A potential ban on menthol cigarettes got some momentum, based upon three studies published in the latest edition of The American Journal of Public Health. Together, these studies were commissioned by Legacy and supported by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), the American Public Health Association, and the Center for American Progress.
Harm Reduction
Is there a link between smoking and blindness? If you weren’t aware that there is, it’s probably for lack of a national awareness campaign. Smoking is indeed causally associated with a number of visually impairing eye diseases, including cataracts and age-related macular degeneration, but a recently released international study in the journal Optometry found that most people simply aren’t aware of the risk. (They might have been, had they perused our classic monograph: Cigarettes: What the Warning Label Doesn’t Tell You).
ACSH gives two cheers to the New Zealand Ministry of Health for acknowledging that electronic cigarettes are “far safer” than traditional cigarettes. This statement was made to Members of Parliament (MPs) as they prepare to vote on the Smoke-Free Environments (Controls and Enforcement) Amendment Bill, which includes a proposal to legislate electronic cigarettes containing nicotine as a tobacco-related product. Currently, however, the Ministry still considers electronic cigarettes to be unregulated medical devices and recommends that clinical trials be conducted to prove their safety and efficacy (i.e. to facilitate smokers’ efforts to quit) before allowing their distribution.
For the second time in as many days, we’d like to give a tip of the hat to ACSH advisor and Boston University School of Public Health Professor Dr. Michael Siegel for his essays on two different smoking-related policies. As we noted in yesterday’s Dispatch, Dr. Siegel’s perspective piece in the New England Journal of Medicine considered the problematic issue of mentholated cigarettes.
Two perspective pieces addressing the menthol cigarette problem appear in today’s New England Journal of Medicine. One, by ACSH advisor and Boston University School of Public Health Professor Dr. Michael Siegel, argues that, by refusing to recommend clearly that the FDA ban menthol cigarettes, the Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee (TPSAC) contradicted the scientific literature featured in its report and thus failed in its mission to provide a public health solution.
The results of a small study on Pfizer’s smoking cessation drug Chantix (varenicline) underscore the difficulties smokers face when attempting to kick the habit for good. Published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, Peter Hajek of the UK Center for Tobacco Control Studies studied 101 middle-aged smokers. Half were randomized to start Chantix four weeks prior to quitting, while a control group took the drug just one week before stopping smoking. In the latter group, participants received sugar pills for the first three weeks and then switched to Chantix.
The Linn County, Iowa Board of Supervisors will vote next month on whether to ban the sale of dissolvable tobacco products. They allege that such a ban will “protect children,” claiming that some of the tobacco products’ packaging resembles candy or breath mints. We beg to differ.
Give it another nine years or so and every state will have implemented an indoor smoking ban. At least that s what the CDC predicts will occur based on the current pattern of anti-smoking laws. Currently, 26 states have adopted comprehensive indoor smoking bans, while another ten have banned the practice either from workplaces, bars or restaurants but not all three. Only seven states have no indoor smoking restrictions, something Dr. Tim McAfee, director of the CDC s Office on Smoking and Health is bullish about changing come 2020.
Two new studies should give you two more reasons to quit smoking or even better, never to start in the first place. Published in Tobacco Control, researchers from the University of Queensland School of Population Health in Australia compared all-cause death (mortality) rates between male and female smokers in a 10-year follow-up study using the Australian National Death Index. A total of 12,154 men and 11,707 women were compared, and it was found that the hazard ratio for death from all causes for smokers was the same regardless of gender, and the risk continued to increase as the amount smoked increased.
The results of two recent surveys conclude the same thing: people have many misconceptions about the risks associated with smoking.
Don’t let the Lexington-Herald Leader headline, “Madison County health board bans electronic cigarettes,” fool you. The Madison County Board of Health has actually added electronic cigarettes to their list of indoor smoking restrictions, perhaps due to an FDA warning in 2009 cautioning that the nicotine-delivery devices supposedly contain “toxic” ingredients. The amendment will go into effect in 60 days. “Their health board clearly does not understand what e-cigarettes really are,” says ACSH’s Dr. Elizabeth Whelan.
Unemployed and looking for a lucrative job in New York City? Don’t mind long walks and occasional arrests? This may be a job for you: According to an article in The New York Times, smuggling and reselling cigarettes on the streets is a profitable practice. The Times reporter Joseph Goldstein followed a successful street vendor nicknamed Lonnie Loosie by law enforcement officials because of his repeated arrests for selling individual cigarettes (“loosies”). Lonnie purchases cigarettes for slightly more than $50 per carton from smugglers in other states where taxes are less than a dollar a pack.