From Action on Smoking and Health <[email protected]>
Subject ASH Daily News for 01 February 2021
Date February 2, 2021 3:00 PM
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** 02 February 2021
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** UK
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** UK betting faces more significant threats than losing its sport shirts (#1)
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** Professor Gordon McVie obituary (#2)
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** South East: More than £13k of illegal tobacco seized from shops in Southampton (#3)
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** International
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** Greece’s tax chief, cigarette company team against tobacco smuggling (#4)
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** Republic of Ireland: New EU excise rules may put paid to cheaper alcohol and cigarettes from overseas (#5)
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** Chicago files yet another lawsuit against e-cigarette industry (#6)
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** UK
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** The long-awaited government review of Britain’s gambling laws is well and truly underway, with renewed warnings in recent days that the logos of betting firms are to be banned from the shirts of Premier League footballers and other sports stars.

The gambling industry is now facing the prospect of a sports sponsorship ban similar to that imposed on tobacco, a reform campaigners say is long overdue. However, while speculation swirls around shirt sponsorship, more profound if less eye-catching reforms are being considered in a process that could herald a seismic upheaval of the regulatory landscape.

When an influential cross-party group of MPs called for a £2 limit on online casino stakes, match curbs on fixed-odds betting terminals (FOBTs) – gambling shares plunged. Any accompanying limits on how much gamblers can deposit or lose could also prove critical. Alongside the government review, the Gambling Commission has been examining affordability checks that could be drawn when setting any deposit limits. A senior analyst, Dan Waugh of Regulus Partners, thinks such barriers could create enough friction in the betting process to limit activity significantly.

With so much hanging in the balance, lobbying campaigns are ramping up. The industry, in particular, has some friends in high places. The head of the industry body BCG (Betting and Gaming Council) Michael Dugher is an ex-Labour MP with contacts in Westminster. BGC recently started paying serving Tory MP Laurence Robertson £2,000 a month, ostensibly for advice on safer gambling, while colleague Philip Davies MP has pocketed £50,000 from Entain in advance of the review.

On the other side of the debate are campaign groups and MPs favouring tighter curbs on online gambling. The 16-week call for evidence ends on 31 March 2021.

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** Source: The Guardian, 1 February 2021
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** Professor Gordon McVie, who has died aged 75, was a towering figure in cancer research and, as Scientific Director and Director General of the Cancer Research Campaign (CRC, now Cancer Research UK). He became the public face of the country’s fight against the disease and a fierce critic of the Government and NHS bureaucracy.

McVie played a significant role in pressing for targeted chemotherapy tailored to individual patients’ needs, encouraging the use of chemotherapy for lung cancer and emphasising the importance of adjusting treatment according to a patient’s ethnicity. During McVie’s time as Director-General of CRC (1996 to 2002), more than 60 new drugs proceeded from laboratory to clinical trial and, disgusted to find that only around 3% of British cancer patients were involved in clinical research (“a disgrace”). He was a key architect of the Cancer Trials Networks which link cancer centres across the country to offer patients who fail to respond to conventional treatments the chance to take part in early clinical trials of new ones.

He was also a founder member of the National Cancer Research Institute (NCRI), a UK-wide partnership between funders, promoting collaboration in cancer research. Among cancer research campaigners McVie was best known for his work in leading the CRC into a merger with the Imperial Cancer Research Fund (ICRF) to create Cancer Research UK (CRUK), the largest such charity in Europe, of which he served briefly as joint chief executive with Sir Paul Nurse, his opposite number at the ICRF.

In 2003 he took up a post as Senior Consultant at the European Institute of Oncology in Milan, with responsibility for planning strategy and science policy. In that capacity, in 2005 he accused the British Government of abdicating responsibility after figures revealed that the CRUK was spending four times as much as the Department of Health on cancer research. The same year he told an international conference that the New Labour government’s delay in implementing a ban on tobacco advertising was “indefensible”.

In an interview in 2005, he recalled that he had worked with seven British ministers of health and confessed a soft spot for Kenneth Clarke – “the only one who understood the issues because he’s a clever guy.” However, he described Clarke’s acceptance of a job as deputy chairman of British American Tobacco as “a dreadful thing”, accusing him of “contributing to the tobacco epidemic.”

Professor Gordon McVie, born in Glasgow on January 13 1945, and died January 20 2021.

Source: The Telegraph, 28 January 2021
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More than £13,000 of illegal tobacco has been seized from Southampton shops following a crack-down on illicit trade by Southampton City Council’s Trading Standards service. The illegal products were found with the assistance of sniffer dog Scamp.

A Trading Standards officer said: “We have some retailers in Southampton who choose to sell illegal tobacco products, and this is a crime. We will continue to target those businesses which sell these unlawful products.”

Councillor Dave Shields, Cabinet Member for Stronger Communities, said: “While illegal tobacco can be as little as a third of the price of the genuine product, it comes at the cost of supporting criminals.”

Source: Daily Echo, 1 February 2021
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** International
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** Greece’s major cigarette distributor Papastratos and the country’s tax collection agency are collaborating to slow illicit tobacco trade, a move that could boost revenues for the company.
The Independent Authority for Public Revenue (AADE) head and Papastratos chairman and CEO signed the agreement. The tobacco company will donate equipment to the agency to fight illicit tobacco trade.

Papastratos donated 50 ventilators for use in Greek hospitals, including 19 to intensive care units at the Sotiria General Hospital of Thoracic Diseases in Athens. The company is affiliated with Philip Morris International and was accused of a “shameful publicity stunt” by a leading campaigner after donating the ventilators.

Deborah Arnott, chief executive of Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), said, “This is a shameful publicity stunt by Philip Morris International, which owns Papastratos and has a 40% share of the Greek tobacco market.”

“Papastratos makes 1.3 billion euros ($1.58 billion) a year ... in comparison, the donation of 50 ventilators is a drop in the ocean.”
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Source: The National Herald, 1 February 2021

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** Editorial note

Article 5.3 of the WHO FCTC and its guidelines states that “Parties should not accept, support or endorse partnerships and non-binding or non-enforceable agreements as well as any voluntary arrangement with the tobacco industry or any entity or person working to further its interests.” This also includes all public authorities including local government. For more information see WHO FCTC ([link removed]) and Article 5.3 Guidelines ([link removed]) .
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** The EU is considering stopping Irish holidaymakers loading up on cheaper alcohol and cigarettes when they travel to other countries – with new rules would also affect trips to Northern Ireland.

The Republic of Ireland is one of the most expensive EU places to buy alcohol and cigarettes due to high excise duties. In a public consultation launched yesterday, the EU suggested holidaymakers should pay excise duties at home rates rather than where they buy products.

The bloc is also looking at mandatory or lower limits on the amount of alcohol and cigarettes holidaymakers can bring back from other EU countries for personal use. The EU fears people are taking advantage of lower duties in some countries, leaving governments out of pocket, and posing a risk to public health.

Northern Ireland would be included in any future policy change as, under the 2019 Brexit deal, it mirrors EU rules on VAT and excise duties. The EU has pencilled in a revision to its tax and excise rules for the end of this year.

Source: Independent.ie, 2 February 2021
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In November 2020, the Chicago City Council banned the sale of flavoured vaping products, but exempted flavoured tobacco products including menthol cigarettes.

On Monday 1 February 2021, the City launched a lawsuit against Equte LLC, a marketing firm, and Vapes.com, of “marketing and selling flavoured vaping products” to Chicago children.

The latest in a string of city lawsuits against the e-cigarette industry follows an investigation by the Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protection. It identified the two companies as having violated the flavoured tobacco ban. Neither company could be reached for comment.

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** Chicago has been a trailblazer for decades in the fight to protect adults in general and young people in particular from the public health dangers of smoking and tobacco-related products. Former Mayor Rahm Emanuel pursued a sweeping anti-smoking agenda that drove the teen smoking rate down to 10.7%. It included: raising the age of sale for tobacco to 21; imposing the nation’s highest cigarette tax; moving tobacco products behind the counter of retail stores; tackling the illegal sale of tobacco to minors; banning the sale of flavoured tobacco products within 500 feet of schools; and banning coupons and discounts that Big Tobacco uses to drive down the price of a pack of cigarettes from $13 to as low as $1 to lure teens into taking up smoking.
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** Source: Chicago Sun Times, 1 February 2021
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For more information call 020 7404 0242, email [email protected] (mailto:[email protected]) or visit www.ash.org.uk

ASH Daily News is a digest of published news on smoking-related topics. ASH is not responsible for the content of external websites. ASH does not necessarily endorse the material contained in this bulletin.

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