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- Category: October 2021
If there is something that every smoker confesses to, it is the desire to quit. However, many will add that they easily relapse as their body craves the deprived nicotine when they put the cigarettes down.
For many nicotine addicts, cigarettes are the main source despite the harmful effects that come from combusted tobacco. The general policy approach has been to push smokers to quit by putting in place various public health restrictions.
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- Category: October 2021
A PACKET OF cigarettes will now cost an extra 50 cent. The increase was announced this afternoon as part of Budget 2022.
This is the sixth year in a row the excise duty on a packet of 20 cigarettes has been increased by that amount.
Smokers can now expect to pay €15 for a packet in the most popular price category. Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe described the increase as a way of supporting Ireland’s public health policy to reduce smoking in society.
There will be a pro-rata increase on other tobacco products.
The increase is expected to be worth €56 million to the exchequer.
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- Category: October 2021
Joining us today to unpack the big news in vaping over the past few weeks, including the FDA’s decision to grant its first marketing authorization for a nicotine vaping product, is Charles Gardner, Executive Director of INNCO and one of the most incisive voices in the world of tobacco harm reduction.
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- Category: October 2021
The Canadian government recently consulted on its proposals for regulating—read:banning—flavors used in vaping products. Its supposed justifications include a perceived increase in youth vaping exposing young people to harm, and the notion that vaping is a “gateway” into cigarette smoking.
Both concerns are flawed to say the least, as is Health Canada’s claim that banning all flavors except tobacco and menthol is any kind of solution. According to Statistics Canada, teen smoking has been falling more rapidly than in previous years and is now at a record low. [...]
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- Category: October 2021
On Aug. 26, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) lowered the hammer on approximately 35,000 flavored e-cigarette items by issuing marketing denial orders (MDOs). The ruling prohibits interstate commerce for these products, resulting in convenience stores, vape shops and tobacco retailers immediately pulling them from store shelves.
One week later, the FDA released approximately 300,000 more MDOs on flavored vape and e-cigarette products. Then, on the court-mandated deadline of Sept. 9, the FDA stated it had taken action on approximately 93% of the more than 6.5 million pre-market tobacco applications (PMTAs) accepted, [...]
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- Category: October 2021
“The brave call by a Thai Government Minister for Thailand to overturn its harsh ban on the sale of vape products has received applause and accolades from around the world,” says Nancy Loucas, [...] Her comments follow Thailand’s Digital Economy and Society Minister, Chaiwut Thanakamanusorn, telling local media that vaping is safer for people trying to quit smoking. What’s more, he is now looking at ways vaping could be legalised in order to offer a less harmful alternative to smoking regular cigarettes.
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- Category: October 2021
Smoking is not only the most common form of tobacco use but one of the leading preventable risk factors for premature mortality worldwide – killing more than eight million people a year, including non-smokers exposed to second-hand smoke.
According to Dr Arifin Fii, a medical practitioner with experience in addiction therapy, Malaysia needs to look for innovative solutions to manage smoking prevalence in the country.
“Official statistics indicate there is little evidence showing that existing tobacco control strategies are working, as most smokers have a low desire to quit.
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- Category: October 2021
The Food and Drug Administration for the first time on Tuesday authorized an electronic cigarette to be sold in the United States, a significant turn in one of the most contentious public health debates in decades.
In greenlighting a device and tobacco-flavored cartridges marketed by R.J. Reynolds under the brand name Vuse, the agency signaled that it believed that the help certain vaping devices offer smokers to quit traditional cigarettes is more significant than the risks of ensnaring a new generation.
“The authorized products’ aerosols are significantly less toxic than combusted cigarettes based on available data,” the F.D.A. said in a statement announcing the decision.
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- Category: October 2021
The Food and Drug Administration’s decision this week to authorize the sale of an electronic cigarette was a landmark for the vaping industry — but it may only deepen confusion about the sector’s future.
More than a month after a court-ordered deadline to determine which e-cigs could stay on the market, FDA has yet to act on applications from some of the industry’s biggest players, including Juul. And while the agency has denied or rejected as incomplete millions of marketing applications from small and mid-sized manufacturers, it has not said whether any type of vape flavors are acceptable. [...]
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- Category: October 2021
To better understand the various influences of COVID-19 on tobacco use, we examined three different tobacco user groups using qualitative methods. Exclusive smokers reported smoking more frequently, driven by COVID-19-related stress, time at home, and boredom. They were not motivated to quit during the pandemic, and some considered smoking to be protective against COVID-19. ENDS users reported vaping less, with dual users often increasing their smoking; many were concerned about health effects of smoking and ENDS use during the pandemic. [...]
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- Category: October 2021
On October 12, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) authorized the first-ever vaping product to legally be sold in the United States.
The FDA determined that the Vuse Solo, along with two “tobacco”-flavored e-liquid cartridges, were “appropriate for the protection of public health”—meaning the agency believed that the products were more likely to help adult smokers switch to a safer alternative than to introduce a new generation to nicotine. The decision is historic, but leaves advocates on both sides of the raging vaping debate dissatisfied.
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- Category: October 2021
Combination therapies, particularly varenicline and nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) combined, are the most effective tobacco cessation pharmacotherapies, the largest review to examine the effectiveness and safety of electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes) and medicines that people use to quit tobacco has found. Varenicline, bupropion, and NRT are recommended as first line treatments to stop smoking by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE). E-cigarettes can be used as aids to quit smoking, but currently there are no medically licensed e-cigarettes in the UK. [...]
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- Category: October 2021
The study titled, “Knowledge and Attitudes Among Medical Students Toward the Clinical Usage of e-Cigarettes: A Cross-Sectional Study in a University Hospital in Saudi Arabia,” aimed to measure the likelihood of study participants’ favouring the use of e-cigarettes for smoking cessation. A total of 399 students filled a four-item questionnaire.
The compiled responses indicated that a minority approved of e-cigarette use for smoking cessation. “A minority (13.5%) believed that e-cigarettes are FDA-approved for smoking cessation, while approximately one-third believed e-smoking lowers cancer risks (31.1%) and could help with smoking cessation (31.1%).”
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- Category: October 2021
From October 1, it’s been illegal to buy e-liquids containing nicotine without a prescription from a doctor everywhere in Australia, except South Australia. I co-led a research team that wanted to find out what’s in the nicotine free e-liquids that vapers inhale, and their potential health effects.
Our study, published this week in The Medical Journal of Australia, found most e-liquids contained chemicals known to cause respiratory issues and lung damage when inhaled. Most contained ingredients that have since been banned by Australia’s drug regulator, the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA).
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- Category: October 2021
A packet of cigarettes in Belgium will soon become 25 cents more expensive as a result of increased tax duties on tobacco.
As part of the government’s budget agreement, announced on Tuesday by Prime Minister Alexander De Croo (Open Vld), the cost of cigarettes will be increased, of which the proceeds will go towards reducing the financial burden on the middle class, by gradually phasing out the special social security contribution among other things.
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- Category: October 2021
E-cigarettes, or vapes, first began to soar to popularity in the late 2000s, because people believed they were a healthier alternative to cigarettes. Since then, vaping has become a global phenomenon, and in the schools of Northern England the craze is at large. Recent data (uncovered after enquiries by The Bureau of Investigative Journalism) showed a serious North-South divide around underage vaping in England. The data revealed that more than a fifth of teenagers aged 15 in Yorkshire and the Humber were underage vaping, which made them three times more likely to do so than the equivalent age group in London. [...]
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- Category: October 2021
Cigarette smoking is one of the leading causes of preventable morbidity and mortality globally, and it is accountable for many causes of premature deaths. Despite the negative consequences of cigarette smoking, studies to identify factors associated with cigarette smoking are scanty and little is known about this practice in the Somali region so far, so this study aimed to assess the prevalence of cigarette smoking and associated factors among adolescents in the Gode, eastern Ethiopia 2020.
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- Category: October 2021
A friend of mine has spent much of the lockdown at home with his parents.
He’s an ex-smoker, now avaper. His parents are not massive fans of vaping – although they’re pleased he’s vaping instead of smoking – so he leaves the house to vape.
He combines his vape with a walk, and has found a pleasant place under a shady tree to enjoy his vape.
Unfortunately, not everyone appreciates that. A runner who goes past the same spot where my friend vapes hates the habit. It’s got to the state where my friend receives a daily torrent of rage and abuse for using the device which is keeping him off smoking.
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- Category: October 2021
Smoking may have been a human habit for far longer than previously imagined. In a new study, published in Nature Human Behaviour on Monday, archaeologists said they've found evidence that people have been ingesting tobacco as long as 12,300 years ago—a whopping 9,000 years earlier than scientists had thought.
Primarily known today as the stuff that comes inside cigarettes, tobacco is derived from plants in the genus Nicotiana, a member of the nightshade family [...] Native to North and South America, the plant was domesticated by indigenous communities thousands of years ago and often used in religious, medicinal, and ceremonial contexts. [...]
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- Category: October 2021
Local news media outlets indicate that the city council for San Jose, Calif., has opted to ban the sale of flavored tobacco products within city limits. Such a ban covers flavored vaping products regardless of their FDA approval status and the flavors of menthol and mint characterized combustible cigarettes.
This means that San Jose is the largest city in California and the entire United States to adopt a prohibition on flavored tobacco.
“I think it’s an important first step to making sure we keep these very dangerous, very addictive products not only out of the hands of our children but really off of their radar,” said Magdalena Carrasco, [...]