This year’s TFWA World Exhibition conference will have as one of its speakers Lord Sebastian Coe, Olympic gold-medalist and British Olympic Association chairman.
The conference, themed “A brand new challenge,” will run alongside the Exhibition in Cannes, France, on Oct. 20-25.
It will be addressed, too, by Willie Walsh, CEO of International Airlines Group, and author, social strategist and consultant John Gerzema.
More details are available at tfwa.com.
The European Commission has been asked how it can be in favor of maintaining cooperation between the EU and tobacco companies when the latter seem to be indifferent to the fate of animals.
The animals in this instance are non-human animals, particularly the rats, monkeys and dogs that mostly are used in testing tobacco products and the smoke produced by them.
In a preamble to three written questions to the commission, Polish member of the European Parliament Jarosław Leszek Wałęsa said that whereas tests involving exposing animals to tobacco smoke “for many years under atrocious conditions” were prohibited in the EU, there were no such restrictions in respect of tobacco products imported into the EU by “the well-known manufacturers which carry out these tests.”
The MEP said there was no point in carrying out research in this way because it had already been proved beyond doubt that smoking was harmful.
In addition, he said, non-human animals reacted differently than did humans to toxins, and, in any case, laboratory animals were not exposed to tobacco smoke in the same way as people were exposed to it.
In all, he asked three questions:
1. How does the commission intend to promote EU practices outside its borders in such a way as to influence the actions of tobacco groups and producers?
2. Does the commission intend to block imports of tobacco products tested on animals?
3. How can the commission argue in favour of maintaining the European Union’s cooperation with tobacco companies when the above proves them to be indifferent to the fate of animals?
The latest attempt to find a nicotine vaccine has come up with a system that uses self-assembling DNA nanoparticles to make a person’s immune system into a”high-precision, super-powerful, nicotine-zapping machine,” according to a piece by Robert Sorokanich for Gizmodo, quoting research by Arizona State University’s Biodesign Institute.
Yung Chang, who leads the research team, was quoted as saying that the DNA nanostructure enabled rational design and construction of synthetic vaccines because of its precision control over the placement of various antigenic components. “This approach may offer a new strategy to improve the efficacy of many different vaccines,” he added.
Sorokanich posited that while clinical testing was still down the road, once nicotine, alcohol and cocaine vaccines became a reality, a person could be fully immune to bad decisions.
His report is at http://www.gizmodo.com.au/2013/07/self-assembling-dna-could-make-you-immune-to-cigarettes/.
The Chinese company Midriver Enterprises is expected to contract nearly 80,000 Zimbabwean farmers to produce tobacco during the 2013-2014 season, according to a story in the Zimbabwe Herald.
And because some farmers have been facing financial problems, the company will offer to supply them with inputs and working capital to pay wages. The company will supply also coal for curing so as to reduce deforestation and promote sustainable practices.
Midriver’s production manager, Johannes Muchimika, said that most farmers had not been producing high-quality crops because they had had limited inputs. Farmers would apply inadequate amounts of fertilizers because of financial constraints, he added.
In addition, Muchimika said, some farmers had faced difficulties paying workers, especially for reaping and curing, a situation that had resulted in huge losses.
Midriver, which will buy the crop from the contracted farmers, says it will provide the inputs at reasonable prices to farmers since it would be buying them directly from the manufacturers.
Health groups have blasted a bid by James Packer’s Crown Ltd. to allow smoking across the entire gaming floor of its proposed Sydney casino, an area that could be as large as two and a half rugby league fields, according to a story in The Sydney Morning Herald.
The NSW Cancer Council’s manager of tobacco control, Scot Walsberger, said the organization was “disappointed” in the NSW government’s conditional approval of the proposal and said potential employees would have to choose “between a job at the casino and their health.”
Crown’s proposal, conditionally accepted by NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell on Thursday, described allowing smoking in the gaming area as “absolutely critical.”
The company has proposed a 24-hour-a-day gaming area of up to 20,000 square metres.
Crown’s Sydney rival, The Star, enjoys a similar exemption from NSW laws in its high roller areas, and Crown’s Melbourne high-roller area, the Mahogany Room, is exempt from Victorian anti-smoking laws.
Quit Victoria Executive Director Fiona Sharkie said the move was “extremely concerning” and accused Crown of “putting profit before the health of their staff and consumers.”
A radio frequency identification (RFID) conference and exhibition is to be held in London on Oct. 25.
According to a press note, RFID Journal LIVE! Europe 2013 will highlight leading companies’ RFID deployments in the region and demonstrate the latest technology available.
The event is due to focus on educating end users about how RFID technology is delivering “real business benefits across the continent.”
“The conference and exhibition will also feature a co-located event, RFID in Europe, connecting European end users, operators, solution providers, universities, research establishments, nongovernment and government organizations, and all other European stakeholders, through the promotion of national projects via an international network,” the note said.
More information is available at www.rfidjournalevents.com/europe.
The inhalation of the non-psychoactive cannabinoid CBD (cannabidiol) significantly mitigates tobacco smokers’ desire for cigarettes, according to a story in The Daily Chronic quoting clinical trial data published online in the journal Addictive Behaviors.
Investigators at University College London conducted a double-blind pilot study to assess the impact of the ad-hoc consumption of organic CBD versus a placebo in 24 tobacco-smoking subjects seeking to quit their habit. Participants were randomized to receive either, in the case of half of the subjects, an inhaler containing CBD or, in the case of the others, a placebo for one week.
Trial investigators instructed subjects to use the inhaler when they felt the urge to smoke.
The researchers reported that, over the treatment week and in comparison with usual consumption levels, the placebo-treated smokers showed no differences in the number of cigarettes they smoked. In contrast, those treated with CBD reduced the number of cigarettes smoked by 40 percent during treatment. The participants who used CBD did not report experiencing increased cravings for nicotine during the study’s duration.
“This is the first study, as far as we are aware, to demonstrate the impact of CBD on cigarette smoking…,” the investigators concluded. “These preliminary data, combined with the strong preclinical rationale for use of this compound, suggest CBD to be a potential treatment for nicotine addiction that warrants further exploration.”
Smokers are unlikely to extend their lifespans if they choose to smoke fewer cigarettes but don’t give up altogether, according to a story from the University of Glasgow, Scotland.
This was the conclusion reached by researchers at the universities of Glasgow and Stirling after examining data on more than 5,200 men and women living in the central belt of Scotland who were smoking when first recruited to two studies in the early 1970s.
All of the participants were re-contacted a few years later and asked again about their smoking. Some had stopped altogether (the quitters), some had reduced the number of cigarettes they smoked (the reducers), while others had maintained or increased the level of their smoking (the maintainers).
All deaths were logged between the second screening and 2010.
“The researchers found that, compared to maintainers, the quitters had lower mortality rates, but there was no significant difference between the reducers and the maintainers,” the university reported.
“In one of the two studies, a subgroup of the reducers who had been among the heaviest smokers at the start did show lower mortality rates, but this was not seen in the other study.
“The Scottish findings, published in the American Journal of Epidemiology, do not support those of a similar long-term study in Israel, where smoking reduction did appear to reduce mortality rates, but are consistent with larger studies of shorter duration in Denmark and Norway, where it did not.”
Tobacco smoking will be banned in enclosed and some other public places in Jamaica from July 15, according to a piece in The New York Times by Tanya Mohn.
From that date, smoking will be prohibited in enclosed public places, such as workplaces; government buildings; educational institutions; health facilities, including pharmacies; on public transport; at sporting and recreational facilities; and at places of collective use, such as bus stops.
During the next six months, businesses will be required to post signs to alert customers of the bans, which is just as well since smokers who light up in places where smoking is banned could be fined JMD50,000 or thrown into jail for three months.
Jamaica will require also that tobacco products carry big graphic health warnings in addition to the textual ones currently in use.
Anti-smoking activists in Hungary seem set on launching a petition aimed at having a ban imposed on tobacco smoking in public places, according to a story by the All Hungary Media Group.
This follows the approval by the National Election Commission of a petition question that would ask: Do you agree that smoking should be banned in public places?
A referendum will have to be held if at least 200,000 people sign such a petition.