Category: Regulation

  • Government not the answer

    Government not the answer

    If the US really wants to solve the smoking problem, government isn’t the answer, according to Brian Fojtik, a Senior Fellow with Reason Foundation, writing on the dailyvaper.com.

    ‘During the last ten years with the rise and growth in the market for e-cigarettes and vapor products, we’ve seen an organic, consumer-driven revolution sweep the nation and much of the world that holds the promise to do more to reduce smoking and smoking-related disease than expensive, intrusive and offensive government programs ever could,’ said Fojtik.

    ‘The response from government regulators, legislators and tobacco control groups masquerading as public health advocates has been nothing short of shameful.

    ‘We’d hope that health organizations and governments that have claimed to be working in the public interest would welcome promise toward reducing lung cancer, heart disease, stroke and COPD – all of which cause smokers to suffer and die prematurely at a rate of half a million a year.

    ‘Unfortunately, so far this promising trend has been received as anything but…’

    Fojtik’s piece is at:

    http://dailyvaper.com/2017/12/13/we-dont-need-the-government-to-solve-smoking-problem/

  • Seeking pure health

    Seeking pure health

    Ajman municipality, part of the United Arab Emirates, is banning shisha smoking in parks, green spaces and beaches, according to a story in The Khaleej Times quoting the Al Bayan newspaper.

    People who violate the ban will face fines of up to Dh1,000.

    Al Bayan said the municipality was committed to providing a healthy and clean environment for residents and visitors to the emirate.

    Khalid Moeen Al Hossani, executive director of the Public Health and Environment division of the municipality, said the ban was being imposed under the directions of His Highness Sheikh Rashid bin Humaid Al Nuaimi, the Head of the department.

    Al Hossani said the health and safety of individuals, along with their happiness, was the goal that everybody sought and strived to achieve.

    Gardens, green spaces and beaches were the most important places for people to seek rest, the perfect atmosphere and pure health.

  • Range of options needed

    Range of options needed

    The European smokers’ group Forest EU said yesterday it welcomed the scrapping of plans for a ban on smoking in Austria’s bars, restaurants and nightclubs.

    The ban, a policy of the outgoing government, was due to come into effect in May 2018.

    It was scrapped following talks between the Freedom Party and the People’s Party, which expect to form the next coalition government.

    “This is defeat for smokers’ ostracization and a great victory for tolerance,” said Guillaume Périgois, director of Forest EU.

    “Governments in Europe must review their smoking ban laws to accommodate smokers without inconveniencing those who don’t want to be exposed to tobacco smoke.

    “Options should include separate, properly ventilated smoking rooms, as … is the case in many EU countries such as Austria. Regulations on outdoor smoking shelters should be relaxed so that people can smoke outside in a warm and comfortable environment all year round.”

    Périgois called on the European hospitality industry to take a stand, defend its customers and call for the repeal of total indoor smoking bans in Ireland, the UK, Greece, Bulgaria, Malta, Spain and Hungary. It should call for the relaxation of national regulations so bars, restaurants and hotels could provide more sheltered outdoor smoking areas.

    “Some countries that allow smoking rooms in bars, restaurants and nightclubs make them pointlessly punitive for smokers,” he said. “In Belgium for example, it is forbidden to have a television in smoking rooms. As if a TV could be bothered by tobacco smoke. This nonsense must end as soon as possible.”

  • Limiting contacts in India

    Limiting contacts in India

    The Health Department of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu is setting up an empowered panel to implement measures recommended by the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), according to a story in the latest issue of the BBM Bommidala Group newsletter.

    The panel will be focusing in particular on dealing with interactions with, or any kind of interference from, representatives of the tobacco industry.

    The panel will reportedly comprise secretaries with the state government’s ‘Health, Home, Finance, Commercial tax, Registration and Law departments.

    The Tamil Nadu government has already issued a protocol for its employees in dealing with the tobacco industry.

    The protocol limits their interactions with tobacco-industry representatives and forbids them from accepting from the industry any contributions or services for themselves or their families, relatives or friends, including funds for research, policy drafts or legal advice.

    Meetings between government employees and representatives of the tobacco industry must be cleared with the panel in writing.

  • Private baths, public spaces

    Private baths, public spaces

    People living in apartment blocks in South Korea are to face stricter smoking restrictions, according to a story in The Korea Herald.

    The Ministry of Health and Welfare and the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport said yesterday the government would increase smoking restrictions at multi-dwelling units through a legal revision that would take effect on February 10.

    Currently, common areas in such blocks, such as elevators, stairs and hallways, are designated ‘manageable spaces’, which the managing authorities, with the consent of half the residents, can declare non-smoking areas.

    The Herald reported that, under the existing regulations, ‘balconies and bathrooms in individual units’ had been out of bounds to the managing authorities, as they were designated private spaces.

    ‘With the revision, a resident, sensing that someone is smoking, can report the claim to the management authorities,’ the Herald said. ‘The authorities will have the right to investigate the matter by searching private dwellings.’

  • It’s all very tortured

    It’s all very tortured

    Sinclair Davidson, a professor of economics in Australia, is due to tell the attendees at a dinner in Brussels on Thursday how it is possible to manipulate data to justify public policy.

    The dinner is being hosted by the European smokers’ group Forest EU and the title of Davidson’s talk will be: ‘How to torture data to justify public policy’.

    The event is due to address a number of questions including:

    • How do public health groups cheat, change the rules of the game and move the goalposts without getting caught?
    • Are public health organizations in the process of being disrupted?
    • Five years on since it was introduced in Australia, has the mandatory standardized packaging of tobacco been a success or a failure?

    Davidson is professor of institutional economics, finance and marketing at RMIT [Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology] University. He is also a senior fellow at the Institute of Public Affairs and academic fellow at the Australian Taxpayers’ Alliance.

    Speaking ahead of the event, Davidson said that government had lost its way. “Since abandoning its role as an impartial player in society it has taken to abusing the trust civil society invests in government,” he said. “The corresponding abuse of evidence based policy should alarm everyone with an interest in good policy.”

    Meanwhile, Guillaume Périgois, spokesman for Forest EU, said too many regulations designed to advance public health were based not on undisputed evidence but on flawed data and wishful thinking.

    “The danger is that inaccurate or cherry-picked data will be used to justify more nanny state policies, from higher taxation to alarmist warnings and further restrictions on lifestyle choices,” he said.

    “Anyone who cares about scientific probity and good governance should be concerned by the questionable data that is often peddled by lobby groups and government officials.

    “It’s time to question and hold to account the public health industry and the flawed and tortured information it frequently disseminates.”

  • While we’re at it …

    While we’re at it …

    The Wilson Housing Authority (WHA) in North Carolina, US, is using public health as a pretense to limit personal freedom, according to an editorial in the Wilson Daily Times.

    A federal mandate requires public housing communities to go tobacco-smoke-free by July 31 next year, but Wilson officials have taken the requirement several steps further by banning the use of electronic cigarettes and smokeless tobacco along with that of lit tobacco products such as cigarettes, cigars, hookahs and pipes.

    Beginning January 1, the WHA will ban the use of tobacco and vaping products in all its homes and offices. The agency will prevent also tobacco use within 25 feet of its buildings.

    Violators will receive two written warnings, be hit with a $50 fine the third time they’re caught and be thrown out the fourth time, according to a lease addendum residents were required to sign.

    The restrictions stem, in part, from a US Department of Housing and Urban Development policy. But HUD considered and rejected blanket bans on smokeless tobacco and e-cigarettes, adopting a policy narrowly tailored to prevent second-hand smoke exposure, reduce the risk of residential fires and reduce maintenance costs.

    ‘Local officials adopted more stringent rules on their own,’ the editorial said. ‘As far as we can tell, the rationale has more to do with paternalism than environmental health.’

    The editorial is at: http://www.wilsontimes.com/stories/housing-authority-should-snuff-out-ban-on-smokeless-tobacco,106226.

  • Sales falling in South Korea

    Sales falling in South Korea

    Cigarette sales in South Korea are expected to fall by 5-6 percent this year, according to a Yonhap News Agency story quoting an official at the Ministry of Health and Welfare.

    Sales fell by 23 percent, from 4.3 billion packs in 2014 to 3.3 billion packs in 2015, after the government imposed a cigarette-tax increase at the beginning of 2015 that took the prices of cigarettes from 2,500 won to 4,500 won a pack.

    Sales increased by nine percent to 3.6 billion packs in 2016 but they are set to fall to 3.4 billion packs this year.

    At the same time, the smoking rate for men over 19 years old fell to 39.4 percent in 2015 from 43.1 percent a year earlier, the first drop since 1998, when the smoking rate was first tallied.

    The smoking rate among this group rose to 40.7 percent in 2016 but is expected to drop again this year,

    “Cigarette sales have declined this year from the previous year as the graphic warning images and the expansion of non-smoking zones have taken effect,” the official was quoted as saying.

    The government mandated in 2016 that tobacco companies place graphic warnings on the upper part of cigarette packs and, earlier this year, it said that those warnings should occupy 30 percent of the front and back of cigarette packs.

    The graphic warnings must be placed on packs of e-cigarettes and chewing tobacco, too.

    South Korea has been expanding non-smoking zones in public places for the past few years, but such measures have fallen short of a far-reaching ban.

    And the country allows some cigarette advertising, promotions and sponsorships.

  • Vapers face jail

    Vapers face jail

    Hong Kong will put forward ‘very soon’ an amendment to an existing bill that will tighten controls on electronic cigarettes, according to a story in the Hong Kong Standard quoting the Food and Health Secretary Sophia Chan.

    Currently, it is not against the law to sell or possess e-cigarettes, though possessing those that contain nicotine can lead to a two-year prison term or a HK$100,000 fine.

    Chan was quoted as saying that tobacco companies often claimed that e-cigarettes were less harmful than was “tobacco”, but that the “opposite may be true”.

    “Evidence that we have collected globally [shows] that e-cigarettes are harmful and many of the substances in the e-cigarette cartridge are actually carcinogenic and harmful to health,” Chan said.

    “So therefore there is a need for the government to strengthen the regulatory framework for e-cigarettes in Hong Kong.”

    It was clear from the story what form the new restrictions or bans would take.

    Chan was speaking to reporters at a tobacco control conference in Wan Chai, where she was also asked if the government would raise tobacco duty next year after a three-year freeze.

    She said the government would look at World Health Organization recommendations, but added that there was more to consider than just tax when it came to tobacco control.

    Hong Kong’s Council on Smoking and Health has urged the government to double the tax on combustible cigarettes, claiming that such a move could reduce the number of smokers in Hong Kong to five percent of the population in 10 years’ time.

    For reasons that aren’t clear, many people believe that a country that reduces its cigarette-consuming population to five percent would have eliminated tobacco smoking.

  • Marking five-year failure

    Marking five-year failure

    The UK smokers’ group, Forest, is calling for an independent review of the impact of standardized tobacco packaging.

    The call comes after what Forest says have been five years of failure following the imposition of standardized tobacco packaging in Australia.

    Commenting on today’s fifth anniversary of the introduction of standardised packs in Australia, Forest’s director, Simon Clark, said standardized packaging had been a “spectacular” failure in Australia.

    “We were told it would deter people from smoking but the effect has been minimal,” he said.

    “Data shows plain packaging has had no impact on the prevalence of smoking in Australia, which is the same now as it was in 2013.

    “In fact, because of population growth, more people are smoking in Australia than five years ago.”

    Clark said that smokers didn’t care about packaging. “It’s the product not the pack that matters,” he said.

    “Plain packaging is no deterrent to teenagers either. Few people ever started smoking because they were attracted to the pack.”

    The UK government followed Australia’s lead and introduced standardized packaging in 2016.

    And now Clark is urging the UK government to commission an independent review of the impact of standardized packaging as part of its new tobacco control plan that was announced in July.

    “Policies,” he said, “should be evidence-based. Plain packaging is based not on evidence but on wishful thinking.

    “The measure has failed in Australia and it will fail in the UK.”