New York: Enforcing tobacco laws cuts kids' smoking

A new study found that enforcement of laws banning tobacco sales to minors has curbed U.S. teenagers' smoking rates.

Between 1997 and 2003, increasing compliance with tobacco sales laws led to a 21 percent reduction in the number of 10th-graders who were daily smokers, researchers report in the online journal BMC Public Health.

The decline followed a 1996 federal law that compelled states to crack down on tobacco sales to minors, including having local authorities send underage "decoy" shoppers into stores to try to buy cigarettes.

The study found that over the same 1997-2003 time period tobacco price increases also seemed to deter teens from smoking. For each dollar increase in tobacco prices, the odds of a teenager being a daily smoker dropped by half.

"Our data indicate that improving merchant compliance with the prohibition on sales of tobacco to minors and increasing the price of cigarettes discourage youth smoking," write Dr. Joseph R. DiFranza and his colleagues at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester.

Before the 1996 legislation, known as the Synar Amendment, tobacco sales to minors were prohibited, but many retailers failed to comply.

DiFranza and his colleagues said, " There is not doubt that the Synar Amendment with its threat of financial penalties for states was the prime motivator for most states to enforce their laws."

This is the first study, they write, to show that the law has had its intended effect on the national level.

While higher prices seemed to be an even greater obstacle to teen smoking, the researchers add, "there is no reason why policy makers should choose between these approaches, as all effective measures to reduce smoking among youth should be employed."

Source: Reuters News, 22 April 2009
Link: http://tinyurl.com/cf839k

Alcohol and tobacco duties rise in budget

Of the tax increases announced yesterday, only two will be implemented immediately - those on tobacco and alcohol.

Smokers had just five hours from the end of the chancellor's Budget speech to purchase cigarettes before the new higher prices came into effect at 6pm.

Drinkers were given a little longer before the increase in duty. A 2 per cent increase in the cost of alcohol was imposed at midnight. Alistair Darling said the measures would raise more than £6bn by 2012.

This will raise the price of a pint of beer by 1p on average and add 4p to the cost of a bottle of wine and 13p to the price of a bottle of spirits.

Prices for beer, cider and wine have already seen large increases, rising by 8 per cent and spirits duty rates by 4 per cent in December.

The cost of tobacco has gone up by 2 per cent, raising the cost of a packet of 20 cigarettes by 7p and putting further pressure on smokers who have already been banned from smoking in many buildings and public spaces.

Patrick King, tax principal at MacIntyre Hudson, the accountancy firm, said that the tax increases in duties for fuel, alcohol and tobacco would undoubtedly hit those on lower incomes the hardest, he said.

Ed note: The 2% increase in tobacco excise duty is based on a projected decline in the RPI of -3%. Therefore it represents an above inflation increase in real terms.  

Source: Financial Times, 23 April 2009
Link: http://tinyurl.com/d94p6a

Tobacco giants 'targeting youth in developing world'

Nearly half of the world's smokers live in three countries - China, India and Indonesia - and many are picking up the habit at a very young age.

In China, one in 10 boys aged 14 are smokers, and in Indonesia a third of students report taking their first puff before the age of 10.

As smoking rates decline in the West, the tobacco industry has been setting its sights on the developing world.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) says the tobacco industry has long targeted young people as so-called "replacement smokers" to take the place of those who quit or die.

Susan Lawrence, head of China programs at the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids in Washington DC said, "The high smoking rates among adults in China make it more attractive to children."

"The message that society sends them is that smoking is normal, that if you're in a public place, you're smoking," she said.

Dina Kania, a youth advocate for Indonesia's National Commission for Child Protection in Jakarta, says the industry is aggressively targeting young people through sponsorship.

"We have been doing tobacco industry surveillance since 2008 and it is very obvious and evident that they are targeting young people. They sponsor music events and we have monitored about 1,350 events sponsored by the tobacco industry and most of those events were attended by children and teenagers," she said.

Ms Lawrence says while there are some advertising restrictions in China, the promotions and sponsorships are clearly aimed at the country's youth.

"There are a lot of schools in rural areas which carry tobacco brand names. They do promotional events in shopping malls, bringing on very popular breakdancing routines or popular singers to entice crowds - and a lot of people in those crowds are kids," she added.

WHO's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, adopted in 2003, sets out measures for countries to protect against the dangers of tobacco, including limits on taxation, government policies, advertising and distribution.

There are 164 parties to the convention, including China, who ratified the agreement in 2005, and Ms Lawrence says the Chinese needs to live up to its commitments.

"I just think it's awfully hard for parents, when the signals that society is sending is that smoking is normal and that in fact, in China, that to be a real man, you have to smoke," she said.

Indonesia has so far not signed up to the framework - the only South-East Asian WHO member not involved.

Source: ABC News, 22 April 2009
Link: http://tinyurl.com/cberw3

Paris bans posters of Coco Chanel star smoking

The city of Paris has banned posters of the actress Audrey Tautou in her new role as Coco Chanel because she is holding a cigarette. 

The transport authority's decision to remove the posters because they were "unhealthy and inappropriate" was condemned as "ridiculous" by Chanel fans.

The posters show Tautou as the chain-smoking French creator of the little black dress gazing sensuously at the camera in silk pyjamas, with a cigarette smouldering in her right hand.

Metrobus, the company which runs advertising on Paris' buses and trains, said that the law came before historical accuracy.

"Cigarettes are banned on our entire transport system, and there is no reason why we should be giving them free advertising through this film poster," a spokesman said.

The film's producers were obliged to provide an alternative poster showing Tautou with the male lead.

But a representative of Warner France said, "for us, the real poster is where Coco Chanel is smoking in a natural pose that translates her strong personality and her modernity."

The ban comes days after a poster of Jacques Tati, one of France's most enduring comic characters, was altered to conform to French rules prohibiting the "direct or indirect" promotion of tobacco products. The actor-director's trademark pipe was replaced with a yellow windmill – a move which one cinema expert said would have made him "die laughing".

Roselyne Bachelot, the health minister, admitted that the rules were being taken too far. "We're getting pretty ridiculous with this," she said.

Even Claude Evin, the politician behind a 1991 anti-smoking law, said the ban should not extend to "cultural heritage".

There is already concern that another film due out later this year about Serge Gainsbourg, the Gauloise-puffing crooner, will fall foul of the no smoking rules. One of his songs is entitled God smokes Havana cigars.

Coco Before Chanel, the new film starring Tatou, opened in France this week to wide critical acclaim.

It focuses on the early years of Gabrielle Chanel, nicknamed "Coco" during her failed attempt to launch a singing career. The film sees her move from poverty-stricken orphan to early catwalk success, but stops short of her controversial affair with a Nazi officer at Paris's Ritz hotel during the Occupation.

Next month the best-selling perfume Chanel No 5 unveils a new advertising campaign starring Tautou, best known outside France for her role in Amelie.

In another sign of Chanel mania, a second film about her love affair with the Russian composer Igor Stravinsky will be released later this year, as part of a new found French craze for biopics sparked by La Vie en Rose, the Oscar-winning film on the life of Edit Piaf, the troubled chanteuse.
 

Source: The Telegraph, 22 April 2009
Link: http://tinyurl.com/dekvnu