamentary holdups could stall the bill; Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) has already threatened a filibuster.

The House must vote on the bill soon so it has a chance to pass in the Senate. It’s been 44 years since the U.S. surgeon general reported that cigarettes are harmful, and the country shouldn’t have to wait another year for independent oversight of Big Tobacco.