February 11th, 2011
Some E-Cig Smokers Say Devices Helped Them Quit Smoking Cigarettes
Feb. 8, 2011 — Can puffing electronic cigarettes help smokers quit smoking?
It sounds wrong. E-cigarettes should be banned, says a long list of prestigious anti-tobacco groups including the American Cancer Society and the American Lung Association. But a federal court has stymied FDA efforts to keep them off the U.S. market.
Meanwhile, more and more Americans are buying e-cigarettes. And many of them say they’ve used the nicotine vaporizers to quit smoking real cigarettes, according to a new survey by Michael B. Siegel, MD, MPH, of Boston University School of Public Health.
February 8th, 2011
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tony-newman/will-cigarettes-be-illega_b_811241.html
Will cigarettes be illegal in the future? The battle over cigarettes is heating up — and recent news shows that momentum to criminalize tobacco smoking continues to build in the U.S. and around the world.
Last week The New York Times reported on the Himalayan Kingdom of Bhutan’s war on cigarette smokers. Back in 2005 Bhutan banned the sale of tobacco but made little headway as smugglers brought in cigarettes from India. Now the country is enforcing the ban by allowing authorities to break down doors looking for illegal cigarettes. People who sell illegal cigarettes are now facing five year sentences. Breaking down doors and long sentences over the tobacco plant! Sounds familiar? If it does, it’s because that’s how the U.S. deals with the marijuana and coca plants.
February 5th, 2011
Kids can’t smoke regular cigarettes because they’re harmful. But what about a cigarette that purports to be healthy?
By Daniel Walters
Pacific Northwest Inlander
It’s Sunday, and a mass of teenagers lugging skateboards shuffles into Smart Smoke in River Park Square. One of them, Alex, wants to find a replacement for a broken part on his electronic cigarette. He’s 16.
“I need you all to show your IDs,” salesman Phoenix Downer says. “If you’re not 18, you need to leave.”
February 1st, 2011
As the March deadline approaches for the FDA’s Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee to produce a report to the FDA on its findings on menthol, Bob Bannon, director of investor relations at Greensboro, N.C.-based Lorillard Tobacco Co., took some time out to discuss his company’s menthol business and more.
You recently introduced a non-menthol cigarette. How are the non-menthol cigarettes doing, and what are your hopes?
As the non-menthol segment of the cigarette industry accounts for approximately 70 percent of total sales, our recent national launch of Newport Non-Menthol was an opportunistic move designed to leverage Newport’s strong brand equity among adult smokers into this large market segment. In the past, we have test marketed a non-menthol Newport style on two separate occasions, most recently in 1999-2000, and believe that the time is right to offer a premium non-menthol product that delivers the high quality tobacco taste that adult smokers have grown to expect from Newport. Newport Non-Menthol was designed to have broad competitive consumer appeal among those adults who choose to smoke and prefer non-menthol cigarettes. The product was launched nationally on November 1, 2010.
