Pension Fund May Exclude Cigarette Makers..

January 19, 2008 - Norway's global pension fund, Europe's largest retirement plan, is considering excluding pornographers, cigarette makers and bookmakers from the 2.08 trillion kroner ($388.1 billion) portfolio. The Norwegian government will evaluate the fund's ethical standards throughout 2008, and has received suggestions from non-government organizations and lobby groups. Finance Minister Kristin Halvorsen said today (1/16/2008) since 2004, the fund has been banned from investing in companies involved in nuclear weapons or cluster munitions, and companies that it says are guilty of human rights or environmental abuses. (" Norway's Pension Fund May Ban Sex Industry, Tobacco, Gambling" by Robin Wigglesworth, Bloomberg.com, 1/16/2008) Click on image to enlarge.. Read more...

Festival cigarette stalls banned in youth crackdown..

January 18, 2008 - New South Wales, Australia is outlawing cigarette stalls at music festivals and banning fruit- and confectionary-flavoured cigarettes in a bid to stop young people from smoking. Retailers face fines of up to $5,500 for selling the flavoured cigarettes from today and public health officers are allowed to inspect premises. The new laws will outlaw mobile tobacco vendors, which set up designated smoking tents at youth festivals. Assistant Health Minister Verity Firth says the vendors are dangerous because they attract young people. "In these tents, there are often DJs designed to attract young people into the tents and attract promoters with the cigarette brand," she said. "In the olden days, they would have been called cigarette girls." But Ms Firth says confectionary is the most dangerous marketing ploy used by tobacco companies to target young people. "Teenagehood (sic) is a key life phase for starting smoking," she said. "Our surveys show that 80 per cent of smokers started smoking during their teenage years and it's an incredibly hard habit to quit." (abc.net.au, 1/18/2008) Click on image to enlarge..
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Tobacco Products When You Can't Smoke..

January 17, 2008 - As a result of the ever increasing number of smoking bans taking effect a growing market has been created to satisfy the nicotine addiction of tobacco smokers when they can't light up. The labeling for the majority of these products even states they are NOT to help people give up smoking but to get them past the cravings for nicotine. Even Snus does fall in this category, afterall Dr. Lars E. Rutqvist, the Vice President for Scientific Affairs at Swedish Match (the world's second largest maker of snuff and chewing tobacco and market leader in Sweden - volume share of 90% at the end of 2006) has stated the drive in Snus sales in Sweden has been in response to the smoking ban rather than the perceived advantage to user’s health. It's assumed that everyone has either used or a least heard of Listerine PocketPaks Breath Strips (that come in 4-flavors) - you place a strip in your mouth, it disolves instantly to freshen your breath. Now Fuisz Tobacco has announced the availability of a tobacco film strip that is spitless and dissolves entirely in the cheek. Nicogel is a water soluble hand gel containing liquefied tobacco. Another soluble hand gel is Nicofix. Star Scientific's tobacco lozenges - Ariva® and Stonewall® Dissolvable Smokeless Tobacco Products - have been around for a few years have recently had a rebirth. Firebreak by Swedish Match, once only sold in Japan but now also available to Swedish cigarette smokers, is a chewing-tobacco product. It comprises finely ground tobacco flour that is embedded in a chewing-gum base. Like other types of chewing tobacco, Firebreak requires a special chewing technique. The user chews the piece a few times then allows it to rest in his or her mouth before once again chewing. These products should be avoided because they don't help the smoker quit just prolong their nicotine addiction and worsen the tobacco related diseases that will shorten their lives. It seems that these products are readily available at various retail outlets, e.g., Walgreens is now stocking its more than 5,500 stores with packets of Nicogel tag line: "Beat the Ban" with Nicogel. You can expect more products to beat the world-wide smoking bans. For the sake of our children these products have to be stopped. (TobaccoWatch.org) Read more...

Ban the Sale of Tobacco from Pharmacies..

January 16, 2008 - New York State Assemblyman Sam Hoyt has introduced a bill that would ban the sale of tobacco from pharmacies. "In light of the overwhelming evidence of the harmful nature of cigarette smoking on one’s health and the astronomical public health cost posed by tobacco products it is contradictory and counter-intuitive to sell such products in any establishment whose purpose is to provide remedies to health problems," Hoyt said in a statement. Because stores such as Tops (large grocery store chain mainly in Western New York) and Wal-Mart operate pharmacies on their premises, they would be covered under the law. The theory is that if cigarettes are taken out of enough stores it will “de-normalize” the product, as it was put by Jim Ver Steeg of the American Heart Association. And by doing that, the logic goes, it would reduce the sale of tobacco, fewer of us would use it and we would all be happier and healthier. Back on January 6, 2008 Danny Wegman of Wegmans, a Rochester, NY, based Supermarket chain announced they will no longer sell tobacco products starting February 10, 2008. Click on image to enlarge..

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General Tobacco completes move to Mayodan, N.C..

January 16, 2008 - , General Tobacco has completed its move from Miami, FL to Mayodan, NC. The sixth-largest tobacco company in the U.S., General Tobacco now has its corporate headquarters in Mayodan, including cigarette manufacturing and warehousing. The company said that it has also made a $25 million payment to the Master Settlement Agreement, the multi-state agreement by tobacco companies setting forth strict guidelines for tobacco marketing and advertising. Related news brief: November 4, 2007.

It has been stated that this company may introduce a Snus product in the near future.
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Our Kids are still our number one priority..

January 14, 2008 - The Standing Committee on Emerging and Newly Identified Health Risks (SCENIHR), received the assignment from the European Union (EU) Commission to investigate the health risks of smokeless tobacco products, including Swedish snus. The committee presented a preliminary report at the beginning of July, 2007 which was based on a review of a large number of scientific studies and reports, and particular attention was paid to Swedish experience of snus. Traditional cigarette companies such as British American Tobacco (BAT), Reynolds American, Imperial Tobacco and Philip Morris that have started to diversify into smokeless products anxiously wait for the final decision. But why should the ban be lifted - the major problem that existed in 1990 still exists today. Small bags of tobacco were banned in Britain in 1990 after the US Smokeless Tobacco company tried to introduce sweet-flavored tobacco capsules called Skoal Bandits . It was feared that they would appeal to children. The ban was supplanted by EU-wide legislation in May, 1992. The legislation prohibited the placing on the market of tobacco for oral use; the primary reason "...products for oral use will be used above all by young people, thus leading to nicotine addiction..." . (The prohibition was introduced by Directive 92/41/EEC amending Directive 89/622/EEC.) However, as we all know Sweden negotiated an exception - these people have been using Snus for over 200 years; it's a tradition--it's part of their culture. The legal age to purchase tobacco products in Britain was just raised from 16 to 18 - why wasn't the age raise to 21 - we all know the majority of smokers start smoking before the age of 21. The art of snusing - the placement of the portioned bag between the upper lip and gum and then sucking while the bag is totally stationary - is not an easy task to master. Public health proponents of smokeless tobacco tell us they are targeting inveterate (hard-nosed, long established, deep-rooted) smokers but as tobacco companies are finding at test sites in the U.S. it's not an easy sell. The Chief Operating Officer of this company, Murray Kessler has stated that "Nine out of 10 smokers that try smokeless still reject the product." Professor John Britton, chairman of the Royal College of Physicians Tobacco Advisory Group, a proponent of SNUS as a harm reduction solution has concluded "It's their (tobacco companies) job to sell as much tobacco as possible, so they will be targeting non-smokers rather than current ones, that's the worry." Those that will give Snus a chance are young adults and kids that want to be young adults; as a result we'll end up with another generation of nicotine addicts never able to achieve their full potential. In Norway (not an EU member) to hook kids on Snus you find starter kits with various Snus packets flavored with various fruit flavors. As Swedish Match learned in Russia (Snus product called Click) with no prior Snus tradition - it is a matter of marketing an entire new behavior pattern and teaching consumers. You would think, that if a tobacco users have to change their behavior, they might as well give up tobacco products and live longer. The EU ban against the use of Snus must be upheld. (TobaccoWatch.org)

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