Category: People

‘There is no epidemic’
‘There is no epidemic in [US] teen vaping,’ according to a story by Michelle Minton published at insidesources.com.
Minton pointed out that the latest survey data [on which claims of an epidemic are based in part] from the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) dealt only with any electronic-cigarette use during the past month.
Previous data, she said, had shown that fewer than six percent of teens (including 18-year olds, who can legally purchase e-cigarettes) vaped habitually (20-30 days a month).
That meant that more than 94 percent of teens were not vaping regularly.
Furthermore, Minton said, CDC data did not indicate how many of these teenage vapers were using nicotine, an important point given that previous research had found most of them were not.
The data didn’t indicate either what percentage of teen e-cigarette users had never smoked, a number previous research put at less than one percent.
More important, the latest CDC data revealed nothing about underage smoking, which was the single most important data point in evaluating the harms or benefits of teenage vaping.
Since the introduction of e-cigarettes to the US market, adolescent use of cigarettes had more than halved, from 15.8 percent in 2011 to 7.6 percent in 2017.
‘Rather than e-cigarettes acting as a gateway to smoking, as is assumed by government and advocacy groups, this indicates that teenage e-cigarette use is more likely diverting would-be smokers toward a less harmful means of nicotine consumption and potentially away from nicotine consumption altogether,’ Minton said.
Minton’s piece looks too at why government agencies and certain health activists focus more on scaring people about the unknown risks of e-cigarettes than helping them understand the relative risks of vaping compared to smoking.
January 7, 2019
Smoking ban challenged
A lawsuit being brought by a smokers’-rights group in Malaysia against a nationwide ban on tobacco smoking in public places has left some people, including some tobacco consumers, asking whether smoking is a protected right, according to a story by Yiswaree Palansamy for the Malay Mail.
Ahead of the court case, several lawyers reportedly told the Mail that the Federal Constitution did not protect the right to smoke in public, and that a ban could not be deemed unconstitutional because it was in the interests of public health.
“This is a very bizarre lawsuit,” lawyers for Liberty executive director Latheefa Koya were said to have told the Mail.
“There is no such guarantee, whether express or implied, of the right to smoke in public places in the Federal Constitution.
“There is also no right under the Constitution that allows individuals to pollute the air with cigarette smoke. It is impossible to understand how the ban can be unconstitutional.”
Latheefa added that the prospect of the group’s winning its case was low.
“Their argument that smokers will be isolated is absurd – because they can still visit and eat at all public eating places so long as they don’t smoke,” she said.
“Furthermore, it is the duty of the government to ensure that members of the public are protected from the harmful pollutants in cigarette smoke.
“The pernicious effects of second-hand smoke are scientifically well documented.”
Meanwhile, the civil liberties lawyer Syahredzan Johan said the group could argue that the ban was a breach of fundamental rights, but he was unconvinced by this argument.
“It is a weak argument because in the first place, there is no fundamental right to smoke,” he said.
Despite that, the political secretary to DAP [Democratic Action Party] MP Lim Kit Siang said the group was left with one recourse on which to base its legal challenge – irrationality.
“It goes back to whether it is reasonable or not,” said Syahredzan. “That’s the only leg that they can stand on: where there is a concept of irrationality.
“When you’re seeking a judicial review, that is the usual ground that you rely on – things like procedural impropriety.”
January 7, 2019
Bans now in the running
The Japanese athlete, Naoko Takahashi, who won the gold medal in the women’s marathon at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, has been appointed as an ambassador to promote a Tokyo ordinance aimed at preventing passive tobacco smoking, according to a Maiinichi Daily News story.
Japan has struggled to bring in public-places tobacco smoking regulations and most of the efforts to do so have centered on a perceived need to enact such legislation before the Tokyo Olympics, which are due to run from July 24 to August 9, 2020.
Tokyo’s ordinance, which partially came into force at the start of this month, asks smokers to pay attention to what they are doing to prevent those around them from being exposed to second-hand smoke.
At the same time, parents and guardians are urged to try to protect children from passive smoking.
Later this year, smoking will be prohibited on the premises of schools, hospitals and other public facilities in Tokyo.
The story said that, on April 1, 2020, all aspects of the ordinance were scheduled to become effective so that smoking at restaurants that hire employees would be ‘basically banned’.
Takahashi received a letter of appointment to her ambassadorial role from Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike.
January 7, 2019
Shisha has weighty issues
A new study has indicated that people who smoke shisha have a significantly increased risk of becoming obese and developing diabetes, according to a story in The Egyptian Streets.
The study, which was carried out by the Brighton and Sussex Medical School (BSMS), UK, found that smokers of shisha were more likely than were non-smokers to gain weight and develop type 2 diabetes.
“It is possible that the toxins in the smoke stimulate an inflammatory response that causes tissues to become resistant to the effects of the hormone insulin, that regulates glucose in the blood,” the head of the Department of Medical Education at BSMS, Professor Gordon Ferns, was quoted as saying.
“However, it is also possible that hookah smoking is associated with other social behaviors that lead to weight gain.”
The study’s 9,840 participants included non-smokers, ex-smokers, cigarette smokers, hookah smokers and those who smoked both cigarettes and hookahs.
January 7, 2019
Quitting with more nicotine
Allowing smokers to determine their nicotine intake while they are trying to quit is likely to help them kick their habit, according to a EurekAlert story citing a study of 50 people led by Queen Mary University of London.
The results of the first study to tailor nicotine dosing based on the choices of smokers trying to quit suggest that most smokers who use stop-smoking medications can easily tolerate doses that are four times higher than those normally recommended.
Study author Dunja Przulj of Queen Mary University of London said that smokers determined their nicotine intake while they smoked, but that when they tried to quit their nicotine levels were dictated by the recommended dosing of the treatment. “These levels may be far too low for some people, increasing the likelihood that they go back to smoking,” Przulj said.
“Medicinal nicotine products may be under-dosing smokers and could explain why we’ve seen limited success in treatments, such as patches and gum, helping smokers to quit. A change in their application is now needed.
“Our findings should provide reassurance to smokers that it is okay to use whatever nicotine doses they find helpful.”
When nicotine replacement treatment was first evaluated in the 1970s, low doses were used because of concerns about toxicity and addictiveness. Evidence then emerged that nicotine on its own, outside of tobacco products, has limited addictive potential, and that higher doses are safe and well tolerated. Despite this, stop-smoking medications have maintained lower nicotine levels in their products.
The new study, published in the journal Addiction, examined 50 smokers in a tobacco dependence clinic in Argentina, and was the first to try a combined approach of ‘pre-loading’ nicotine prior to the quit date, and tailoring nicotine levels based on patient feedback.
January 4, 2019
More Danes smoking
The incidence of smoking in Denmark increased significantly last year for the first time in two decades, according to a story in The Local Denmark.
Figures based on an annual survey of smoking habits conducted among 5,017 people, showed an increase in the number of people who smoked regularly from 21.1 percent of the population in 2016 to 23.1 percent last year.
Sporadic, small increases in smoking had in recent decades broken up an overall trend towards lower numbers, but the figures now showed a tangible increase, concluded the report, which was conducted by the Danish Health Authority (Sundhedsstyrelsen) and three other organizations.
Niels Them Kjær, a project manager with the Danish Cancer Society (Kræftens Bekæmpelse), called the findings of the report a “catastrophe”.
“It is terrible that we will, also in the future, see many Danish people die of cancer,” Kjær said.
Almost 5,000 people died annually in Denmark due to smoking-related cancer, Kjær said.
Higher prices and stricter marketing regulation, as well as increasing the number of no-smoking areas, were key to breaking the “upward curve” of smoking in Denmark.
“We can see that this is what works for our neighbors,” he said.
Denmark’s neighbors Sweden, Norway and Finland have not shown statistical increases in their incidences of smoking.
The Minister of Health Ellen Trane Nørby reportedly told Politiken that discussion of smoking should not be simplified to talking about the cost of a pack of cigarettes. “An overall cultural change in society is needed to push this curve downwards,” Nørby said.
January 4, 2019
Vaping saves money
Smokers in New Zealand can now improve their physical and financial health considerably by switching to vaping.
According to a story in The Bay of Plenty Times, a January 1 tax increase was at least partially responsible for taking the retail price of a pack of 20 cigarettes to more than NZ$20, and in the case of some brands to more than NZ$25.
The excise tax increase behind the price rise is part of a series of annual increases, the last of which is due to be imposed on January 1, 2020.
In the face of the latest price hike, many smokers are switching to vaping as a cheaper option or because of the associated health benefits.
Shosha [a large retail group offering, among other items, vaping devices and e-liquids] vaping store manager Harinder Singh said more people were switching to vaping than ever due to the huge financial savings and health benefits. Most vapers, he said, could expect to pay NZ$60 a week less than they were paying as smokers.
Meanwhile, Mihi Blair of Hapai Te Hauora Maori Public Health said the organization was urging smokers, particularly wahine, to vape as a way of kicking the habit. “Whanau who are wanting to learn more about vaping or going smoke-free should contact Quitline,” Blair said.
Quitline was expecting an influx of calls and texts from people seeking support this month because such people often said their key motivation was to save money, according to Quitline’s communication manager Calvin Cochran.
January 4, 2019
Healthy gambling
Under a revised law that came into effect on Tuesday, all smoking lounges in Macau casinos must conform to enhanced technical standards and be approved by the authorities, according to a story in GGRAsia, a website and newsletter about the Asian sector of the casino industry.
The city’s Health Bureau said that, as of yesterday, it had received 498 requests for installing the new higher-standard lounges, which are said to have better air extraction equipment than was required under the previous regulatory regime.
And it said that, as of Monday, it had given permission for the installation of 378 of the new-style smoking lounges.
Also as of Monday, 13 gaming venues had made no request for new-style smoking lounges.
Meanwhile, a December report on the casino sector outlook for Macau by brokerage Sanford C. Bernstein said the new smoking rules, which include a ban on tableside smoking in VIP gambling rooms, were ‘likely a headwind for the industry’. But the report’s authors added that any negative impact from the smoking ban would ‘likely be temporary’.
Macau’s Legislative Assembly passed on July 14, 2017, a revised bill on smoking that banned tableside tobacco use in VIP rooms, which, up till then were the only places in Macau casinos where smoking was still allowed at gaming tables.
Although the new rules came into force on January 1, 2018, tableside smoking at VIP rooms was in effect permitted until January 1, 2019, because casinos had been given a year’s grace in which to set up smoking lounges for VIP players.
On the first two days of the new law being in effect, Macau’s Gaming Inspection and Co-ordination Bureau and the city’s Health Bureau jointly announced that 14 charges had been filed in relation to people smoking outside authorized areas in the city’s casinos. Nine charges related to visitors and five charges were against locals.
The Tobacco Prevention and Control Office additionally received 23 complaints about smoking in casinos, via the city’s anti-smoking hotline.
January 3, 2019
Tax hike in Qatar
The retail prices of tobacco products and sugary drinks have increased in Qatar following the imposition of new excise taxes, according to a story in The Gulf Times.
The new excise tax rates, which came into effect on Tuesday, have been set at 100 percent for tobacco and energy drinks, and at 50 percent for carbonated drinks.
A pack of Marlboro cigarettes that used to sell for QR11 now costs QR22, while the price for a pack of Pall Mall increased from QR5 to QR10, according to the Times citing an official price matrix.
A Doha-based store owner was said to have told the Times that most of his customers who are smokers had been complaining about the high prices, but that there was nothing that could be done. “These are new prices sanctioned by the government and there is nothing we could do but to comply with the new policy,” he said.
In a general awareness workshop, the Tax Department had previously defined excise tax as ‘a form of indirect tax levied on specific goods that are deemed harmful to human health or the environment’. ‘The intent of excise tax is to reduce consumption of such goods, while also raising revenues for the government that can be spent on public services,’ it said.
January 3, 2019
Nation-wide ban sought
Anti-tobacco campaigners in China have renewed calls for a national ban on smoking in public places, according to a story by Wang Xiaoyu for the China Daily.
The Beijing-based Thinktank Research Center for Health Development (TRCHD), which lobbies for tougher tobacco control measures, called last week for the creation of a smoke-free environment for the public.
The latest draft of a basic medical care and health promotion law, which was published in October and is under review by the National People’s Congress Standing Committee, highlights the need for publicity campaigns to curb smoking and higher taxes on tobacco products.
Kelvin Khow, a technical officer for the World Health Organization’s Tobacco Free Initiative, said the new draft was encouraging, “but regarding smoke-free public places, we need stronger wording – to ban smoking in all indoor areas”.
The draft, he said, used less-specific phrases such as “control smoking in public places”.
Khow said nearly 90 percent of Chinese people were not protected by smoke-free laws, making them vulnerable to health risks from second-hand smoke.
“We’re hurting people by not acting on a national law,” he said.
Twenty-one Chinese cities have banned smoking in indoor public spaces, with the latest being Xi’an, capital of Shaanxi province, in November.
Zhangjiakou, co-host of the 2022 Winter Olympics, is expected to join them soon. It released a draft regulation in September.
Wu Yiqun, deputy director of the TRCHD, said tobacco companies were hindering the launch of a nationwide ban.
“At the very least, we should stop advertising and sponsorship by tobacco businesses and introduce larger graphic warnings on all tobacco products,” she said. “A healthy China must be smoke free.”
January 2, 2019