Cigarette Smoking News

When it comes to smoking, local hospitals having been putting up signs telling everyone to light-up off the property. But are they following through? It was almost three years ago when Sisters Hospital officials announced the campus was going 100 percent smoke-free. Back in November of 2008, CEO Peter Bergmann announced, “It’s our responsibility to provide a safe and healthy environment for those who work, visit and receive care at our hospital and outpatient facilities.”

But fast-forward to today, are they still standing by their mission? We wanted to find out, but we’re not singling out Sisters. In fact, you’ll find no-smoking signs at all hospitals across western New York, telling smokers to move off the property. Continue reading

Eleven men have been indicted in Charlotte and accused of conspiring to pay more than $7.5 million in cash for over 400,000 cartons of discount Astra cigarettes they believed had been stolen. Some of the suspects also are accused of laundering money through legitimate businesses they owned or controlled. The men are charged with conspiring to receive and transport across North Carolina and South Carolina Marlboro cigarettes they thought had been stolen in Virginia and Tennessee. But unknown to the defendants, they were dealing with undercover law enforcement agents and officers.

The cigarettes purchased during the sting had a wholesale value of more than $15 million. Among the details outlined in the indictment:

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Imagine your doctor diagnosed you with lung cancer. If you’re a smoker, would you quit? You may be surprised how many people don’t, even though smoking is what probably cause the killer disease in the first place. Cancer doctors will tell you it is an all too familiar scenario.

Smoking is addictive. Everyone knows that. So addictive, researchers show nearly 15 percent of lung cancer patients still continued to smoke five months into their diagnosis. Baton Rouge cancer specialist Jay Brooks says he sees it in his own practice. “I counsel them to quit smoking, they simply say they can’t quit,” said Brooks. Continue reading

An initiative petition that seeks to increase revenue from taxes on Classic cigarettes in Missouri might not be what it seems at first glance. Opponents say it targets only small tobacco product manufacturers and would be a setback in attempts to get the state to raise the overall cigarette tax.

The state’s cigarette tax is now just 17 cents a pack, and this measure for the 2012 ballot would raise it on a pack of cheaper, off-brand cigarettes by one dollar. But State Representative Jeanne Kirkton of Webster-Groves says it’s not worth it.

“If we pass this on just the off-brand manufacturers, it’s not likely that we’ll ever get an across-the-board cigarette tax in Missouri, and right now we are the lowest in the nation.” Continue reading

A report on a smoke-free places policy for the City of Fredericton will be coming forward before the end of the year, says city community services director Wayne Tallon. Raised by Coun. Stephen Kelly after Dieppe implemented a policy to ban smoking flavored cigarettes in public areas, Kelly asked for a similar report from Fredericton.

After Kelly raised the subject publicly, the Canadian Cancer Society decided it would host a day-long seminar on the topic with interest groups, including Tallon who attended on the city’s behalf.

Representatives from the Department of Health, the New Brunswick Lung Association, the Dr. Everett Chalmers Regional Hospital, members of the New Brunswick Anti-Tobacco Strategy coalition, and officials from the communities of St. Stephen and Hampton attended the Wednesday meeting. Continue reading