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ASH Scotland calls for tougher restrictions on advertising vapes and e-cigarettes
In response to a Scottish Government consultation, ASH (Action on Smoking and Health) Scotland want more restrictions on spaces such as billboards and bus shelters that carry vape advertisements, as well as limiting promotional or sponsorship activities and distribution of samples.
The Scottish Schools Adolescent Lifestyle and Substance Use Survey (Salsus) in 2018 showed that vape use by young people has increased since 2015. The number of 13-year-old non-smokers who have tried vapes has risen from 13% to 15% and for 15-year-olds, it rose from 24% in 28%.
ASH Scotland is concerned that young people are finding these products attractive due to the flavours they come in and the colourful packaging.
Sheila Duffy, chief executive of ASH Scotland, said: “With alarming reports about children in Scotland as young as seven possessing vaping products, which often have flavours, colouring and packaging attractive to young people, we strongly support the important precautionary steps proposed by the Scottish Government to curb the promotion of recreational e-cigarettes to protect youngsters from being lured into experimenting.”
Source: The Sunday Post, 29 April 2022
Editorial note: The SALSUS data combines never smokers and ex-smokers into the same non-smoking group. ASH’s annual survey of youth e-cigarette use in Great Britain in 2021 found that 95% of 11-17 year olds who had never smoked had never tried an e-cigarette.
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US: Reporter who exposed Big Tobacco cover-up, Philip J. Hilts, passes away aged 74
The Justice Department eventually dropped its criminal investigation into whether the executives had perjured themselves. But in 1998, four tobacco companies and 46 states reached what was the largest civil litigation settlement in American history, with the companies agreeing to pay the states $206 billion over 25 years. Millions of internal company documents were made public in the process.
Hilts’ article, on the front page of The Times, appeared a month after top executives of the seven biggest American tobacco companies testified before Congress that nicotine was not addictive. Two years later, they were all under federal investigation for potentially lying under oath and were no longer leading their companies.
Hilts wrote, “[the Brown and Williamson executives] chose to remain silent, to keep their research results secret, to stop work on a safer cigarette and to pursue a legal and public relations strategy of admitting nothing.”
In 1994, Hilts obtained internal documents showing that executives of the Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corporation were debating whether to disclose to the surgeon general what they knew in 1963 about the hazards of smoking; their own research showed that cigarettes were addictive and caused lung cancer or predisposed people to it.
Philip J. Hilts, a science writer and journalist known for exposing a Big Tobacco cover-up has passed away at the age of 74. Hilts was a renowned journalist, writing for The Times, The Washington Post and other publications, and was the author of ‘Smokescreen: The Truth Behind the Tobacco Industry Cover-Up’ (1996).
Source: The New York Times, 29 April 2022
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Smokers in Finland required not to smoke on beaches and playgrounds
To further reduce the appeal of tobacco or smoking products, Finland will introduce from 2023, stricter regulations on product packaging. The stricter Tobacco Act will oblige manufacturers to remove logos from unit packets of tobacco products, e-cigarettes and refill containers.
Finland’s amended Tobacco Act also takes aim at tobacco flavouring products. This concerns flavour cards that can be put inside a cigarette pack to make the smoke taste like chocolate, strawberry and menthol. Retailers and wholesalers will, however, be allowed to sell products that are already in stores and warehouses until the end of April 2023.
Finland has introduced from Sunday, 1st May, a ban on smoking in playgrounds and a seasonal ban on smoking on public beaches. Smoking will be prohibited at public beaches from the beginning of May to the end of September annually.
Source: BNN, 2 May 2022
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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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