While smoking might be viewed as the least of their problems, people experiencing homelessness, mental illness and alcohol and other drug dependence are crying out for the right support to quit, according to the Public Health Association of Australia.
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- Category: January 2019
The American Lung Association gives a federal agency and individual state governments poor marks in a new report card evaluating tobacco prevention programs.
The federal government is failing to act to protect kids from e-cigarettes, which can lead to a potential addiction, according to the association's 17th annual State of Tobacco Control report. [...] Some of the harshest criticism is reserved for the US Food and Drug Administration, which received a grade of "F" from the lung association, primarily due to a "lack of action," said Thomas Carr, [...]
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- Category: January 2019
Children are at increasing risk of poisoning from unregulated e-cigarette liquids containing nicotine, according to new research from Queensland experts.
The findings, [...] warn the risk to children, especially young children, from e-cigarette liquid “should not be underestimated.” One of the paper’s authors, Carol Wylie, [...] said just one millilitre of a highly concentrated nicotine solution can be lethal if ingested by a child.
“Children have died as a consequence of swallowing these e-cigarette refills,” Ms Wylie said.
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- Category: January 2019
It’s estimated that every year around 207,000 children aged 11-15 start smoking. Children who live with parents or siblings who smoke are three times more likely to smoke themselves and with 14.9% of adults classified as smokers, it is a problem that will persist. [...] Anyone with even a passing interest in health knows the risks, which makes it even more shocking to see that 15 percent of the population (an estimated 7.4 million people) are smokers. It’s a habit that costs the NHS £2.5 billion a year in England alone, [...]
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- Category: January 2019
It’s been a long time since I smoked pot. My friends and I used to smoke it at school. We were bored, I suppose, but in retrospect this was a terrible place to take drugs. [...] I had more fun with the drug in my 20s but it often made me fall asleep and it was hard to wake me up. [...] We seem to be entering a period of cultural reaction against the legalisation of cannabis. See, for example, Malcolm Gladwell in the New Yorker. Some of it feels hysterical; some of it reasonable. [...]
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- Category: January 2019
Last year, an increase in heat-not-burn (HNB) electronic tobacco product sales in South Korea coincided with a decrease in cigarette sales, causing people who care about public health to pore over the potential significance.
South Korea’s consumer trend could indicate the harm reduction potential of HNB products—which heat tobacco sticks enough to produce nicotine-containing vapor, but not enough to produce smoke—to move smokers off of cigarettes. US federal regulators, meanwhile, say that not enough evidence shows that HNB products reduce harms relative to smoking.
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- Category: January 2019
The battle over the future of vaping is ongoing in many places, but it’s finally reaching a boiling point after years of debate. As such, both sides are digging in with their perspective and evidence, ready for a fight. Critics continue to claim, without real evidence, that e-cigarettes are specifically targeting teens and luring them into a life of smoking. Supporters of the vaping industry, on the other hand, are continuing to build their case for the harm reduction and smoking cessation value of vaporizers.
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- Category: January 2019
According to many, public perception remains the most significant problem facing the acceptance of vaping. In order to better ensure our continued right to vape, the best thing we can do is increase the number of people who understand the dramatic harm reduction and smoking cessation value of vaporizers. We still have a long way to go before society fully understands what vapes have to offer, but a new reportpublished in the Addiction journal seems to indicate we are most certainly on the right track.
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- Category: January 2019
Inmates want to quit smoking but don't have access to smoking cessation programs in state prisons, increasing the risk—especially among black male inmates—of cancer, heart disease, stroke and other smoking-related diseases, according to Rutgers researchers. In a study published in Health Psychology Open, researchers examined smoking behaviors and characteristics of 169 black and non-black male inmates in three state correctional facilities in the Northeast to identify racial differences in their smoking behaviors and motivation to quit.
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- Category: January 2019
Teens are smoking fewer cigarettes, drinking less alcohol and not taking as many opioids — but their use of electronic cigarettes is on the rise [...]
The Monitoring the Future report, based on questioning almost 45,000 eighth-, 10th- and 12-graders in New Jersey and across the nation, found the number of students using e-cigarettes increased by 78 percent last year.
The report does not give a state-by-state breakdown, but according to a recent youth tobacco survey almost 10 percent of New Jersey teens are using e-cigarettes.
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- Category: January 2019
More than 100 free-market thinktanks have argued against tobacco control policies or accepted donations from the tobacco industry, research by the Guardian shows
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- Category: January 2019
Lost in the often vitriolic debate over electronic cigarettes versus traditional cigarettes are little nonbiodegradable pieces of plastic: cigarette butts. They are the world’s most ubiquitous form of litter, with millions upon millions of them infesting the environment.
And yet this raging debate has focused almost entirely on how best to protect people’s health. Many opponents of electronic cigarettes focus on potential but unproven concerns about their harmful effects, while proponents focus on [...]
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- Category: January 2019
SINGAPORE - At what looks like a colourful juice bar a lively presenter blends together a tasty looking fruity milkshake. But then, he adds some car fuel to the mix, and the drink no longer looks enticing.
The stark contrast in the scene is part of the Health Promotion Board's (HPB) newly launched campaign on the harmful effects of e-cigarettes. It attempts to bring across clearly the message of how seemingly appealing and flavourful vaporisers can hide dangerous chemicals.
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- Category: January 2019
The American Academy of Pediatrics called Monday for a major new effort to discourage children and teenagers from using e-cigarettes. According to AAP data, last year 20 percent of high school students, and five percent of middle school students, used e-cigarettes; that is a 75 percent jump overall since 2017.
"The increasing use of e-cigarettes among youth threatens five decades of public health gains," the AAP said.
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- Category: January 2019
As educators in Spokane battle the proliferation of e-cigarette puffing in the classroom, state regulators are eyeing stricter and clearer rules for the sale of vaping products.
New proposed rules from the state Liquor and Cannabis Board, which were presented at a meeting held in Spokane earlier this month, require full disclosure of business owners to regulators and impose escalating fines for failure to follow state laws, including allowing those under 18 to enter stores where vaping devices can be sampled.
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- Category: January 2019
Smoking rates among disadvantaged Australians are significantly higher than the general population, but not enough is being done to help them quit, health experts say.
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- Category: January 2019
A draft activist letter to the WHO Executive Board is circulating widely on email networks – so widely that it has even been sent to me. It is a response to an open letter from the Foundation for a Smokefree World to the WHO Executive Board, which is having its annual meeting 24 January – 1 February, 2019.
I won’t be signing the activist letter, but I would like to suggest that others who are inclined to sign think carefully before they put their name and reputation behind this one.
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- Category: January 2019
More people die of lung cancer than any other cancer in Ireland. Yet people have less sympathy for those diagnosed with it – often at a late stage when survival rates are lower – because nine out of 10 cases are caused by smoking.
“Other cancers and diseases are not subjected to the same degree of judgment. Regardless of a person’s smoking history, everyone affected by a lung cancer diagnosis deserves the same care and compassion as other cancer diagnoses,” says Kevin O’Hagan of the Irish Cancer Society.
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- Category: January 2019
Early last year, we got our first confirmation that vaping—once touted as a “Get Out of Jail Free” card for smokers—isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be.
That confirmation came in the form of a 600+ page report
that comprehensively analyzed 800 peer-reviewed studies. It concluded that the available evidence supports far more caution should be exercised with regard to vaping than we previously thought, especially when it comes to young people vaping.
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- Category: January 2019
Where should vaping products be stocked in stores? That question was sharply raised in response to Sainsbury’s, a British supermarket chain, placing e-cigarettes and vaping liquids on its shelves next to nicotine replacement products like patches and gums. Although British political hostility to vaping is nowhere near that seen in the US, opposition inevitably followed. Conservative Member of Parliament Bob Blackman, chair of the Parliamentary Group on Smoking and Health, blasted Sainsbury’s: “It’s wrong to have them on open shelves [...]
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- Category: January 2019
Juul, the Silicon Valley startup that’s taken over three-quarters of the US e-cigarette market, has repeatedly declared it is in the business of helping adult smokers quit tobacco.
But a new analysis of its early advertising campaign tells a very different story.
In a white paper, a team of researchers [...] have shared their study of the company’s marketing campaign, between Juul’s launch in 2015 and fall 2018. They looked at thousands of Instagram posts, emails, and ads, and came to this searing conclusion: Juul’s marketing “was patently youth-oriented.” [...]