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- Category: September 2019
Michigan on Wednesday will become the first state in the nation to ban flavored e-cigarettes, a step the governor said was needed to protect young people from the potentially harmful effects of vaping.
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D), in an interview, said the state health department found youth vaping constituted a public health emergency, prompting her to take the action.
“My number one priority is keeping our kids safe and protecting the health of the people of Michigan,” Whitmer said.
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- Category: September 2019
There is little question that e-cigarettes are less harmful to health than conventional cigarettes. Many of the carcinogenic materials released from ordinary cigarettes are not present in e-cigarettes. Nevertheless, e-cigarettes are not harmless. Just recently, the World Health Organization published a clear warning that said e-cigarettes are “undoubtedly harmful.” Even in countries such as the United Kingdom and New Zealand, where supporters of e-cigarettes were quoted to support their use, authorities clearly acknowledge that they are not harmless.
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- Category: September 2019
The health minister, Greg Hunt, has hardened his opposition to changing Australia’s e-cigarette laws amid warnings of a vaping epidemic that has led to at least one death in the United States.
But despite the government’s stance, the vaping industry, which includes big tobacco companies such as Philip Morris, is preparing to ramp up lobbying efforts to push Canberra for policy change.
Following pressure from Coalition MPs late last year, Hunt ordered an independent inquiry into the use of nicotine e-cigarettes, the first report [...]
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- Category: September 2019
Walking through rural Indonesia, it's not uncommon to see primary school children smoking cigarettes. It's just one part of an epidemic in a country where nearly 70 per cent of all men and one in five children aged between 13 and 15 smoke, according to official data.
Indonesia has one of the highest smoking rates in the world and a tobacco industry that continues to thrive as the number of smokers decreases globally.
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- Category: September 2019
Independent public policy think tank The Helen Clark Foundation released a report tonight recommending that New Zealanders vote yes in the 2020 cannabis referendum.
The report also gave recommendations to the Government on policies around cannabis legalisation in New Zealand, saying it should look at:
• Expunging prior minor cannabis offences from the record and remove past convictions for supply where there was no compounding factor associated with the conviction, such as firearm use or violence. [...]
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- Category: September 2019
Menthol is a compound with a cooling, minty taste and odor. It is found in peppermint and other mint varieties. It can be organically or synthetically produced.
Menthol is an ingredient incorporated in a wide range of products we use almost everyday. It can be found in cosmetics, lozenges, toothpaste, liqueur, cigarettes and a whole lot more.
Using menthol containing products is believed to be beneficial. Find out if it can really be good or not.
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- Category: September 2019
An estimated 12% of the world’s cigarette smokers live in India. [...] For over 270 million tobacco users in India, there has to be a viable alternative that helps them switch from tobacco dependence to harm-reducing choices such as ENDS i.e., Electronic Nicotine Delivery Systems. ENDS work on the principle of delivering nicotine without combustion, [...]
However, contrary to the pragmatic approach, the Indian government considers banning all ENDS products as a measure to control the use from rising.
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- Category: September 2019
Health groups on Monday said there is no scientific evidence to support claims that e-cigarettes and heated tobacco products are safe.
“Even in the UK, where e-cigarettes are heavily promoted, no public health authority has claimed that these products are safe. The public and public servants in a position to protect public health must be fully apprised of the risks inherent to vaping,” Dr. Ulysses Dorotheo, Executive Director of Southeast Asia Tobacco Control Alliance (SEATCA) said in a statement.
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- Category: September 2019
Having been outlawed in Thailand since 2014, e-cigarettes remain a subject of controversy and debate. While many are calling for the ban to be lifted due to the perceived health benefits of vaping, others argue that it may actually do more harm than good.
Public debate on the issue was once again brought to the forefront recently, following the government's announcement last month that the ban on e-cigarettes would stay in place. [...]
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- Category: September 2019
The Mexican Supreme Court in August ordered the Health Ministry to publish guidelines for medicinal cannabis use within 180 days.
Last October, the court also ruled that the prohibition of personal use, possession and private cultivation of cannabis is unconstitutional because it violates “the fundamental right to the free development of the personality.” In Mexico, such rulings do not automatically extend to everyone, though they often prod Congress to change laws.
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- Category: September 2019
The most detailed audit ever done on litter in New Zealand has revealed some shocking results. Cigarette butts make up almost 80 per cent of all litter in New Zealand.
The project, conducted by not-for-profit organisation Keep New Zealand Beautiful, took five months to complete. [...]
"The research estimates 10 billion cigarettes are littered across the country. That equates to 2142 cigarette butts per New Zealander."
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- Category: September 2019
A New Zealand academic has challenged the World Health Organisation's criticism that e-cigarettes are just as harmful as smoking, arguing that the approach will only protect the cigarette trade and do more harm than good.
The WHO recently warned that e-cigarettes are harmful to people's health as they contain addictive liquids with toxic substances. The organisation also says the devices are opening the door to addiction for youth, blaming the aggressive push for vaping products from big tobacco over the past few years.
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- Category: September 2019
The UK’s biggest vaping retailer has attacked Government cuts to smoking support services, and said it is investing to help address the issue.
VPZ said it is set to launch a new support service in its stores to help smokers turn from cigarettes for good, amid the reduction in available support.
Bosses at the retailer, which has 135 stores across the country, have criticised reductions in public health spending which they believe have made it “more difficult” for smokers to quit.
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- Category: September 2019
Innovative individuals in the Asia-Pacific region, home to the largest population of smokers, have an opportunity to end the smoking epidemic by improving the technologies to deliver nicotine in a much less hazardous and more affordable way, according to experts [...]
“We have the ability to use business and create regulatory incentives to change the [tobacco] market. We have tremendous opportunity to do really amazing things,” David Sweanor, an adjunct professor of law at the University of Ottawa, says [...]
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- Category: September 2019
How do you convince yourself to quit smoking when doing it makes you feel really good? This is the dilemma of every smoker who understands that at one point in their lives, they will have to give up smoking for the vice could kill them sooner than they wish. But how does one quit smoking? An alternative to smoking may be a solution, but is vaping really a healthier alternative?
Vaping is much like traditional smoking, however, it comes with special devices like the vape and the vape juice. [...]
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- Category: September 2019
Despite medical cannabis now being legal on the NHS, a limited number of prescriptions have been granted since the law change and some parents are having to pay thousands for import licences and private prescriptions. An NHS England review has blamed the lack of prescriptions on concerns about both the potential harm to mental health and effectiveness of medical cannabis. It said more clinical trials need to be carried out and a "UK-wide paediatric specialist clinical network" should be created to help “very cautious” doctors, by providing expert advice on complex cases. The "forward-looking and positive review" was welcomed by the Medical Cannabis Clinicians Society (MCCC), whose executive director Hannah Deacon spoke to ITV News about the issue. Her eight-year-old son Alfie Dingley, who suffers from severe epilepsy, was the first of a handful of patients in the UK to receive an NHS prescription for medical cannabis, despite rule changes last year allowing doctors to prescribe it.
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- Category: September 2019
The tobacco giant Philip Morris has denied it's promoting vaping and e-cigarettes to youth, after being told on TVNZ1's Q+A programme that high school students are vaping.
There's concern not only about the unknown long-term health effects, but also that promoting vaping will entice a new generation of young people into addiction.
New Zealand communications manager for Philip Morris International, Peata Melbourne, told Q+A less than one per cent of young people who are non-smokers are taking up e-cigarette products.
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- Category: September 2019
Since July, a cluster of 15 cases of severe lung problems requiring hospitalization has emerged in the Midwest. All patients were teens or young adults, and all reported recent vaping. As of today, the Wisconsin Department of Health Services (WDHS), in Madison, said it was studying 12 confirmed respiratory cases, and 13 more are under investigation. So far, the affected counties are Dodge, Door, Racine, Walworth, Waukesha, and Winnebago. Patients experienced a plethora of symptoms, the agency reports, including shortness of breath, fatigue, chest pain, cough, anorexia, nausea, diarrhea, and weight loss, with symptoms worsening over days or weeks before requiring admission to hospital. Physicians aren't sure what's causing the severe symptoms but point to a combination of patient age and contents in the e-cigarette vapor as potential factors.
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- Category: September 2019
In an article published [...] in the Boston Herald, a Boston pulmonologist attributed the growing number of cases of severe, acute respiratory disease to "vaping" in general, giving the impression that the risk factor for these illnesses is any type of e-cigarette use [...] As an trained epidemiologist, it was immediately clear to me that these cases are not being caused by vaping products generally because these products have been on the market for years without any significant problems and because the reports are clustered in specific geographic areas.
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- Category: September 2019
Head and neck cancer is the sixth most common cancer in the world. The vast majority of cases are head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC), a type of cancer that arises in the outer layer of the skin and mucous membranes of the mouth, nose and throat. Cigarette smoking is a major risk factor for developing the disease and reduces treatment effectiveness. Now Thomas Jefferson University researchers studying the effects of cigarette smoke on tumor progression show that cigarette smoke reprograms the cells surrounding the cancer cells, and helps drive HNSCC aggressiveness. The results were published online in the journal Molecular Cancer Research.