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- Category: April 2022
To mark National No Smoking Day in March, insurance comparison site Quotezone examined a sample of 5,000 life insurance policies to gauge the prevalence of smoking. Smokers must disclose the habit when applying for life insurance cover.
Quotezone found that the number of non-smokers fell by nearly 10% between the first and second half of 2021. But the increase in smoking between the beginning and end of 2021 isn’t simply because people who gave up smoking for a New Year’s resolution fell back into the habit. The number of non-smokers previously increased across both 2019 (by 20%) and 2020 (by 8%).
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- Category: April 2022
Brazil’s national drug agency, Anvisa, has opened a consultation on e-cigarettes, reports Portal Rondonia. The agency is seeking technical and scientific information to help it craft regulations for the product category.
The import, sale and advertising of e-cigarettes is banned in Brazil, but the products are said to be widely available anyway.
Brazil’s Pulmonology Society has already expressed its opposition to e-cigarettes, claiming they are a threat to public health.
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- Category: April 2022
The State Budget for 2022 (OE2022) has updated the Tax on Alcohol, Alcoholic Beverages and Sugar-Added Beverages (IABA) by 1%, with total revenue expected to amount to €286.8 million.
An identical rise of 1% will also target the Tobacco Tax (IT) rate, according to the report accompanying the OE2022 proposal.
“Regarding Special Consumption Taxes, the tax rates will be updated by 1% for IT and IABA”, says the document, noting that, “taking into account the expected evolution for private consumption and the internal demand”, an increase in revenue is expected in 2022, compared to 2021, of 20 million euros in IT (+1%) and 29 million euros in IABA (+11%).
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- Category: April 2022
Vaping or e-cigarettes are a gateway to traditional smokes, according to new Australian research.
A team at the Australian National University reviewed the results of close to 200 studies. It concluded non-smokers who vape are three times as likely to take up regular smokes than those who do not.But lead researcher Professor Emily Banks said bottom line, vapes are harmful.
“We reviewed the global evidence about e-cigarettes and the bottom line is that they're harmful for non-smokers and particularly for young people.
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- Category: April 2022
Long-term cannabis use is linked to hippocampal atrophy and poorer cognitive function in midlife — known risk factors for dementia.
A large prospective, longitudinal study showed long-term cannabis users had an intelligence quotient (IQ) decline from age 18 to midlife (mean 5.5 IQ points), poorer learning and processing speed compared to childhood, and self-reported memory and attention problems. Long-term cannabis users also showed hippocampal atrophy at midlife (age 45), which combined with mild midlife cognitive deficits, all known risk factors for dementia.
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- Category: April 2022
The media hype over the just-released report on vaping by the Australian National University’s National Centre for Epidemiology and Public Health (NCEPH), is yet more hysterical shroud waving by those in the public health establishment. The report was commissioned by outgoing Minister for Health, Greg Hunt who, with the stridently vocal encouragement of Australian public health poohbahs, has cracked down on nicotine vaping, making it prescription-only rather than a retail product. To be fair, Hunt is convinced he’s done right, but he has been fed one-sided advice from bureaucrats, public health activists, and the medical lobby, [...]
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- Category: April 2022
The Parliamentary Special Select Committee (PSSC) on Health, Science and Innovation, which has begun a series of proceedings to review and scrutinise the Tobacco and Smoking Control Bill, must also allow local vape industry players to give their views on the Bill.
In a statement today, Malaysia Retail Electronic Cigarette Association (MRECA) said that the PSSC should allow local vape bodies and players, including MRECA, to give their views on the Bill.
MRECA president Datuk Adzwan Ab Manas said that while the industry welcomes the government's move to introduce vape products, more detailed discussions are needed on the regulations for vape products [...]
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- Category: April 2022
More than nine in ten users of e-cigarettes in Ireland would not favour an outright ban on flavoured vapes, a new survey has found.
The research, conducted by Red C, a market researcher in Dublin, was carried out through 221 face-to-face surveys last month. The survey found that nearly half of vapers would stop vaping altogether if a flavour ban was introduced. It’s believed more than 200,000 people are vape users in Ireland. About 84 per cent of vapers believe a flavours ban would create a black market for the products, while a majority — 59 per cent — said they would source the products abroad or online. [...]
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- Category: April 2022
New legislation enacted on March 15External Link Disclaimer makes clear that FDA can regulate tobacco products containing nicotine from any source. This law takes effect April 14, 2022.
As of April 14, 2022, manufacturers, distributors, importers and retailers of tobacco products containing non-tobacco nicotine (NTN)—that is, nicotine not made or derived from tobacco, such as synthetic nicotine—must ensure compliance with applicable requirements under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD&C Act) resulting from this law, such as:
Not selling these products to persons under 21 years of age (both in-person and online); [...]
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- Category: April 2022
On April 8, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) sent marketing denial orders (MDOs) to Fontem Ventures for some of its myblu vaping products. It’s the first MDO issued for a pod-based vapor product made by a major tobacco company.
The denied products include Fontem’s myblu device kit, as well as its Tobacco Chill, Intense Tobacco and Gold Leaf flavored cartridges. Fontem is owned by Imperial Brands, one of the largest tobacco companies in the world. “Without more information, it is hard to guess what exactly led to the FDA’s decisions,” Greg Conley, the president of the American Vaping Association, told Filter. [...]
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- Category: April 2022
Pretty much every vaper must have seen a warning against vaping when pregnant. Some e-liquids and many device packages have a specific warning symbol for it. Many of them have wording to say not to vape if you are pregnant. Even Totally Wicked packaging recommends that you consult your doctor before vaping when pregnant. So vaping when you are expecting a baby is bad, right? Well actually, no, in many cases it can be an incredibly good thing. If you might be smoking instead, vaping is a much better choice. An expectant mother smoking just an occasional cigarette is a risk for their unborn child. Vaping instead dramatically reduces that risk.
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What is Tobacco Harm Reduction? Why do we need it and what are the common myths? Is it safe and does it work? This 30-minute presentation was made to the Harm Reduction Forum in Canada, 5 April 2022
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- Category: April 2022
On April 13, Chicago convenience stores began selling the first very low nicotine cigarettes to be authorized by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as modified risk tobacco products (MRTPs).
The MRTP designation granted last December allows 22nd Century Group, which makes the VLN King and VLN Menthol cigarettes, to publish explicit marketing claims about their products. The company can state that each product contains “95 percent less nicotine,” “helps reduce your nicotine consumption” and “greatly reduces your nicotine.”
They are not, however, “FDA approved” or considered “safe.”
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- Category: April 2022
David Sweanor has played a global role in steering the World Health Organization, governments and nongovernmental organizations to use the most powerful interventions they have to end smoking. His focus on policy measures to reduce the carnage from cigarette smoking, including a leading role on excise taxes, marketing restrictions and smoke-free policies, has long included tobacco harm reduction (THR). And in the process, Sweanor has highlighted the need to move from blunt approaches to all tobacco products to a system that regulates products proportionate to their risk. In a recent conversation, Sweanor discussed the origins of innovation in THR.
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WASHINGTON —
U.S. regulators will soon begin cracking down on vaping companies that are taking advantage of a now-closed loophole, including the maker of a line of fruit-flavored e-cigarettes that have become teenagers’ top choice.
Under a law taking effect Thursday, the Food and Drug Administration can regulate e-cigarettes and similar products that use synthetic nicotine.
The action targets Puff Bar and several other vaping companies that recently switched their formulas to laboratory-made nicotine to skirt FDA oversight.
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- Category: April 2022
“Tobacco use is the single most preventable cause of disease, disability, and death in the United States” according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Smoking kills more people than alcohol, AIDS, car crashes, illegal drugs, murders and suicides combined.
Cigarettes, cigars, and vapes have been marketed to youth, with flavor options such as cotton candy, cupcake, and tutti-frutti. The 2009 Tobacco Control Act was effective in banning most fruit- and mint-flavored nicotine vaping products in an effort to reduce teen use, but did not include menthol on its list.
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- Category: April 2022
It’s been a decade since we first wrote a comprehensive post on the safety of vaping.
Back then, vaping didn’t have the support of the UK government, the huge body of evidence and the longer-term studies it now has.
Still, even then we knew that:
- Nicotine is not the cause of smoking diseases.
- Vaping doesn’t produce smoke.
- Vapour from vape devices provided a fraction of the toxins and chemicals found in cigarette smoke.
It led David Sweanor, an expert (and former WHO tobacco control medal award winner) to state:
If there is anyone who believes cigarettes are no more hazardous than e-cigarettes I’d recommend a remedial course in basic sciences.
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- Category: April 2022
Anew law is set to take effect this month that will see some vaping products that use synthetic nicotine pulled from the shelves if they fail to receive authorization from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The spending bill amended the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA) to define a tobacco product as "any product made or derived from tobacco, or containing nicotine from any source, that is intended for human consumption." This change is not a ban on vaping or vaping products generally but it could have major consequences for producers and consumers of e-cigarettes and potentially see popular products withdrawn.
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The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently issued "marketing denial orders" (MDOs) for the myblu vaping device and several of its tobacco-flavored proprietary pods. The decision, which the FDA announced last Friday, affects one of the leading e-cigarette brands and does not bode well for smokers who have switched to vaping or might be interested in doing so. [...] The FDA seems determined to ban nearly every vaping product currently available in the United States. [...]
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- Category: April 2022
It isn’t easy for vapers to secure access and choice to safer nicotine products. It’s enough already dealing with junk science, anti-vaping hysteria, and the constant pummelling by public health prohibitionists and federal regulators.
But now, vapers face a new, more sinister reality. [...] Joining us today to discuss the dawn of a new prohibition era is Jacob Grier, author of the 2019 book “The Rediscovery of Tobacco: Smoking, Vaping, and the Creative Destruction of the Cigarette” [...]