Who’s Minding the E-Cigarette Industry?

Should electronic tobacco devices be regulated as tobacco products or are they something completely different? Four new trade associations with varying opinions and agendas guide this booming category.

Starbucks banning smoking outside

But in the interest of promoting public health and a healthier image, retail coffee giant Starbucks on Saturday banned smoking within 25 feet of entrances, where local law permits. The Seattle-based chain also banned electronic smokeless cigarettes at all locations.
Starbucks' new non-smoking policy took effect at all locations throughout the U.S. and Canada. In the U.S., many states and municipalities ban smoking in public areas. More than 81 percent of the American population resides in areas with some type of smoking ban, including bans on smoking in restaurants, bars, workplaces, or even outdoor areas, according to the American Nonsmokers' Rights Foundation.

Tobacco advertising geared toward women

Tobacco advertising geared toward women began in the 1920s. By the mid-1930s, cigarette advertisements targeting women were becoming so commonplace that one advertisement for the mentholated Spud brand had the caption “To read the advertisements these days, a fellow’d think the pretty girls do all the smoking.” As early as the 1920s, tobacco advertising geared toward women included messages such as “Reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet” to establish an association between smoking and slimness. The positioning of Lucky Strike cigarettes as an aid to weight control led to a greater than 300% increase in sales for this brand in the first year of the advertising campaign. Through World War II, Chesterfield advertisements regularly featured glamour photographs of a Chesterfield girl of the month, usually a fashion model or a Hollywood star such as Rita Hayworth, Rosalind Russell, or Betty Grable. The number of women aged 18 through 25 years who began smoking increased significantly in the mid-1920s, the same time that the tobacco industry mounted the Chesterfield and Lucky Strike campaigns directed at women. The trend was most striking among women aged 18 though 21. The number of women in this age group who began smoking tripled between 1911 and 1925 and had more than tripled again by 1939. In 1968, Philip Morris marketed Virginia Slims cigarettes to women with an advertising strategy showing canny insight into the importance of the emerging women’s movement. The slogan “You’ve come a long way, Baby” later gave way to “It’s a woman thing” in the mid-1990s, and more recently the “Find your voice” campaign featuring women of diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds. The underlying message of these campaigns has been that smoking is related to women’s freedom, emancipation, and empowerment. Initiation rates among girls aged 14 though 17 years rapidly increased in parallel with the combined sales of the leading women’s-niche brands (Virginia Slims, Silva Thins, and Eve) during this period. In 1960, about 10% of all cigarette advertisements appeared in popular women’s magazines, and by 1985, cigarette advertisements increased by 34%. Women have been extensively targeted in tobacco marketing. Such marketing is dominated by themes of an association between social desirability, independence, and smoking messages conveyed through advertisements featuring slim, attractive, and athletic models. In 1999, expenditures for domestic cigarette advertising and promotion was $8.24 billion—increasing 22.3 % from the $6.73 billion spent in 1998. Advertising is used in part to reduce women’s fear of the health risks from smoking by presenting information on nicotine and tar content or by using positive images (e.g., models engaged in exercise or pictures of white capped mountains against a background of clear blue skies).

Smoking in vehicles

Meanwhile, a consultation on proposed legislation to ban smoking in vehicles when children are present is to be launched by Liberal Democrat MSP Jim Hume. Mr Hume said such a ban has already gained support from a number of charities, including Children in Scotland and the British Heart Foundation. The South of Scotland MSP will launch the consultation on proposals for his Members Bill next month. He said banning adults from smoking in cars when children are present is the next step in tobacco control. "Passive smoking is entirely avoidable and a private vehicle is one of the few places a child can still be legally exposed to tobacco smoke," he said. "I stand alongside the British Heart Foundation, British Lung Foundation, Children in Scotland and ASH Scotland, among many others, in seeking a change to the law and hope that people and organisations from across Scotland can take part in this important consultation. "It doesn't seem fair that any child should have to be trapped in a car which is filled with smoke. When you consider the real implications this can have for a child's immediate and future health, it is clear we need to do what we can to protect children and give them the best start in life."

Quit-smoking treatments safe, effective: review

Popular smoking cessation treatments - such as nicotine replacements and antidepressants - improve people's chances of kicking the habit without much risk, according to a review of past research. "It seems very clear that medications can help. They're not the magic bullet but you do improve your chances of quitting - generally - if you try them. And as far as we can tell, they're safe to use," said Kate Cahill, who led the study. Several reviews have looked at the effectiveness of smoking cessation treatments, but the researchers wanted to put those results into a single large review to help people who want to use medical treatments to stop smoking, Cahill, a senior researcher for the Cochrane Tobacco Addiction Group at the University of Oxford, UK, told Reuters Health. About one fifth of the U.S. and UK populations are current smokers, according to the researchers. Previous studies have found between 70 percent and 75 percent want to quit, but only about 3 percent accomplish that every year. For the new study, the researchers pulled data from 12 reviews published by the Cochrane Collaboration, an international research organization that evaluates medical evidence. Those analyses, which were conducted between 2008 and 2012, included data from 267 studies of more than 101,000 smokers. The studies typically compared smokers trying to quit without the help of a smoking cessation treatment to smokers using nicotine replacement therapies, such as nicotine gum and patches, or prescription drugs. The medications include varenicline (marketed by Pfizer as Chantix or Champix) and bupropion (marketed by GlaxoSmithKline as Zyban or Wellbutrin, but available as a generic).

Lib Dem minister urges coalition to carry out plain cigarette packet plan

A health minister has urged the coalition to press ahead with forcing cigarettes to be sold in plain packets to reduce sales, despite the plan being dropped from the Queen's speech because of unease in Downing Street.
Norman Lamb, a Liberal Democrat, has urged ministers to make Britain the first country in Europe to adopt what he claims would become a key element of the legacy of government's time in power.
"As a liberal I would always defend someone's right to smoke, if that's what they choose to do. But, given we're dealing here with a product that kills between 80,000 and 100,000 people a year, I think it's legitimate for government to seek to control the marketing of that deadly product," Lamb told the Guardian.
"I think it would be a legacy for this government to have legislated on something which would be a landmark public health reform and to be out there in front in Europe. It's something that both Liberal Democrats and Conservatives could be very proud of"," he added.
The care and support minister said he intended to keep fighting to secure the introduction of plain packs, even though it did not appear as expected in the government's legislative programme unveiled last week. David Cameron ditched it amid fears of a backbench revolt against a "nanny state" idea and tobacco industry warnings of job losses if it went ahead.
"MPs from all three parties support this, so I will continue to argue the case for us to act. There could still be an opportunity in this parliament to act and I will argue the case for it," said Lamb.
Other Lib Dem ministers and MPs agreed with him, he said, although the education minister, David Laws, and the Home Office minister, Jeremy Browne, who are on the right of the party, are thought to be against it. Representatives for Nick Clegg and the business secretary, Vince Cable, declined to say if either personally supported plain packs, which the Liberal Democrats have backed as a party since 2008.