Beyond being banned from smoking in public places or inside the workplace, more and more smokers are finding that their habit may bar them from being hired in the first place. There is an increasing trend among employers to refuse to hire smokers or anyone who tests positive for nicotine, which may include even those who use smokeless tobacco or nicotine patches while in the process of quitting.
Harm Reduction
Because of the fresh start afforded by the new year, it s a good bet that more than a few of the 70 percent of American smokers who would like to quit will give it a go. However, according to a recent CDC study, only one in 10 of those would-be quitters will actually succeed.
Nearly 70 percent of adult smokers want to quit, and 52 percent have attempted to do so in the past year, according to data collected by the CDC as part of the 2001 to 2010 National Health Interview Surveys. But what ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross found most shocking about the survey results, which were published in the CDC s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, was that fewer than half the smokers who visited a health professional in the past year had been advised to quit.
A new study has found more evidence to link cigarette smoking to one type of skin cancer, supporting earlier studies that have observed significant associations between the two. This study, published in Cancer Causes Control, found a significantly increased risk of squamous cell carcinoma among female smokers.
In a two-part series for his blog, Tobacco Analysis, ACSH advisor Dr. Michael Siegel, a professor in the Department of Community Health Sciences at the Boston University School of Public Health, details the most serious barrier yet to tobacco harm reduction. Dr. Siegel explains how the recent Institute of Medicine (IOM) recommendations to the FDA, which pertain to the marketing of modified risk tobacco products (MRTPs), will, if implemented, present a blockade to the development and approval of such products. It would, in fact, be a death blow to tobacco harm reduction and to our nation s 45 million addicted smokers.
We were disappointed to learn that the Institute of Medicine (IOM) has taken an unfavorable stance toward modified risk tobacco products (MRTPs), advising the FDA to set high hurdles for the manufacturers of such products before they can market them as less harmful alternatives to cigarettes. The IOM report released yesterday concluded that MRTPs, which include a variety of smokeless tobacco products and clean nicotine delivery systems (such as e-cigarettes), should not be marketed as less harmful until researchers manage to accumulate a wide range of favorable evidence regarding their composition, efficacy, addictive
The results of a survey on substance use among U.S. teenagers were released yesterday. The survey, conducted by the University of Michigan for the National Institute on Drug Abuse, found that smoking and alcohol consumption are historically low among this demographic but marijuana use is more common than it has been in three decades. The national survey included 47,000 eighth-, 10th-, and 12th-graders and revealed that, while less than 12 percent of them reported smoking cigarettes within the past month, nearly 26 percent said they had smoked pot within the past year.
The good news is that, in many states across the country, fewer teenagers are smoking cigarettes but the bad news is that many of them have begun to smoke flavored cigars instead. While flavored cigarettes were prohibited by the FDA in 2009, flavored cigars, including Black & Mild cigarillos, are exempt from the ban.
The executive arm of the European Union, the European Commission is, once again, considering an end to its ban on the export of Swedish snus to other EU countries. The Commission, which has considered lifting the ban several times before, has frequently been made aware of the comparatively low smoking and cancer rates in Sweden, the only EU country where snus (smokeless tobacco contained in small sachets) is legally available. However, the EU Commission may soon respond to the demands of its citizens: The results of a large survey reveaI strong support for lifting the ban on snus.
We re always eager to hear the results of smoking cessation trials, hoping for some rare good news on this subject. But the latest trial of nicotine therapy has us baffled. In this nationwide randomized clinical trial just reported in the Archives of Internal Medicine, researchers studied the effect of nicotine lozenges on smokers who were in a practice quit attempt trial. The smokers were not committed to quitting and were not advised to do so.
New York City s roll-your-own (RYO) cigarette shops are getting attention due to the city s attempt to end what they deem illicit tax avoidance by the RYO makers. At issue is the tax loophole that such businesses happily exploit: The loose tobacco they sell for their high-speed cigarette rolling machines is subject to only a fraction of the taxes that would be fixed on a commercially produced pack.
Today marks the 36th annual Great American Smokeout a yearly event sponsored by the American Cancer Society that encourages smokers to quit for at least one day in the hope that it will eventually lead to quitting for good.