Illicit cigarettes - unpleasant ingredients like insect droppings..

June 28, 2009 - Smokers in Dudley are being warned they face getting more than they bargain for if they buy illegal (illicit, contraband)tobacco products from unlicensed sellers.

Dudley Primary Care Trust’s Stop Smoking Service is taking their ‘Dodgy Cigs Roadshow’ on tour to raise awareness of the dangers of buying counterfeit cigarettes. It will be at Rock the Castle festival in Himley Park on July 3 and at Stourbridge Carnival in Mary Steven’s Park on July 5.

As well as providing advice for those wishing to stop smoking, it will also show smokers the variety of unusual substances they may be inhaling if they buy counterfeit or illegally-bought cigarettes. The event is the latest part of a hard-hitting poster and radio advertising campaign from the Department of Health and HM Revenue & Customs highlighting some of the unpleasant ingredients that can be found in illicit tobacco products, such as floor sweepings, insects, sawdust and animal droppings.

Paul Hooper, regional tobacco policy manager for the West Midlands, said: “People often say these cigarettes taste different and this unusual mix of ingredients is often the reason why.”

Visit http://www.dodgycigs.co.uk about illicit tobacco and the penalties for selling it.

According to The Tobacco Atlas, cigarettes are the world’s most widely smuggled legal consumer product. In 2006, contraband cigarettes accounted for 11 percent of global cigarette sales, or about 600 billion cigarettes.

Image from BBC News article: 42m illicit cigarettes discovered, 5/29/2006.