Concluding a five-day conference on key health issues for Asia World Health Organisation officials called smoking a "deadly epidemic" and called for an all-out-war against tobacco use in Asia.
Shigeru Omi, WHO's regional director for the Western Pacific, told the conference on South Korea's Jeju Island that a few member states have met the requirements of the agency's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control and that others are making good progress in implementing the convention's provisions.
"No country will be alone when facing the tobacco industry to protect the continued spread of this deadly epidemic, there is strength in numbers" Omi said.
He repeated that the region has one-third of the world's smokers, the highest percentage of male smokers and the fastest increase of smoking among children and young women.
WHO statistics estimate that each day 3,000 people die as a result of smoking.
Tobacco control was one of the central topics at the 58th meeting of the WHO Regional Committee for the Western Pacific, which includes China, Malaysia, the Philippines and other countries as well as large areas of Oceania.
"The region will continue to aggressively promote evidence-based strategies such as tax and price measures, the expansion of smokefree policies, comprehensive bans on advertising and promotion, and stronger health warnings on tobacco products," Omi said Friday.
Source: ASH daily news (www.ash.org.uk)

Smokers, already pushed outside in New York, may be getting more grief than usual for lighting up in public places thanks to a new ad campaign designed to discourage smoking around children.
The state's $5 million campaign, one more push for champions of the anti-smoking movement, came at the same time a report by the U.S. Surgeon General indicates infants and young children are especially vulnerable to secondhand smoke. One print ad warns "when you smoke around your kids, they smoke too. By the age of 5 they'll have inhaled over 100 packs."

Sources: www.tobacco.org and AP
Date: 2007-09-23
Author: VALERIE BAUMAN Associated Press Writer, 997-2005
URL: http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/newyork/ny-bc-ny--secondhandsmoke0923sep23,0,6587147.story

Since smoking in public was banned in Scotland, heart attacks have dropped by 17%, which is more evidence of passive smoking's impact, researchers say

The Scots are notorious for their chronically low life expectancy. Many drink and smoke too much and their diet often leaves something to be desired -- and so they tend to die a few years before the average European. In Glasgow, for example, the average man does not need to worry about what he will do on his 71st birthday. . . .

Now the Scots and the rest of the world are marvelling at 551 heart attacks that never happened -- simply because of cleaner air. How can pollutants with a relatively low concentration, inhaled during the occasional visit to the pub, have such a dramatic effect?

Many people in the United Kingdom have reacted incredulously to the surprising results, which make smoking bans appear to be the best and cheapest health measure since the invention of recreational sports. Some speculated that perhaps it was all to do with the weather, while the London Times recommended "healthy skepticism" in the face of the results.

But for medical experts, the Scottish study is actually not that surprising. There are already several studies from other countries which have yielded very similar results:

Sources: www.tobacco.org and Business Week
Date: 2007-09-21
Author: Marco Evers
URL: http://www.businessweek.com/globalbiz/content/sep2007/gb20070921_491568.htm?chan=globalbiz_europe%20index%20page_top%20stories

A Liverpool anti-tobacco youth group warned that the latest measures to stop young people buying tobacco did not go far enough.
New legislation which has come into force makes it illegal to sell tobacco to anyone in England and Wales under the age of 18.
But D-MYST (Direct Movement by the Youth SmokeFree Team), the SmokeFree Liverpool youth group, stressed that, although this was a positive step towards reducing the number of young people who smoke, other measures are still needed to tackle the problem.
D-MYST member Ailene Whitehead, 16, said: This increase in the age limit is great and it will hopefully stop cigarettes being available so easily to young people.
But we know that there are other things like smoking in the media which influence young people to start smoking or continue, which are still a problem.
This is why our Toxic Movies campaign, which aims to remove smoking and tobacco from films, is so important, to further reduce the amount of young people who smoke.
Public Health Minister Dawn Primarolo said: We are determined to reduce the number of young people who smoke.
Raising the legal age of sale to 18 will make it easier for retailers to spot under-age smokers and lead to less young people becoming addicted to nicotine and continuing to smoke into adulthood. Research shows that, the younger people start, the more likely they are to become life-long smokers and die early."
This change in law highlights our commitment to protect our children and will potentially save thousands of lives and others will be spared the misery of watching family and friends die prematurely from smoking related illnesses.
The Chief Medical Officer, Sir Liam Donaldson, said: I welcome the raising of the legal age for buying tobacco to 18 years. This will result in fewer young people becoming addicted to nicotine, which could ultimately result in early death from cancer and other smoking-related illnesses."

Sources: IC Liverpool, 01 October 2007 and ASH daily news (www.ash.org.uk)
Link: http://tinyurl.com/2csf8xpy

Research question: Can bupropion help primary care patients quit smoking?
Answer Yes. It doubles the odds of continuous abstinence for one year compared with placebo. . . .

What does it mean? This trial tested the effects of bupropion in an unselected population of smokers who were treated entirely by general practitioners. The findings suggest that this established treatment works well in primary care, doubling the odds of continued abstinence for almost a year. Lots of people failed to complete their treatment, but that's typical of smoking cessation trials, say the authors. The chances of giving up were still high compared with other trials in more specialised settings. This trial was managed, monitored, analysed, and interpreted independently of bupropion's manufacturers (GlaxoSmithKline), which paid for a pilot study, the drugs, the placebo, and the carbon monoxide monitors.

Sources: British Medical Journal and www.tobacco.org
Date: 2007-09-29
URL:
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/335/7621/662?maxtoshow=&HITS=10&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=&fulltext=smoking&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&sortspec=date&resourcetype=HWCIT

Quit Victoria says that the ban on smoking in bars is helping smokers give up.
The anti-smoking body's executive director Fiona Sharkie said that in the three months since the July 1 smoking bans, weekend calls to the Victorian Quitline had increased by almost 20 per cent, compared to the three months before the bans.
Ms Sharkie said bars and clubs no longer provided an encouragement and endorsement for smoking more cigarettes.
"In the past, many smokers would not have considered giving up smoking over weekends as they would be spending time in licensed venues where, traditionally, smoking has had social approval," she said.
"Now, with the introduction of indoor smoking bans in bars and clubs, many smokers are viewing the weekend and socialising in these venues as an opportunity to try and kick the habit in a more supportive environment.
"Although much progress has been made in tobacco control in Australia, there is still much work to be done, especially as we are dealing with a tobacco industry adept at using below the line tactics to target new generations of potential smokers."
Sources: The Herald Sun, 02 October 2007 and ASH daily news www.ash.org.uk
Link: http://tinyurl.com/2c8hxq

A new study has found that chronic nicotine use recruits a major brain stress system, which contributes to continued tobacco use by exacerbating anxiety and craving upon withdrawal. The researchers found that administering a compound that blocked the receptors involved in this stress system alleviated withdrawal symptoms.

Olivier George a research associate in the Scripps Research Koob lab said: "We reduced the need to take nicotine by blocking CRF-1 receptors in the brain. We were surprised by the compound's dramatic effectiveness. We don't know yet if the same mechanism is involved in humans with tobacco dependence, but it is very promising."

Tobacco addiction is the leading avoidable cause of disease and premature death in the United States, responsible for more than 438,000 deaths annually, according to the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention. Nicotine, the main psychoactive ingredient in tobacco, is a tough drug, with smokers continuing to crave it long after they've started withdrawal. Most smoking cessation medication is based on nicotine replacement therapy, using nicotine gum or patches, that substitutes one source of nicotine for another.

While nicotine can produce mildly pleasurable effects, the Scripps Research scientists believe a more important factor in the difficulty in quitting is the brain's adaptation to that reward, which produces an intense discomfort upon withdrawal.

"The key in nicotine addiction is that the positive pleasurable effects of nicotine are instantaneous and short lasting, while the negative effects are delayed and long lasting. Even if nicotine may transiently induce a relief from a negative emotional state, its long term consequences are disastrous." George says.
For years, scientists have wanted to know what changes in the brain occur in the transition from nicotine use to nicotine dependence.

In the current study, the researchers set out to see if nicotine dependence is linked to changes in the CRF system in the amygdala, an area of the brain that plays a primary role in the processing and memory of emotional reactions.

When the researchers induced nicotine withdrawal in rats, the nicotine-deprived group exhibited severe anxiety like behavioural symptoms of withdrawal, such as burying and freezing. In addition, withdrawal whetted the rats' appetite for even greater quantities of the drug, a result the researchers call the "nicotine deprivation effect."

"Rats exhibited drug loading behaviour following a cycle of abstinence, attaining an amount of nicotine in roughly six hours that previously took 12 hours. This is like a light smoker becoming a chain smoker after trying to give up." George says.

Measurements showed this behaviour was indeed matched by hyperactivity in the CRF system, and that these withdrawal effects lasted a surprisingly long time. In addicted rats, these effects developed in under a week and maintained a hold for at least two months.

"That's a long time for a rat, considering its life expectancy is two years," says George. "These results suggest long lasting neuroadaptations of the CRF system, possibly through gene regulation, which may explain why many cigarette smokers relapse even after a long abstinence from smoking."

The Scripps Research scientists hope their work sheds light on questions such as what makes some people more likely than others to become addicted in the first place.

The research is being published the week of October 1, 2007, in an advance, online issue of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS)

Source: ASH DCaily News and Science Daily, 02 October 2007
Link: http://tinyurl.com/347k7o

Smokers should be treated the same as heroin addicts and offered tobacco substitutes that deliver the same hit of nicotine without the harm, doctors say today.

The number of people smoking is declining by only 0.4 per cent a year and a new approach is needed to protect those who continue to smoke from the lethal effects of their habit.

Half of all smokers will die prematurely if they do not give up, 150 million of them worldwide in the next 20 years. . . .

The Royal College of Physicians today calls for a middle way in the approach to smoking, based on "harm reduction," which it says holds real potential for saving lives. By getting smokers to switch to safer forms of nicotine, they would avoid the damaging effects of the burning tobacco that delivers the drug.

Sources: www.tobaco.org and The Independent (uk)
Date: 2007-10-05
Author: Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor
URL: http://news.independent.co.uk/health/article3028740.ece

The Swiss parliament has agreed in principle to a nationwide ban on smoking in the workplace and public indoor areas, with exceptions for bars and restaurants. The House of Representatives (conseil national) on Thursday agreed to the measure, although no timetable has been set for implementing a law. Lawmakers agreed that designated smoking areas, or fumoirs, would be permitted in designated areas that are isolated and equipped with proper ventilation.

In the case of bars and restaurants, operators of these establishments will be required to apply for authorization if they want smoking permitted everywhere.

Sources: www.tobacco.org and Tribune de Genève (ch)
Date: 2007-10-05
URL:
http://www.tdg.ch/pages/home/tribune_de_geneve/english_corner/news/news_detail/(contenu)/141470

Under a new scheme launched last week to combat tobacco smuggling and counterfeiting, every cigarette packet sold in Britain will now contain a microchip.

Since October 1, radio frequency (RFID) tags have been embedded in each packet of cigarettes produced for sale in Britain. The technology will allow HM Revenue & Customs officials to use hand held electronic devices to determine whether an individual cigarette packet is bootleg or genuine and whether or not duty has been paid on it.

The scheme provides an instant authentication method, said a spokesman for the Tobacco Manufacturers' Association (TMA), which is helping to direct the project with the Government. He added that it would end the existing expensive and lengthy process of sending suspect cigarette packs to a laboratory in order to determine their authenticity.

The TMA said that in 2006, almost two billion counterfeit cigarettes were consumed in the UK, nearly 3 per cent of the 67.5 billion total. The illegal trade in cigarettes is blamed for 3.5 billion in lost British tax revenues per year.

The TMA said that counterfeiters, many of whom are based in China, have started to use increasingly sophisticated methods both to dodge customs agents and also to market their products.

For example, health warnings on counterfeit packs are deliberately printed in Polish and other Eastern European languages to fool UK buyers into thinking that they are buying smuggled tobacco, rather than counterfeit goods.

Most of the cost of the anti counterfeiting scheme is being met by Britain's four main cigarette manufacturers: British American Tobacco, Philip Morris, Imperial Tobacco, and Gallaher.

The estimated cost of implementing the scheme is expected initially to be as high as 10p a packet, although it will fall rapidly as the technology enters mass production.

The Government agreed to back the scheme this year.
Customs officers will be unable to start to use the technology until some time next year, when old stocks of cigarettes without the RFID technology have passed through the supply chain.

Source: ASH daily news (www.ash.org.uk) and The Times, 08 October 2007
Link: http://tinyurl.com/yptz4k

Hospitality workers across the country are already experiencing health benefits following the 1 July smoking ban, a study has suggested.

Research by the Tobacco Control Collaborating Centre in Warwick reported that before the ban, the average hospitality employee's exposure to second-hand smoke was the equivalent to smoking 190 cigarettes a year. However, the study of 40 bars, pubs and restaurants in August revealed today that employees' exposure to second-hand smoke has since dropped by 95 per cent.

Now that smoking is allowed only in specified outdoor areas of pubs, restaurants and hotels, the study asserts that employees are now exposed to the second-hand smoke of only 44 cigarettes a year.

Researchers tested the air quality of pubs and restaurants and measured the level of cotinine, the metabolic byproduct of nicotine, in non-smoking workers' blood. They found that the air quality dropped from near hazardous levels to ones similar to outside air and staff now have four times less cotinine in their blood than in June.

Sources: ASH daily news (www.ash.org.uk) and People Management Online, 8th October 2007
Link: http://tinyurl.com/39aw83

Persons with multiple sclerosis who smoke risk increasing the amount of brain tissue shrinkage, a consequence of MS, and the subsequent severity of their disease, new research conducted at the Buffalo Neuroimaging Analysis Center (BNAC) at the University at Buffalo has shown.

The results are based on magnetic resonance images (MRIs) of smokers and nonsmokers in 368 MS patients treated in UB's Jacobs Neurological Institute, the university's Department of Neurology in its School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences.

Results of the research were presented today (Oct. 13, 2007) at the 23rd Congress of the European Committee for the Treatment and Research in Multiple Sclerosis in Prague, Czech Republic.

"Cigarette smoke has many properties that are toxic to the central nervous system, and cigarette smoking has been linked to higher susceptibility and risk of progressive multiple sclerosis," said Robert Zivadinov, M.D., Ph.D., UB professor of neurology, director of the BNAC and first author on the study.

Sources: www.tobacco.org and University of Buffalo
Date: 2007-10-13
Author: Topic Area, ljbaker@buffalo.edu, 716-645-5000
URL: http://www.buffalo.edu/news/8885

Heavily addicted smokers do not get enough support to help them quit, warns a UK report published last week. It calls for better access to nicotine replacement treatment as part of a harm reduction strategy.

It proposes that a new nicotine regulatory authority be established to oversee all aspects of regulation of nicotine products and to coordinate efforts to end the advantage that cigarettes currently have in the marketplace over alternative products such as gums and patches.

The report, published by the Royal College of Physicians, argues that smokers smoke mainly for the effects of nicotine, that nicotine itself is not especially hazardous, and that providing nicotine in an acceptable and effective form such as cigarette substitutes could save millions of lives.

Sources: www.tobacco.org and British Medical Journal
Date: 2007-10-12
Author: Susan Mayor
URL: http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/extract/335/7623/742-a

Most Americans say employers shouldn't have the right to require employees to attend smoking cessation or weight-loss programs, a new poll shows.
The Wall Street Journal Online/Harris Interactive poll was conducted as companies are adopting wellness policies and instituting programs involving health-risk assessments and fitness coaches with an aim to keep health-care costs in line. Some companies have taken a tougher stand, for instance, threatening to fire employees who are overweight.
Sixty-five percent of respondents believe employers shouldn't have the right to require employees to attend smoking cessation programs or to fire an employee who is unwilling to quit smoking, according to the survey.

Sources: www.tobacco.org and The Wall Street Journal Interactive Edition
Date: 2007-10-17
Author: BECKEY BRIGHT, beckey.bright@wsj.com
URL: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119254884726660648.html

Subtitle: Healthy Life
Source: www.tobacco.org and ABC News
Date: 2007-10-17
URL: http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=3736200&affil=wftv