Author: Marissa Dean

Black Market Thrives in Bosnia and Herzegovina

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About 49 percent of citizens in Bosnia and Herzegovina buy tobacco products from the black market, according to 2020 research data published by the Center for Policies and Management, a Sarajevo think tank organization that deals with European integration and public administration reform, reports the Sarajevo Times.
The legal sale of cigarettes decreased by 7.6 billion cigarettes per year from 2008 to 2020, though the number of smokers did not significantly decrease. The Liberal Forum, a nongovernmental organization, suggests that that means smokers turned to the black market for cheaper products.
Illegal cigarettes and tobacco are often smuggled into Bosnia and Herzegovina from Montenegro, Serbia and Albania; Bosnia and Herzegovina is a transit country on the international smuggling route leading to European Union countries, according to the Indirect Tax Administration.
The Bosnia and Herzegovina prosecutor’s office filed indictments against 13 people this year for illegal tobacco product trade, three of whom were border police members.
December 12, 2022
Egypt Shops Must Formalize Operations

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Egypt has implemented a law requiring unlicensed shops to legalize their businesses and putting restrictions on cafes serving shisha, reports Ahram Online.
The new law requires previously licensed shops to make a one-time payment of half the newly required fees to receive a permanent license. Licensed shops will have a two-year grace period to submit their permanent licenses.
New businesses will receive their licenses within 60 days of applying.
A fine of EGP20,000 ($811.19) to EGP50,000 will be imposed on unlicensed shops and those failing to adhere to the law will be sentenced to prison, according to the Cairo government.
The law will specify fees based on the location of the shops as well as social and economic dimension of the shops’ activities.
The law also puts restrictions on cafes serving shisha. Cafes and restaurants serving shisha must license their shops or face fines of EGP10,000 to EGP20,000.
These cafes and restaurants must be located at least 1,000 meters away from places of worship, schools, educational institutions and fuel stations. They must also keep their doors closed except for entering and exiting, and they cannot serve shisha in more than 50 percent of their total area.
Shop floors cannot be covered in flammable materials and used coals must be stored in specialized ceramic or metal containers. Stored coal must be located in isolated places.
December 12, 2022
Law Review Urges Action to Protect Youth

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While Canada’s Tobacco and Vaping Products Act (TVPA) is making progress toward meeting the objectives it set out in relation to vaping, more works remains to be done, particularly in terms of protecting youth, according to the first review of the legislation, which was recently tabled in Parliament by Minister of Mental Health and Addiction and Associate Minister of Health Carolyn Bennett, reports Health Canada.
The review identifies areas for potential action, including examining access to vaping products by youth, communicating the potential benefits of vaping as a less harmful source of nicotine for people who smoke and completely switch to vaping as well as the health hazards, strengthening compliance and enforcement, and addressing scientific and product uncertainty to better understand the vaping product market and the health impacts of vaping.
“Vaping products offer the 3.8 million Canadians who smoke a less harmful source of nicotine than tobacco products and do help people to stop smoking,” said Bennett. “These products, however, are not without risk—particularly to youth and people who do not smoke cigarettes. This first legislative review of the Tobacco and Vaping Products Act is a valuable opportunity to take stock of the progress we’ve made to address youth vaping—but there is more to do. Our government will continue to work to put the right safeguards in place to protect young people from the harms of vaping and nicotine addiction.”
The TVPA was implemented in 2018 to respond to the increasing availability of vaping products in Canada and to help ensure that Canadians would be informed about and protected from the health hazards associated with vaping. It regulates the manufacture, sale, labeling and promotion of vaping products sold in Canada.
The TVPA includes a requirement for a legislative review three years after coming into force and every two years thereafter to provide a means to examine and respond to tobacco-related and/or vaping-related issues that may emerge over time.
The review was informed by a public consultation that ran from March 16, 2022, to April 27, 2022.
December 12, 2022
Push to Close Tobacco Advertising ‘Loophole’

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U.S. Senators Jeanne Shaheen and Richard Blumenthal reintroduced the No Tax Subsidies for E-Cigarette and Tobacco Ads Act, which would end a tax provision that allows manufacturers to claim federal tax deductions for the cost of advertising for e-cigarettes and tobacco products, according to Shaheen’s website. Senators Brown, Reed, Durbin, Van Hollen and Merkley also joined in reintroducing the bill.
“E-cigarettes are fueling a public health crisis—particularly among teenagers. E-cigarette and Big Tobacco companies must be held responsible for deliberately advertising these dangerous products to youth,” said Shaheen. “It’s outrageous that a tax loophole allows companies to write off the costs of their ads, having taxpayers foot the bill and subsidize the advertising of harmful products. That’s why I’m reintroducing legislation to close this loophole and hold e-cigarette companies accountable for their harmful marketing practices.”
“Old regulatory loopholes are helping Big Tobacco addict more Americans to lethal products,” said Blumenthal. “This bill will close a gaping tax loophole, putting an end to Big Tobacco’s tax write-offs of dangerous ads and preventing young people from starting up a deadly addiction.”
The bill also bars tax deductions for advertising expenses related to tobacco cigarettes, cigars, snuff, chewing tobacco, pipe tobacco and roll-your-own tobacco.
December 12, 2022
Companies to Post ‘Corrective Statements’

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Tobacco companies will have to start displaying signs with “corrective” statements about the health effects and addictive nature of cigarettes at U.S. points of sale in the second half of 2023, according to the Department of Justice (DOJ), reports Fox News. A court order requiring the statements will take effect July 1, 2023, after which tobacco companies will have three months to start posting the statements for 21 months in English and Spanish.
The order “resolves the government’s long-running civil racketeering lawsuit against the largest United States cigarette companies,” according to the DOJ. The racketeering lawsuit was filed in 1999 and ended in 2005; however, the DOJ said the new court order is the last of several corrective remedies related to that case.
Altria Group, Philip Morris USA, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. and four cigarette brands owned by ITG Brands are subject to the order. An estimated 200,000 of 300,000 retail stores in the U.S. that sell cigarettes have agreements with the tobacco companies. The order requires the companies to amend their agreements, requiring corrective statements to be placed at the stores on color signs that are eye-catching. Messaging will include adverse health effects of smoking, the addictive nature of nicotine and adverse health effects of secondhand smoke, among others.
“Justice Department attorneys have worked diligently for over 20 years to hold accountable the tobacco companies that defrauded consumers about the health risks of smoking,” said Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta. “Today’s resolution implements the last remedy of this litigation to ensure that consumers know the true dangers of the smoking products they may consider purchasing.”
“This is an important moment in the history of cancer control in the United States,” said William Klein, associate director of the National Cancer Institute’s behavioral research program. “Smoking causes about 30 percent of all cancer deaths in the United States, and therefore, the court-ordered corrective statements appearing at the point of cigarette sale will help support our mission to reduce the burden of cancer. We are grateful to our colleagues at the Department of Justice for having completed this significant work.”
December 7, 2022
Sweden Approaching ‘Smoke-Free’ Goal

Delon Human | Photo: Taco Tuinstra
Smoking in Sweden has fallen to 5.6 percent, making Sweden the only European nation close to reaching the smoke-free goal set by the EU ahead of the 2040 target, Swedish authorities confirmed, according to BusinessWire.
According to participants in an event organized by the Oral Nicotine Commission in Stockholm, Sweden is about to become the first country in the world to be defined as “smoke-free,” representing a share of less than 5 percent of the population smoking.
Sweden’s smoking rates have plunged since the 1980s from 35 percent to below 6 percent. The next lowest smoking rate in Europe is double that of Sweden’s, with the EU average sitting around 23 percent, four times higher than in Sweden.
“If all smokers in the world, some 1.1 billion people, would switch to one of [the] less harmful alternative smoke-free, nicotine-based products, it could prevent disease and save millions of lives worldwide. Sweden has found the fire escape for smokers. We need to work together to repeat the Swedish experience globally to save lives,” said Delon Human, president of Health Diplomats and organizer of the Oral Nicotine Commission event.
“The upcoming Swedish EU presidency is a great opportunity to share their 5 percent success story to other EU countries,” said Karl Fagerstrom, professor, at the event. “We hope that Sweden will be generous with sharing this know-how internationally.”
Speakers at the conference emphasized the need for sound evidence-based policy interventions in tobacco control.
December 7, 2022
FDA Urged to Expand Menthol Ban

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The U.S. Food and Drug Administration should extend the ban on menthol cigarettes to other products, like pipe tobacco and cigarette tubes, according to researchers at the Rutgers Center for Tobacco Studies and Ohio State University, reports EurekAlert!.
“Tobacco companies have rebranded their roll-your-own cigarette tobacco as pipe tobacco to avoid taxes and rebranded flavored cigarettes as flavored cigars to skirt a federal ban,” said Andrea Villanti, deputy director of the Rutgers Center for Tobacco Studies and co-principal investigator of a study published in Tobacco Control discussing the addiction potential of menthol cigarette alternatives. “We have already seen companies advertising pipe tobacco and cigarette tubes alongside cigarettes and filtered cigars. The products we tested in our study are likely to be products that tobacco companies will promote following a ban on menthol cigarettes.”
Research showed that mentholated pipe tobacco and tubes in a roll-your-own cigarette were the most appealing substitutes for menthol cigarettes and resulted in the highest number of indicators for future nicotine addiction. The proposed menthol ban does not include these products, however.
“The present findings suggest that components of menthol roll-your-own products, including menthol rolling papers, cigarette tubes and pipe tobacco, should be included in the menthol cigarette and flavored cigar product standards,” said Theodore Wagener, director of the Center for Tobacco Research at the Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center—Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute and corresponding author of the study. “Their absence from this restriction will result in a critical loophole that is already being exploited by the tobacco industry and has the potential to lessen the potential public health benefits of the proposed menthol ban.”
December 7, 2022
Filipino Smoking Rate Decreases

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The rate of current tobacco use and smoking among Filipinos aged 15 and older decreased to 19.5 percent, or 15.1 million, in 2021, according to GMA News.
Exposure to secondhand smoke in homes and public places “significantly declined,” according to Vito Roque Jr. from the Department of Health’s Epidemiology Bureau, citing the 2021 Global Adult Tobacco Survey (GATS). The largest decline was in public transportation, decreasing from 37.6 percent in 2015 to 12.2 percent in 2021.
While the quit rate among past 12-month users decreased, the number of adult smokers thinking of quitting because of health warnings increased from 37.4 percent in 2009 to 43.7 percent in 2021.
“Key results from 2009 to 2021 showed a favorable trend in the country’s initiative on tobacco prevention and control. Results show a consistent downward trend in tobacco use prevalence [and] exposure to secondhand smoke,” Roque said.
“These successes may be attributed to the adoption and implementation of tobacco prevention and control health policies and interventions. The results also reflect the effectiveness of the enforced key policies on tobacco taxation, graphic health warnings, protection of bureaucracy against tobacco industry interference and smoke-free environments,” he added.
December 7, 2022
Swedish Match Applies for Delisting

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The board of Swedish Match said it will apply for delisting of the company’s shares from Nasdaq Stockholm, according to a press release. The last day of trading in the company’s shares on Nasdaq Stockholm will be announced as soon as the company has received confirmation from the exchange.
Philip Morris Holland Holdings, an affiliate of Philip Morris International, declared the public offer for Swedish Match unconditional on Nov. 7, 2022. PMHH controls more than 90 percent of the shares in Swedish Match and has initiated squeeze-out proceedings in respect of the remaining shares in the company.
December 6, 2022
Biden Signs Federal Marijuana Bill

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U.S. President Joe Biden officially signed the first piece of standalone federal cannabis reform Friday, according to the National Law Review. The U.S. president signed a marijuana research bill into law that cleared the House in July and the Senate last month.
The act is aimed at providing federal support to facilitate research of cannabis and its potential health benefits. The law gives the U.S. attorney general 60 days to either approve a given application or request supplemental information from the marijuana research applicant.
The Marijuana and Cannabidiol Research Expansion Act also creates a more efficient pathway for researchers who request larger quantities of cannabis.
The act does three things: provides a mechanism for the scientific study of cannabidiol and cannabis for medical purposes; arranges a pathway for the Food and Drug Administration to approve the commercial production of drugs containing or derived from cannabis; and protects doctors, who may now discuss the harms and benefits of using cannabis and cannabis derivatives.
The president remains opposed to federal cannabis legalization, but he campaigned on a number of more modest marijuana reforms, including promoting research, decriminalization and rescheduling cannabis under the Controlled Substances Act.
Biden also issued a mass pardon in October for Americans who have federal marijuana possession cases and directed an administrative review into cannabis scheduling.
December 6, 2022