Speaking of snus, three members of the Swedish Parliament recently wrote a letter to the editor of the Swedish newspaper Göteborgs-Posten, requesting that the E.U. lift the ban against Swedish snus. The writers argue that, while the E.U. considers the sale of snus outside of Sweden illicit, all other oral tobacco products are fully legal and loosely regulated — a policy that, Dr. Ross says, is among the most ironic.

Can smokeless tobacco products satiate a smoker’s nicotine craving while simultaneously serving as a smoking cessation aid? And if so, is it conceivable that such a transition might result in net harm, paradoxical as that seems? These are the pivotal questions that Matthew Carpenter, an associate professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and the Department of Medicine at the Medical University of South Carolina, aims to answer with his new year-long study on 1,250 smokers nationwide.

As the swimming season approaches, it s worth taking a look at these simple steps provided by The Los Angeles Times for avoiding the unpleasant experience of swimmer s ear, a common malady that accounted for 2.4 million health care visits in 2007, according to the CDC. While the infection largely affects children between the ages of five and nine, adults are susceptible, too.

Last week, the CDC released the results of a study that enumerates “Ten Great Public Health Achievements” in the U.S. from 2001 to 2010. Among other triumphs, the report notes a substantial decline in vaccine-preventable diseases and strides made in the prevention of cardiovascular disease, cancer and childhood lead poisoning.

New York City anti-smoking laws are today extended to include city parks, public beaches and pedestrian malls. The ban is controversial, in that many consider it an infringement of personal rights for the sake of health benefits that are decidedly questionable, or non-existent. However, the city has shifted the emphasis of the law to its effect on residents’ quality of life instead, pointing to the absence of both smoke and cigarette-strewn public grounds as reason enough for the ban. ACSH's Dr.

Today readers of a number of newspapers, including The Wall Street Journal, U.S.A. Today and The New York Daily News, will encounter a full-page advertisement for Camel Snus.

ACSH would like to congratulate Ronald McDonald on maintaining his mascot status with McDonald’s, having narrowly escaped being swept into the dust bin after a petition called for his termination. McDonald’s believes, as do we, that Ronald McDonald is not a villain in the obesity epidemic.

A large study from the Harvard School of Public Health indicates that regularly drinking even one cup of coffee daily may reduce a man’s risk of developing high-grade prostate cancer. Published in Wednesday’s issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, the study monitored nearly 48,000 U.S. men from the Health Professionals Follow-up Study to evaluate a potential association between coffee consumption and prostate cancer risk.

We were shocked and disappointed to read that an average 40 percent of pregnancies in our country are unwanted or unexpected. Based on a 2006 state-by-state pregnancy intention survey — the first of its kind ever conducted — out of 86,000 women who gave birth and 9,000 who had an abortion, the study found that the highest rates of unwanted and unplanned pregnancies occurred in the South, Southwest and in states with large urban populations.

For women over 30, a human papillomavirus (HPV) screening test may out-perform a Pap smear in predicting cervical cancer risk, according to a study by the National Cancer Institute. The study, led by Hormuzd Katki — the results of which will be presented at the meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology — monitored more than 330,000 women who received HPV and Pap tests through Kaiser Permanente Northern California for five years.