In June 2009, the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act became law, directing the Food and Drug Administration to not only create larger health warnings, but to include graphic images in the labels. And when the U.S. Supreme Court shot down a tobacco-industry fight against these labels in April 2013, it was supposed to get the ball rolling again on these new warnings. But in the years since, there’s been no apparent movement on the matter and the FDA won’t say when, or even if, these Congressionally mandated labels will become a reality. [More]
tobacco
Philip Morris Does Horrible Job Of Defending Itself After John Oliver Mocking
By 2.17.15
On Sunday night, John Oliver called out the tobacco industry, and particularly Philip Morris, for the practice of threatening small and poor countries with complicated, expensive international trade lawsuits if they try to strictly regulate cigarette marketing. But while Big Tobacco has the coffers to pay for costly legal battles, it does a really poor job of trying to defend its actions. [More]
Meet The New Marlboro Spokesman: Jeff, The Diseased Lung In A Cowboy Hat
By 2.16.15
On Sunday’s episode of Last Week Tonight, host John Oliver took an in-depth look at how the tobacco industry uses expensive lawsuits and byzantine international trade agreements to keep countries from pushing for stronger regulation on cigarettes. But rather than just call Big Tobacco out for its bad behavior, Oliver also offered a helpful solution that might make all sides happy. [More]
Washington Could Become First State To Raise Smoking Age To 21
By 1.23.15
The era of walking into a store and buying that first nudie magazine and pack of cigarettes upon turning 18 might soon be a thing of the past for presidents of Washington State, as legislators there are proposing a new age threshold for those who want to light up. [More]
Are You Vaping Formaldehyde In Your E-Cigarette?
By 1.22.15
Formaldehyde may be good for preserving dead bodies, but as a known carcinogen, it’s not really something you want to put into a living body. But when users of e-cigarettes — many of whom ditched smoking because of cancer-causing chemicals like formaldehyde — enjoy their tasty vapor, they may be getting more formaldehyde than they would from smoking a cigarette. [More]
Sorry Camel, Fewer People Than Ever Are Smoking Between Every Thanksgiving Course
By 11.26.14
It’s been 78 years since Camel rans its full-page Thanksgiving ad encouraging smokers to enjoy a cigarette after every course of their holiday meal to aid with “good digestion.” Since then, food has apparently gotten a lot easier to digest — and people aren’t so keen about dying of lung cancer, emphysema and heart disease — as a new CDC report finds that fewer Americans than ever are aiding their digestion with cigarettes. [More]
Massachusetts Town Decides Against Banning Tobacco Sales After Outcry
By 11.20.14
After floating the idea of possibly banning all tobacco sales within city limits, a Massachusetts town’s Board of Health has decided to give up the proposal after some residents protested the effort, saying they should be able to buy cigarettes and other products in their own town. [More]
Massachusetts City Considering Banning Tobacco Sales Completely
By 11.10.14
While most cities have banned smoking indoors in public places, and companies like CVS have decided to stop selling cigarettes outright, no U.S. town has actually banned the sale of tobacco… yet. One Massachusetts city is considering taking tobacco off the shelves, a choice that would make it the first town to do so. [More]
CVS Yanks Tobacco Products From Its Shelves A Month Earlier Than Planned
By 9.3.14
Earlier this year, CVS Caremark announced it would stop selling cigarettes and other tobacco products in its drugstores across the country by October 1. It’s not October yet, but CVS has decided to pull those items early. As in, today. And it’s got another change in the pipeline, too — its new corporate name is CVS Health. [More]
Jury Smacks Tobacco Company R.J. Reynolds With $23 Billion Verdict
By 7.21.14
The bill has arrived for R.J. Reynolds Tobacco company in a lawsuit brought by a Florida woman whose husband smoked cigarettes and later died from lung cancer, and the company is not pleased: The jury returned one of the largest verdicts ever against a tobacco company, smacking Reynolds with $23.6 billion in damages. [More]
CDC Unleashing Another Barrage Of Terrifying Anti-Smoking Ads
By 6.24.14
Two years ago, the Centers for Disease Control launched a series of ads featuring horror stories from former smokers who got cancer, lost organs, teeth, and whose children suffered from the ill effects of being exposed to cigarette smoke. Some of these ads have been viewed millions of times online and the CDC claims they are helping to get people to quit or to never start smoking; that’s why a new series of TV spots will soon start hitting the TV airwaves in July. [More]
Documents Show That Big Tobacco Has Been Interested In Pot For At Least 45 Years
By 6.3.14
With medical marijuana now legal in nearly half the country and pot now a legal retail item in Washington and Colorado, it would make sense that the nation’s tobacco companies would be seeing the potential for making green from green. And a new report uncovers documents showing that the tobacco industry has been thinking about marijuana long before most of the people who smoke it today were even born. [More]
Lawmakers Urge Drug Store Chains To Stop Carrying Tobacco Products
By 4.29.14
It’s been nearly three months since CVS announced it was phasing out the sale of tobacco products in its stores, and so far no other major drug store chain has followed suit. So today, a dozen members of Congress, led by Rep. Frank Pallone of New Jersey, called on these retailers to put an end to their part in the sale of cigarettes and other items containing tobacco. [More]
Proposed Regulations On E-Cigarettes Include Health Warning Label, Age Restrictions
By 4.24.14
It only took five years, but the Food and Drug Administration is ready to begin regulating electronic cigarettes. While the new rule covers a lot of ground with the never-before regulated devices, it doesn’t deal with some of critics’ more controversial concerns. [More]
28 Attorneys General Urge Major Retailers To Discontinue Tobacco Sales
By 3.17.14
Is it a conflict of interest when stores that sell products to improve your health also make billions every year selling cigarettes? More than two dozen Attorneys General think so, and are lighting a fire under the nation’s largest drugstore and supermarket chains to get them to quit. [More]
Groups Call On Walgreens To Stop “Evaluating” Cigarette Sales And Just Stop Them Already
By 2.12.14
Last week, Walgreens responded to the news that CVS would stop selling cigarettes by saying it was “evaluating its tobacco line.” That didn’t sit well with some advocacy groups who have called on the nation’s largest drugstore chain to give up its nicotine addiction. [More]
Walgreens Wants Everyone To Know It’s Continuing To Sell Cigarettes
By 2.5.14
Earlier today, CVS surprised an awful lot of people by saying it would give up $2 billion a year in cigarette sales because it’s “the right thing for us to do for our customers and our company to help people on their path to better health.” Meanwhile, Walgreens, the nation’s largest drugstore chain, apparently wants the world to know that it will keep on selling tobacco. [More]
50 Years After First Surgeon General’s Report, Smoking Still Leading Preventable Cause Of Death
By 1.17.14
Back in 1964, 42% of American adults smoked tobacco. That same year, the U.S. Surgeon General’s office issued a landmark report about the link between smoking and lung cancer. Since then, there have been 31 additional reports from various Surgeons General, each adding more insight into the health hazards of smoking. In that time, the percentage of adult smokers has been cut by more than half to 18%, but the latest report says people aren’t quitting fast enough. [More]
