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The Food and Drug Administration announced Friday it will convene a public meeting in October to review the risks of psychiatric and behavioral side effects with Pfizer’s anti-smoking drug Chantix. […] Since 2009, Chantix has carried the government’s strongest safety warning—a “black box” label—because of links to hostility, agitation, depression and suicidal thoughts. The warning was added after the FDA received dozens of reports of suicide and hundreds of reports of suicidal behavior among patients taking the smoking-cessation drug. …

https://s3.amazonaws.com/public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2014-09491.pdfThis is the docket reading

The federal government wants to extend its oversight of tobacco to include cigars, hookah, nicotine gels, pipe tobacco and dissolvable tobacco products. The Food and Drug Administration proposal being issued Thursday would ban sales to minors and require approval for new products and health warning labels. …

Fox Host Bill O'Reilly on Wednesday claimed that he could have been the Marlboro Man. "While I was covering the News in Denver, I was approached by a modeling agency to be the Marlboro guy dressed as a cowboy," he said on the "O'Reilly Factor" while lamenting the lack of a public health campaign warning about the dangers of weed. He lauded the U.S. government's campaign against smoking tobacco, but said that the U.S. has taken the opposite approach to pot. "Smoking marijuana is quite the opposite. That’s on the rise, as pot use is considered cool in many...

Every drug of addiction must have its day. Morphine remains one of the most potent painkillers ever discovered. Cocaine’s chemical cousin lidocaine is still used by physicians and dentists as an effective local anesthetic. Even demon alcohol, when taken in moderation, cuts the risk of heart attacks, osteoporosis, rheumatoid arthritis and a hodgepodge of other ailments. Now comes nicotine, perhaps the most unlikely wonder drug ever to be reviled. If dozens of human and animal studies published over the past six years are borne out by large clinical trials, nicotine — freed at last of its noxious host, tobacco, and...

Australian researchers published findings this week on a newly-discovered plant compound that destroys cancer cells, but leaves healthy cells unharmed. They found it in possibly the last place you'd look for a cancer cure: the family of plants that brings us cancer's number-one culprit, tobacco.

TRENTON — Gov. Chris Christie’s administration wants to increase taxes on electronic cigarettes for the sake of the public’s health, state Treasurer Andrew Sidamon-Eristoff said today. “Our goal is to achieve rough parity with the tax burden on conventional cigarettes. Why? Our main concern is public health,” Sidamon-Eristoff said at an Assembly Budget Committee hearing today. “Contrary to the claims of some users, e-cigarettes have not been shown to be a ‘safe’ alternative to regular cigarettes. Nor are they a proven path to smoking cessation.” Christie’s budget anticipates $35 million in revenue by applying the $2.70 per pack regular state...

A dangerous new form of a powerful stimulant is hitting markets nationwide, for sale by the vial, the gallon and even the barrel. The drug is nicotine, in its potent, liquid form — extracted from tobacco and tinctured with a cocktail of flavorings, colorings and assorted chemicals to feed the fast-growing electronic cigarette industry. These “e-liquids,” the key ingredients in e-cigarettes, are powerful neurotoxins. Tiny amounts, whether ingested or absorbed through the skin, can cause vomiting and seizures and even be lethal. A teaspoon of even highly diluted e-liquid can kill a small child. But, like e-cigarettes, e-liquids are not...

Republican Rep. Duncan Hunter is speaking out against a reported proposal being considered by the Navy to ban the sale of tobacco products on all its bases and ships, calling it a “political decision.” The Military Times reported Monday that Navy officials are considering removing tobacco from all retail outlets, including exchange-operated sales venues and Morale, Welfare and Recreation program outlets. Navy commissaries do not sell tobacco products. Hunter, a Marine veteran who served two tours in Iraq and one in Afghanistan, said in a letter to Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus he strongly opposes the ban, saying it...

Some statements and arguments are so asinine that you'd have to be an academic or a leftist to take them seriously. Take the accusation that Republicans and conservatives are conducting a war on women. Does that mean they're waging war on their daughters, wives, mothers and other female members of their families? If so, do they abide by the Geneva Conventions' bans on torture, or do they engage in enhanced interrogation and intimidation methods, such as waterboarding, with female family members? You might say that leftists don't mean actual war. Then why do they say it? What would you think...

A majority of the cigarettes for sale in New York are illegally smuggled into the state, according to a report out Wednesday from the conservative research group the Tax Foundation. According to the report, 56.9% of the cigarettes sold in New York—the highest importer of smuggled cigarettes—originated from out of state. Since 2006, cigarette smuggling in the state has risen sharply, by 59%, in tandem with a massive hike in cigarette taxes of 190%. New York state now has the highest cigarette taxes in the country, at $4.35 a pack. Residents of NYC must also pay an extra $1.50 per...

A group of 28 U.S. attorneys general is urging chief executive officers of five major retailers, including Walmart, to stop selling tobacco products, saying it is contradictory to carry such items in stores that also provide health care services. The companies receiving a letter on Sunday from the group were Wal-Mart Stores Inc, supermarket operators Kroger Co, Safeway Inc, which operate pharmacies, and drugstore chains Walgreen Co and Rite Aid Corp. …

The European Union’s member states today (14 March) gave final approval to a revision of rules on tobacco products that tighten the content and marketing of both cigarettes and electronic cigarettes. […] The tobacco manufacturer Philip Morris countered that: “The new rules will do little to improve public health and will make the EU less competitive, pushing even more consumers to the unregulated black market in tobacco.” The new legislation requires bigger health warnings on packets of cigarettes and roll-your-own tobacco. All characterizing flavors, such as menthol, will be prohibited as will the sale of packs with fewer than 20...

Anyone with a modicum of knowledge regarding public health will agree that the most important, devastating, and preventable threat to human health we face is cigarettes. Smokers trying to quit have an extremely difficult time: Less than 10 percent succeed without help, and the various FDA-approved products are of little help, if any. Over the past few years, a new technology has been taken up by millions seeking an escape from deadly smoke: electronic cigarettes (e-cigs, also known as ENDS, electronic nicotine-delivery systems). Many experts in tobacco control believe e-cigs present the best hope of improving the unacceptably low rate...

The net for Ohioans is a $174 million tax cut over the next three years. Kasich proposes funding an 8.5 percent income tax-cut for all tax brackets — a $2.2 billion reduction over the next three years — by raising the state’s tax on a pack of cigarettes 60 cents, from $1.25 to $1.85, while also taxing other tobacco products, including electronic cigarettes, at an equivalent rate. That would generate about $850 million during the next three years. Kasich also wants to raise the Commercial Activity Tax on gross receipts for businesses from 0.26 percent to 0.3 percent, a roughly...

<p>FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) -- A contentious Kentucky bill that would enact a statewide ban on smoking in shared public spaces and places of employment is dead, the sponsor says.</p>

A handful of Democratic Senators are up in arms about the Golden Globe awards. No, they’re not upset that Breaking Bad beat out House of Cards for best Television Drama Series. Instead, they’re fuming about a few actors using electronic cigarettes during the award show broadcast. They’ve fired off a strongly worded letter to NBC Universal and the Hollywood Foreign Press Association for “glamorizing” the use of e-cigarettes. And now they’re going even further in advocating for a ban on these products in the U.S. Capitol. Banning consumption of electronic cigarettes in public has become a troubling trend of paternalistic...

As state and local units of government continue to increase cigarette excise taxes to raise revenue, smugglers apparently continue to profit from their illicit trafficking. We estimate that for 2012, 27.6 percent of all cigarettes consumed in Michigan were smuggled into the state. Nationwide, our research — and other academic papers — suggest that cigarette smuggling is not abating dramatically. There is both empirical and recent anecdotal evidence to suggest the problem is increasing in some areas and right alongside big excise tax hikes. We just published our fourth set of smuggling estimates for 47 of the 48 contiguous states,...

The former US vice president is in line to make a large profit from a firm producing smart meters which monitor household electricity use. He is a partner in a Silicon Valley venture capital firm which invested £45 million in Silver Spring Networks, a small California company which has been developing technology to monitor household power use to make the electricity grid more efficient. Last week the US Energy Department announced £2 billion in grants and a proportion of that, thought to be more than £305 million, will go to utility operators with which Silver Spring has contracts. The venture...

Lawmakers in Utah and Colorado are promoting legislation to raise the legal age for tobacco use to 21, a higher standard than imposed by any other state, saying they want to discourage young people from picking up a lifelong smoking habit. Supporters say keeping tobacco out of the hands of young adults will save thousands of lives, even as critics complain that Americans who are old enough to vote and serve in the military should not be deemed too young to decide on their own if they should smoke. In a dramatic display of the risks of smoking, lawmakers in...