Category: People

Smokers face discrimination
Fifty-six percent of smokers in the US believe they are at least occasionally discriminated against in public life or employment because of their smoking, according to a story by Art Swift published by the Gallup Organization.
In comparison, 17 percent of those who are overweight feel they have been discriminated against at some point because of their weight.
Thirteen percent of smokers say they feel discrimination every day, while one percent of overweight people say they are discriminated against daily.
The figures cited by Swift are from a July 5-9 Gallup poll on the consumption habits of US citizens.
Discrimination against smokers can take many forms.
‘According to news reports, smokers often say they are discriminated against through smoking bans, including more recent bans at some parks and beaches, higher insurance rates, and not getting jobs because of their habit,’ Swift says. ‘Analysis of income patterns has shown smokers earn less than those who do not smoke, although this difference could result from smokers tending to have lower average levels of education than non-smokers.’
The poll is the first time Gallup has asked about smokers’ perceived discrimination in this format. Previously, Gallup asked smokers whether they felt discriminated against specifically because of smoking restrictions and high cigarette taxes, and found 58 percent believed they were discriminated against on each account.
Swift’s piece is at: http://www.gallup.com/poll/214205/majority-smokers-feel-discriminated-against.aspx?g_source=Well-Being&g_medium=newsfeed&g_campaign=tiles.
July 19, 2017
Plea for common sense
The Scottish Prison Service has been urged to put ‘common sense’ ahead of ‘anti-smoking politics’ and abandon plans to make Scotland’s prisons smoke free.
“The risks of second-hand smoke have been greatly exaggerated,” said Simon Clark, director of the smokers’ group Forest. “Allowing inmates to smoke in their cells poses no significant risk to prison officers.
“On the other hand, banning smoking in prisons risks inflaming a tense and sometimes violent environment.
“Tobacco is an important currency in prison. The removal of one of the few privileges inmates are allowed could also fuel the use of illicit substances.
“Prison inmates don’t have a right to smoke but issues like this require a pragmatic response that puts common sense ahead of doctrinaire anti-smoking politics.”
July 19, 2017
E-liquid policy must change
The head of the Australian Drug Law Reform Foundation has told a federal parliamentary committee that the country’s policy on e-liquids must change, according to an Australian Associated Press story.
Electronic cigarettes are licit products in Australia but the sale and possession of the nicotine used in them is illegal.
Dr. Alex Wodak, a retired doctor, cited a major study by a public health agency in England that found electronic cigarettes were about 95 percent safer than were combustible cigarettes.
Australia should facilitate easy access to a diverse range of products, such as flavoured nicotine liquids, that would appeal to smokers who wanted to quit, he said.
“It’s very important, in harm reduction and public health generally, to have your intervention [be] attractive to the people most at risk,” he said.
“I think having a vibrant vaping community network, through the distribution of vaping shops, is very important from a public health perspective.”
Meanwhile, Colin Mendelsohn, an associate professor in the School of Public Health and Community Medicine at the University of NSW, said Australia’s policy focus on abstinence when it came to smoking was naive in the face of another option: harm minimisation.
“The reality is that many smokers are unable or unwilling to quit,” said Mendelsohn, who is a GP and tobacco treatment specialist helping smokers to quit. “We can’t just sacrifice them.”
The committing is hearing from experts about how the health risks of electronic cigarettes and combustible products compare, and how such products should be regulated.
The AAP story is at: http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2017/07/12/doctors-plead-e-cigarette-reforms.
July 13, 2017
Tobacco hospitals opposed
A recent move by the Karnataka health and family welfare department exploring the possibility of its entering a partnership with a tobacco company to build speciality government hospitals has sparked opposition among public health activists, according to a story in The Times of India.
In an e-mail dated April 18, Shalini Rajneesh, the principal secretary of the department, wrote to Anil Rajput, senior vice president, corporate affairs, at ITC, outlining the government of Karnataka’s plan to build five ‘super speciality hospitals’ and the opportunity for private companies to partner the government in this initiative.
‘As discussed, we are planning to set up five super speciality hospitals in five districts of Karnataka,’ the e-mail was reported to have said.
‘We plan to build the hospital and invite PPP partners to come with doctors and equipment to run the hospital.
‘The government will pay for the patients as per package costs pre-decided with a group of doctors both from the government and the private sector…
‘May I request you to put up this proposal before the ITC board, as early as possible?’
Public health activists have termed the move a clear case of a conflict of interests.
In opposing the initiative, one unnamed activist was said to have quoted Article 5.3 of the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.
Meanwhile, anti-corruption activist Ravi Krishna Reddy said such partnerships allowed the tobacco industry to make inroads into the health sector and influence government decisions.
“The Karnataka government itself, recognizing WHO guidelines, issued a circular in the past that government and elected officers shall not participate in tobacco industry related events,” he said.
“The recent move by the Karnataka health department to partner a tobacco firm now is a breach of public trust and a case of conflict of interest – as the tobacco firm gains close access to decision making authorities dealing with tobacco control.”
Asked about the move, Rajneesh said no decision had been taken by the government to partner with ITC to build government hospitals.
“Following a cabinet decision to build five super speciality hospitals in five districts, we are exploring various financial models to implement the project, and PPP is one of them,” she said.
July 12, 2017
Smoking incidence down
The prevalence of smoking among Japanese people aged 20 years or older has fallen below 20 percent for the first time on record, according to a story in The Japan Times citing the results of a government survey published yesterday.
The fall in smoking prevalence was said to have given a boost to a health ministry proposal to ban smoking in enclosed public spaces.
During the survey, 19.8 percent of respondents said they smoked, a figure that was down 1.8 percentage points from that of a 2013 survey.
The downward trend was said to have been observed in most age groups and in respect of both men and women.
The percentage of people who said they smoke every day was down by 2.4 percentage points to 29.1 percent in the case of men, and down by 0.9 of a percentage point to 8.6 percent in the case of women.
The prevalence of smoking, including occasional smoking, among men in their 20s saw the biggest drop since 2013: 5.4 percentage points to 31.1 percent. The figure for men in their 20s in 2001 was 55.6 percent.
The group with the highest smoking prevalence is that comprising men in their 30s, 39.9 percent of whom are smokers, while the group with the lowest smoking prevalence is that comprising women aged 80 and older, 1.7 percent of whom smoke.
The Times reported that, as Japan prepares to welcome more foreign visitors ahead of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare had been promoting a bill that would strengthen measures protecting people from second-hand smoke.
June 28, 2017
Farmers flock to tobacco
More than 10,000 new tobacco growers have registered with the Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board (TIMB) as part of preparations for the 2017-18 tobacco season, according to a story in The Herald.
Figures from TIMB indicate that of the 47,299 farmers have registered to grow tobacco during the 2017-18 season, 10,789 are new growers.
As of June 21, the communal sector had accounted for the highest number of the new growers. Six thousand and ninety communal farmers had registered to grow the crop for the first time.
Meanwhile, the TIMB said that seed sales had increased by 93 percent year-on-year. So far, tobacco farmers had bought seed equivalent to 84,308 ha whereas, by the same stage of last year’s preparations, they had bought seed equivalent to 43,473 ha.
The Herald story said that tobacco production had been on the increase ‘for the past years because of an organized marketing system, higher prices and better payments modalities’.
But part of this seems at odds with previous official figures. According to these figures, average flue-cured tobacco prices in 2015 and 2016 were about the same, at US$2.94 per kg, but back in 2008, the average price was US$3.24 per kg.
June 27, 2017
If you’re going to …
San Francisco is to ban the sale of flavored cigarettes, including menthol products, from April next year, according to a story by Joshua Sabatini on sfexaminter.com.
On Tuesday, the Board of Supervisors approved unanimously legislation introduced by supervisor Malia Cohen that prohibits retailers from selling flavored tobacco products, including menthol cigarettes, flavored chewing tobacco and flavored liquids containing nicotine used in electronic cigarettes.
Such products were said to impact disproportionately the LGBT and black communities.
“We want to enhance our prevention strategies,” Cohen was reported to have said. “The goal of this ordinance is to keep people from smoking in the first place.”
The ban drew opposition from small businesses, and from the Small Business Commission which represents them, for the impact it would have on their bottom-lines and the concern that patrons would only shop online or in other counties for the same products.
To address the business concerns, Cohen amended the legislation to have it go into effect in April 2018, rather than January, when it was originally aimed to come into force. She said also she would support increased city funding to help small stores transition their business models under the Healthy Food Retail program.
The legislation was said to build on a September 2009 US Food and Drug Administration ban on ‘characterizing flavors’ in cigarettes.
Sabatini’s piece is at: http://www.sfexaminer.com/sf-bans-sale-menthol-cigarettes-will-eliminate-least-50-5m-tobacco-sales/
June 22, 2017
Jobs targeted at Reynolds
R.J. Reynolds Tobacco confirmed on Tuesday it was offering voluntary retirement to production workers ahead of the pending sale of its parent company, Reynolds American Inc. to British American Tobacco, according to a story by Richard Craver for the Winston-Salem Journal.
“We manage our businesses for maximum flexibility, and several factors led us to believe this was a good time to offer some production associates an opportunity to retire with severance benefits,” Reynolds spokesman David Howard was quoted as saying.
“This is on a voluntary basis – we do not plan any involuntary job eliminations regardless of how many employees sign up.”
Reynolds is estimated to have between 2,000 and 2,200 local employees, the majority of whom work at its Tobaccoville plant, but the company has refused to provide a local workforce count in recent years.
Reynolds had 5,500 full-time and 50 part-time employees as of December 31, according to its 2016 annual regulatory report. The total includes 3,700 Reynolds Tobacco, 500 Santa Fe Natural Tobacco and 600 American Snuff employees.
The bulk of the remaining Reynolds Tobacco employees are sales and marketing representatives out in the field serving retail, wholesale and distribution customers, as well as about half of Santa Fe’s workforce.
BAT said in a January 18 regulatory filing that it “has no plans to close or move the head office in Winston-Salem, nor make any significant changes to the current high-quality manufacturing facilities in North Carolina and Tennessee, nor to the trade marketing team”.
But Nicandro Durante, BAT’s chief executive, said in a letter to BAT shareholders that the company projected $400 million in cost savings by July 2020. Such a saving would mean eliminating duplicate corporate functions, greater supply chain economies of scale and enhanced manufacturing efficiency from Reynolds’ two-million-square-foot Tobaccoville plant.
Craver’s piece is at: http://www.journalnow.com/business/business_news/local/reynolds-offers-voluntary-retirement-packages-to-select-production-workers/article_558dab5c-6df6-5429-afe7-607be539fbb2.html
June 22, 2017
Turning swords into tobacco
Coltabaco S.A.S., Colombia’s biggest tobacco company, is one of hundreds of Colombian businesses that are employing former members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in an effort to integrate them into the society against which they previously fought, according to a story by John Otis for Bloomberg News.
When Colombia’s government signed a peace treaty with FARC last fall, it meant more than an end to a 52-year conflict that had left an estimated 220,000 people dead and forced more than five million civilians from their homes. It also meant 7,000 guerrillas would have a chance to disarm and enter the workforce.
Miguel Suárez, a top official at the Reincorporation and Normalization Agency, the government body that receives newly demobilized fighters, was quoted as saying that it was the responsibility of all Colombians to generate opportunities and make the integration policy work.
Coltabaco has spent $15 million on minimarkets and tobacco plantations that employ former guerrillas as well as members of the paramilitary death squads that were the rebels’ archenemies.
“We have to co-operate so that these people don’t return to a life of crime,” says Humberto Mora, Coltabaco’s vice president.
“We are not doing this simply out of altruism. This is also a form of self-protection.
Otis’ story is at https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2017-06-20/what-do-you-do-when-guerrilla-is-the-only-thing-on-your-r-sum.
June 21, 2017
Acting on child labor
In the wake of World Day Against Child Labor on June 12, some US politicians are attempting to reintroduced the Children Don’t Belong on Tobacco Farms Act, according to a TMA report citing Congressional Documents and Publications.
The act, if passed, would amend the Fair Labor Standards Act effectively to prohibit children under the age of 18 from working on tobacco farms.
One of the sponsors of the bill, US Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL), was quoted as saying that it had been known for decades that tobacco companies had no qualms marketing their deadly products to minors.
But Big Tobacco’s willingness to exploit children for profit didn’t end there, he said. Children as young as 11 or 12 had been found risking nicotine poisoning and long-term health consequences from handling tobacco plants.
US law prohibited children under the age of 18 from buying cigarettes, but children as young as 12 were permitted to work in tobacco fields, where handling tobacco plants could lead to nicotine poisoning.
Tobacco companies and growers’ associations in the US recently adopted voluntary standards to limit child labor in tobacco work, but this bill would codify the implicit agreement that a tobacco farm is no place for children to work.
June 14, 2017