Ciggyfree Blog & Gov Alert

The tobacco money against Measure 50’s proposed cigarette tax increase keeps piling in. Philip Morris has donated another $1.1 million to the campaign, putting total contributions to that effort over $11 million.

Philip Morris, the Richmond, Va.,-based maker of Marlboro cigarettes, and its parent company have donated $6.9 million to Stop The Measure 50 Tax Hike. Reynolds American, the maker of Camels, has contributed $4.8 million to another committee opposing the proposal, Oregonians Against The Blank Check.

Measure 50 would raise cigarette taxes by 85 cents a pack and use the money for children’s health insurance and other health programs. The campaign supporting the measure, Yes on the Healthy Kids Plan, has reported raising and spending $3.2 million so far. The proposal is one of two statewide measures on the Nov. 6 vote-by-mail ballot.
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Ashton Kutcher:
“I read a book by Alan Carr, The Easy Way To Stop Smoking,” page five has ‘light one up now’, so I was like ‘absolutely!’ But when you get to the end of the book it says ‘now have your last cigarette’, which I did, and I haven’t smoked since.”

Anthony Hopkins:
“Some friends of mine who had stopped using Allen Carr’s method suggested I tried it. I did. It was such a revelation that instantly I was freed from my addiction. Like those friends of mine, I found it not only easy but unbelievably enjoyable to stay stopped.”

Ellen DeGeneres announces she quit smoking with EasyWay

Other clients include :
Dave Stewart, Bruce Oldfield, Julie Christie, Ruby Wax, Johnny Cash, Barry Sheen, Kerry Packer, Susannah York, Marie Helvin, John Sessions, Lord & Lady Bonham Carter, Lady Astor, Leslie Grantham, Dennis Waterman, Rula Lenska, John Cougar Mellencamp, Rick Parfitt, Martin Clunes, Lisa Stansfield, Robson Green, Vicky Binns, George Melly, Derek Jameson, Sean Bean, Ronnie O’Sullivan, Linda Robson….and many others who wish to remain anonymous.

http://www.theeasywaytostopsmoking.com/

The journal Arthritis and Rheumatism puts in evidence that tobacco might cause a genetic reaction which conducts to serious forms of arthritis rheumatoid.

Tobacco increases the production of the so-called rheumatoid factor (RF) and decreases the levels of the GSTM1 gene. The GSTM1 is a gene which is important in the detoxification process of the carcinogen agents presented in tobacco.

The presence, and perhaps the severity, of COPD might be predictable by examining the facial skin, and accelerated wrinkling could signal the need for studies of lung function.

Smoking is associated with other health-related problems, and future studies might attempt to correlate skin findings with cardiovascular disease in smokers. Laboratory elucidation of the specific mechanism behind increased susceptibility would be useful and interesting.

If a genetic predisposition is identified, susceptible families and individuals might receive more urgent counsel to avoid smoking and exposure to secondhand smoke.

— Jeffrey P. Callen, MD

Nationwide, smoking bans are on the rise in workplaces, restaurants and bars. Research shows that bans decrease the overall number of cigarettes people smoke and in some cases, actually result in people quitting.One reason bans help people quit is simple biology. Inhaling tobacco actually increases the number of receptors in the brain that crave nicotine.

“If you had a smoker compared to a nonsmoker and were able to do imaging study of the brain, the smoker would have billions more of the receptors in areas of the brain that have to do with pleasure and reward,” says Richard Hurt, an internist who heads the Mayo Clinic’s Nicotine Dependence Center.

So, removing the triggers that turn on those receptors is a good thing.
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(SALEM, Ore.) - What was it Deep Throat said during the Watergate fiasco? “Follow the money.”

When we do so today in the Measure 50 debate what do we find? We find the anti-50 side has shattered all records for spending… over $10 million and still going strong… 99.999% of which comes from three out of state tobacco companies.

Oh the shock and surprise are palpable.

No? Me neither.

Big Tobacco, one of the greatest liars of the modern age, is pulling out all the stops in their desperate attempt to derail Measure 50, the Healthy Kids initiative.

To most this is a no-brainer. Raise taxes on tobacco, a known killer and health risk, to fund health care for kids. The ignorance is what is truly palpable however.

I lost track of how many folks spew the ignorant whine that if the tax decreases smoking it will reduce the revenue from the tax and make the project non-viable. This ignores a few facts. If the tax were to cover every penny that smoking costs the health care industry etc it would be over $11 a pack. So we are adding around 85 cents a pack to bring the total; to just a hair over $2 a pack. So let’s say the tax causes a million less packs to be sold. That means $2 million less in revenue from the tax BUT $11 MILLION LESS EXPENSE to the health care infrastructure.

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Dave Hogan from The Oregonian reported today that:

Reynolds American, the makers of Camel cigarettes, has contributed another $304,000 to the record-setting campaign against Measure 50, which would raise Oregon’s cigarette tax by 85 cents a pack.”

Reynolds, based in Winston-Salem, N.C., has now contributed $4.6 million to the Oregonians Against The Blank Check campaign while Philip Morris, the makers of Marlboros, and its parent company have donated $5.8 million to the Stop The Measure 50 Tax Hike committee.
Those two committees have raised far more money than any other ballot measure campaign in Oregon history.

It looks like Reynolds has a major business problem with measure 50! If fewer people can afford to maintain smoking and fewer children pick up the addiction, tobacco profits will plummet to record lows. In order to profit, a cigarette company needs to always find replacement smokers since the majority of smokers die before their time.

The CDC says that in 2006 tobacco use was the leading preventable cause of death in the United States and that cigarette smoking causes an estimated 438,000 deaths, or about 1 of every 5 deaths, each year. This estimate includes approximately 38,000 deaths from secondhand smoke exposure.

A team of Quebec researchers has uncovered a series of genes linking the response to stress and high blood pressure with alcoholism and tobacco dependence. If a person has that series of genes, he or she will be more prone to drink or smoke in order to cope with stress and high blood pressure, according to researchers.

“What that tells us is that it’s not only bad education or family behaviour that matters,” explained Dr. Pavel Hamet, who is leading the study of 120 families in the Saguenay Lac-St.-Jean region.

“The fight against alcohol and tobacco should not only be moralistic, but also give people ways to manage stress,” he said, adding that one in five persons has the predisposition. He gave his findings at the Canadian Cardiovascular Congress in Quebec City yesterday.
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Tobacco companies have funded nearly 50 studies on the link between secondhand smoke and heart disease — but when scientists found a connection, the industry skewed their conclusions or stopped funding them, report University of California researchers.The researchers — Eliza Tong of UC Davis and UC San Francisco’s Stanton Glantz — analyzed 5,000 internal company documents uncovered by lawsuits. Their findings, recently published in Circulation, are the first such review of the industry’s work on secondhand smoke and heart disease. Scientists agree that frequent exposure ups disease risk by 30 percent.

Surprisingly, the only major media outlet to pick this story up was the Sacramento Bee. Have journalists become so cynical and novelty-consumed that we don’t even bother to tell the public when tobacco companies are once again caught in a coverup that, in ethical if not legal terms, is close to murder?

Tobacco industry deceit claimed [Sacramento Bee]

Tobacco Industry Efforts Undermining Evidence Linking Secondhand Smoke With Cardiovascular Disease [Circulation]

Image: J.L. Trinh

Source: Brandon Keim, WiredScience

If you quit cold turkey - drink plenty of OJ. You’ll get over the irritability, anxiety, confusion and trouble concentrating and sleeping that come with nicotine withdrawal a lot faster if you drink a lot of orange juice during this time.

That’s because OJ makes your urine more acidic, which clears nicotine from your body faster, says Thomas Cooper, D.D.S., a nicotine dependency researcher and professor of oral health sciences at the University of Kentucky in Lexington. “Besides,” adds Dr. Jorenby, “the citrus taste in your mouth makes the thought of having a cigarette pretty disgusting.”

According to the American Cancer Society, studies show that cigars are just as bad for you as cigarettes. Researchers found that cancer risks increased dramatically for those who smoke three cigars daily, and even more for those who inhale when they light up. These risks include:

• A 500 percent increase in lung cancer for inhalers and a 300 percent increase for non-inhaling cigar smokers.
• A 1,000 percent increase in cancer of the larynx.
• A 400 percent increase in cancer of the oral cavity/pharynx.
• A 270 percent increase in pancreatic cancer for inhalers.
• A 360 percent increase in bladder cancer for inhalers.

The study also shows that cigars themselves are changing. “PH levels of cigars are indeed changing,” says Eric Jacobs, study author and researcher for the Cancer Society’s department of epidemiology and surveillance research. “While the pH of cigars has always been higher than cigarettes, pH varies greatly between cigar types. Higher pH levels mean the smoke may contain more free ammonia, and while it’s more difficult to inhale, the nicotine absorption rate is substantially higher.”

“The take home message from all this is that cigar smoking is much more lethal than we ever believed,” Jacobs said. “Whether you light up or not, whether you inhale or not, cigars carry the same risks that cigarettes do.” He adds, “Cigar smoking is not cool or glamorous. It can kill you.”

In a last-drag effort to defeat Oregon’s 85-cents-a-pack tax increase on cigarettes, the makers of Camel smokes tossed in another $905,000 today against the fight to crush Measure 50. Today’s donation puts tobacco contributions at a staggering record of $10 million so far. Reynolds American, the producers of Camel, has now contributed $4.2 million to the campaign against Measure 50. The other $5.8 million has come from Philip Morris, the maker of Marlboro’s.

In case you were wondering what Measure 50 will do, well, allow us to tell you what it will do: Money raised from the tax increase for cigarettes would be used to pay for children’s health insurance and other health programs.

Measure 50 will appear on the Nov. 6 ballot, with ballots being mailed next week.

While at least 10 other Oregon ballot measure campaigns have raised more than $5 million in adjusted-for-inflation dollars during the past 20 years, only one raised more than $7 million and none raised more than $8 million, the Oregonian reported.

Source: Joseph Friedrichs, New West

Exclusive: A major new report seen by the IoS has revealed that smoking holds the key to a mystery that has baffled doctors and brought heartache to thousands.

Nine out of 10 mothers whose babies suffered cot death smoked during pregnancy, according to a scientific study to be published this week. The study, thought to be one of the most authoritative to date on Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS), says women who smoke during pregnancy are four times more likely than non-smokers to see their child fall victim to cot death.

The comprehensive report will make a strong case for the Government to increase the scope of anti-smoking legislation. It even suggests a possible move to try to ban pregnant women from getting tobacco altogether.

The study, produced by Bristol University’s Institute of Child Life and Health, is based on analysis of the evidence of 21 international studies on smoking and cot death. The report, co-authored by Peter Fleming, professor of infant health and developmental physiology, and Dr Peter Blair, senior research fellow, will be published this week in the medical journal Early Human Development.
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Not Succeeding is a failure only if you do not try to quit smoking again.

Results from the World Health Organisation (WHO) show that currently there are 1.3 billion smokers in the world. The same data show that every 8 seconds somewhere in the world one person dies from the consequences of smoking. Smoking is the leading cause of premature deaths in the world.

Experts calculated that the number of deaths caused by smoking will increase by 10 million annually until 2020. In Croatia, every third person is a smoker, of which 33.8% are men and 21.7% are women.

Smoking is often considered just a habit, but it is actually a much more serious problem. Smoking is an addiction on three levels – psychological, emotional and physical. The World Health Organization prepared an International Classification of Diseases which includes smoking addiction as a mental organic disorder.
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We opened up with a joke on his first name. With a gentle smile, Erphacksand Kinyua Mureithi explained that the name was handed down to him from his paternal grandfather, although it is biblical.

The challenge of doing this story from an interview that Kinyua gave a month before he died, is that it has to be in the past tense.

Kinyua was one of the youngest lung cancer cases recorded at the Kenyatta National Hospital in Nairobi.

Had he lived past July 23, he would have turned 30 in August.

When Kinyua showed up for this interview, he was a brave young man who agreed to share with the world his experiences with lung cancer.

At the end of the interview, there was no mistaking the passion that he had for the legacy he wished to leave behind.

Leaders of tomorrow

“If I had a forum, I would tell the youth that every decision they make in life will determine how they end up. I may not have been a smoker for a long time, but who knows, the disease might have caught up with me because of the few years I smoked. There is so much to live for because we are the leaders of tomorrow.”

Kinyua’s story is a point to ponder in light of the consequences of smoking.

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It is a “big disappointment” that R.J. Reynolds has “found an ally” in some women’s magazines, which have “sold out the well-being of their readers” by publishing Camel No. 9 cigarette advertisements, Rep. Lois Capps (D-Calif.) writes in a Washington Post opinion piece (Capps, Washington Post, 10/12).

Reynolds in February launched the brand, which several public health organizations and women’s groups say are targeted at young women. The company — in an effort to increase its market share among female smokers, who made up about 30% of Camel buyers — packaged the cigarettes in a “hot-pink fuchsia” and a “minty-green teal package” and advertised the brand with the slogan, “Light and Luscious.” An ad campaign for the brand says the cigarettes are now “available in stiletto,” a longer, thinner cigarette.
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Do you smoke? Thinking of quitting? Discovery Health lists seven reasons why you should. They might just persuade you ditch the smokes before it’s too late…

1. You smell pretty bad
Bad breath and body odor, sallow skin, smelly clothes, yellow teeth — what’s not to love? Maybe it is time stub it out.

2. Food doesn’t taste as good
Smoking can permanently harm your sense of smell, which in turns affects your tasting experience. This can be reversible, but you do run the risk of permanent damage to this sensory experience.

3. More time in hospital
The carcinogens released when you light up gives you a better chance to develop cancer of the mouth, lung and throat, and your basic flu easily turns into bronchitis or pneumonia. You are more likely to spend some quality time with healthcare professionals than a non-smoker.

4. Your body ages faster
Want to look nine years older than you actually are? Then have a cigarette, don’t exercise too much and just for good measure add a bit of weight to your frame. The good news is that it is reversible. If you stop smoking, do some mild exercise and lose the weight, you can look and also feel younger than your actual age.

5. Smoking harms your children
Smoking during pregnancy can lower your child’s IQ and lead to low birth weight, still births, miscarriages, birth defects such as cleft lip and sudden infant death syndrome (cot death). Cigarette smoke contains an estimated 4000 chemicals, with nicotine, tar, and carbon monoxide thought to be the most dangerous to the fetus.

6. You have to exercise harder
Your lungs aren’t operating at full volume due to the tar and increased levels of carbon monoxide in your lungs. This poisonous gas is quickly absorbed into the blood, reducing its capacity to carry oxygen. As a result, the smoker has to exert more physical effort to attain a given task than does a non-smoker. The heart in particular must work harder, particularly during rigorous exercise. Increased levels of carbon monoxide in the blood can impair vision, perception of time, and co-ordination.

7. You can pass risks onto your kids
Like father like son… Most children of smokers will take up the habit as well or suffer the consequences of second-hand smoke.

This morning is cloudy, overcast, and drab day here in New England. I’ve been procrastinating about taking the a/c out while silently volleying around the house packing a few more boxes to accommodate this moving to parts unknown plan that I developed late this summer…

Settling down with a steaming cup of coffee, I perused my favorite Usenet quit group. While poking through the posts I became interested in a Freedom Village post that was offering a link to free mentor support to anyone who needed quit smoking assistance. Because the site hosted three advertisements (Wal-Mart, Overstocked, and Netflix):
the Freedom Village site owner (Bubba) was unfortunately rudely intercepted by a few posters.

So I got to thinking that if Freedom Village violated the compost rules (no commercial posts permitted on this newsgroup,) then that would make www.Silkquit.org also a violator of compost policy.

As an example of the direction my thinking is going in: when I clicked on the Silkquit meter page I could purchase a Quit Key for $59.95 or I could get hypnotized for $250.00. Check it out! Google ads rotate so you won’t see the same ads that I did when you visit www.silkquit.org

I also rediscovered that myopic thinking tends to infuriate me. This was another case of obviously palpable double standards. Wikipedia perhaps sums it up best.

“Willful ignorance is a bad faith decision to avoid becoming informed about something so as to avoid having to make undesirable decisions that such information might prompt.”

~robbster

Source: Jacob Sullum, Reason Magazine

Yesterday I mentioned the controversy over legislation that would give the FDA authority to regulate tobacco products, authority the FDA itself (or at least its current head) does not want. One reason for the agency’s leeriness is the possibility that FDA regulation could actually increase the harm associated with tobacco use. One way that could happen, as I’ve noted before, is through censorship of truthful comparative risk claims—in particular, efforts to promote smokeless tobacco as a harm-reducing alternative to cigarettes. Last week there were a couple of positive developments in this area.
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MINDEN - Students of Piñon Hills Elementary School expressed both wonder and disgust when Victor DeNoble walked around showing them a piece of a human brain.

“It looks pretty cool but kind of disgusting,” said fourth-grader Timothy Cadaret at the presentation.

DeNoble, a former tobacco scientist for Philip Morris, said he approached a 63-year-old hospital patient dying of lung cancer and asked him if he could have his brain after he died. He explained to the patient that he was conducting experiments on the effects of nicotine on the human brain.

“You’re weird,” DeNoble said the patient told him.

The patient said he also hadn’t smoked for two years. But DeNoble, who had been experimenting on rats and monkeys, was convinced that the effects of nicotine on the human brain lasted even after an individual quit smoking.

“The man told me that although he hadn’t smoked in years, he still woke up every morning wanting a cigarette,” DeNoble said.

After the man died, his wife gave DeNoble permission to use his brain for experimentation. DeNoble said his initial hypothesis was right: The man’s brain cells showed nicotine-related alteration even though he hadn’t smoked for years.

“Young people don’t really recognize that nicotine is a drug that changes their brain,” DeNoble said.
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Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania recently received a $2.3 million grant from the National Institutes of Health for a new study focusing on the chemical changes that occur when the body is exposed to cigarette smoke.

Previous research has shown that chemical changes in the body can occur after exposure to cigarette smoke and that smoking and exposure to cigarette smoke is the environmental exposure responsible for causing more deaths than any other toxins. The chemical elements found in cigarette smoke can cause certain types of cancer and have been associated with cardiovascular, pulmonary and pancreatic diseases.

Smokers, non-smokers and even individuals who are in regular contact with second-hand smoke will be screened for the presence of distinctive lipid and DNA biological indicators or chemicals and through additional discovery potential protein indicators in their blood, urine and breath. These indicators, also known as biomarkers or biochemicals, will be utilized to determine the susceptibility of individuals to tobacco-related lung and cardiovascular problems after exposure to cigarette smoke. The results will hopefully provide reliable data for use in subsequent studies.
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BARCELONA: Cancer deaths will more than double to 17 million people each year in 2030 with poor countries shouldering the heaviest burden from the disease, the head of the UN’s cancer agency said on Monday.

An aging population will bump up cancer rates worldwide in the coming years, especially in developing countries where the number of people who smoke and drink is on the rise, said Peter Boyle, director of the International Agency for Research on Cancer.

And the disease will hit poorer countries harder because of limited health budgets and a lack of treatments such as radiotherapy that can extend people’s lives, he told the European Cancer Conference. “If we put population growth and ageing to one side the exportation of cancer risk factors, primarily tobacco smoking, from developed countries will continue to be a major determinant of cancer risk and cancer burden in less developed countries,” he said.
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The past decade has seen a remarkable shift in the way Americans view cigarette smoking. Since the massive tobacco litigation settlements began in 1997, the federal government has phased out support for tobacco farming, states and cities have enacted public smoking restrictions, and the number of smokers has steadily declined.

Meanwhile, the tobacco industry’s manipulative advertising tactics have become part of the cultural lexicon. In the 2005 big screen satire Thank You For Smoking, the film’s protagonist — a “morally flexible” tobacco lobbyist — admits, “I earn a living fronting an organization that kills 1,200 people a day.”

With Hollywood now taking jabs at its one-time co-conspirator, it’s no wonder that the Centers for Disease Control found that 70 percent of the current 45 million adult smokers in the United States want to quit. While slightly less than half will succeed, the mere desire offers hope that cigarette smoking in America could one-day go the way of trans-fats or MSG.

Such logic, however, does not extend to the tobacco manufacturers themselves. The multinational tobacco corporations have moved their production and marketing efforts overseas, causing experts to predict that by 2010, 87 percent of the world’s tobacco will be grown in the developing world.

Since the ’60s, global production has doubled and 33 million people work cultivating tobacco to serve the world’s 1.2 billion smokers — one-fifth of the world’s population. Meanwhile, according to conservative estimates by the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, since 1997 consumption has increased at an annual rate of 1.7 percent in developing countries, meaning people there will smoke 71 percent of the world’s tobacco by 2010.
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The warning signs for esophageal cancer include :

* Hoarseness
* Difficulty swallowing
* Painful swallowing, especially when accompanied by hiccups.

Esophageal cancer is a serious form of cancer that starts in the inner layer of your esophagus, the 10-inch long tube that connects your throat and stomach. The most common symptom of esophageal cancer, usually occurring late in the disease, is difficulty swallowing and a sensation of food getting stuck in your throat or chest.

A black, hairy tongue (lingua villosa nigra) occurs when the papilla on the tongue, normally only one mm in length, grow up to 1.5 cm in length and turn black or brown, says Joachim Dissemond of the University of Essen. It occurs most regularly among men who smoke.

Buerger’s disease is a seldom seen condition that strikes mostly men aged twenty to forty. Buerger’s disease affects the arteries and veins in a person with a combination of inflammation and clots, ultimately causing impaired blood flow. This can result in tissue being destroyed, with infection and possible gangrene as a consequence.

Buerger’s disease most commonly starts in the hands and the feet and works it way to bother other parts of the body. What exactly precipitates Buerger’s disease is unknown, but everyone diagnosed with it smokes or uses some form of tobacco.