Tobacco News on the Web
Archive, June, 1998
Note: These articles wink in and out of existence with the frequency of sub-atomic particles. Many links will be dead. In that case, these pages can be approached as bibliographies, both noting the event, and showing where you might look for further information.
- Roman Catholics in western New York are being asked to give more money to make up for the shortfall caused by the decrease in Bingo revenues. The Roman Catholic Diocese in the Buffalo area expects to lose about $1 million to $2 million this year because of government regulations that required non-smoking bingo. In many parishes, Bingo profits are down by 75 percent.
- The topic: Republican SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL's plan to eliminate the federal tobacco program. Tobacco farmers love the program, which keeps prices high. Many vow revenge not only against Mr. McConnell when he runs for re-election in 2002, but against his GOP ally, REP. JIM BUNNING, who is running for the Senate now -- even though Mr. Bunning says he disagrees with Mr. McConnell.
- There's no butts about the benefits of a smoke-free home, a Fort McMurray father says. Eddie King, 34, won a seven-day Caribbean cruise for declaring his home smoke-free as part of a provincial anti-smoking campaign. "This is a wicked prize and my heart is pounding," said the single father of an eight-year-old son upon learning he'd won the trip aboard the world's first smoke-free cruise ship.
- The Fianna Fáil MEP, Mr Mark Killilea, has defended the way he voted in the recent EU tobacco advertising and sponsorship votes in the European Parliament. ASH Ireland, the anti-smoking lobby, criticised the Connacht MEP, saying it was surprised he appeared not to have supported the Minister for Health and his party colleagues
- Zila, Inc. (Nasdaq: ZILA), international provider of healthcare products for dental/medical professionals and consumers, announced that Taiwan has initiated a national oral cancer screening program using OraTest, Zila's oral cancer detection system.
- If the plan fails, the state could be left with up to Z$4,5bn worth of unsold tobacco, further encumbering the budget deficit and Zimbabwe's relations with the International Monetary Fund.
- Local experts are warning tobacco farmers to be on the lookout for a fungal disease that could threaten their crop. Blue mold has been found in Florida, Georgia, Texas, Kentucky and Tennessee and, if the winds blow it this way, it could arrive in Pennsylvania as well.
- Tobacco growers are finding an opportunity in raising organic tobacco for the SANTA FE NATURAL TOBACCO CO. plant. The Oxford company's primary products are cigarettes and other tobacco products that have no additives and are made of tobacco grown without chemicals or substances other than organic matter.
- For starters, his cold-caller avoided pushing anything speculative at the outset . . . Explaining that WARREN BUFFETT owned UST shares, the broker, JOHN P. CLANCY, made the most of rumors that the famed Nebraska investor would buy more.
- "I'm sorry Paul, but you're not coming to France." . . At Sheryl's Hertfordshire home he awoke today to the realisation that he has paid a high price for smoking 20 cigarettes a day and having too many late nights out. Hoddle had decided that Gascoigne was too unfit to be included in the final squad of 22 players. However, sources close to the England team say the decision was based purely on "football and fitness"
- The New Carrollton establishment is one of dozens of religious nightclubs that have popped up across the country in the last few years, offering Christians a smoke-free, alcohol-free, sex-free alternative to secular nightspots.
- Average annual household expenses, by age of head of household: Tobacco products and smoking supplies: 55 to 64 years 314; 65 years and older 139
- An Italian friend of his was visiting after a long absence from New York. Over dinner, he talked about how impressed he was with the cleanliness of the city and the quality of life campaign. However, he said he was surprised that the campaign seemed to condone what appeared to be an increase in prostitution. How had he come to that conclusion? his host asked. Well, he said, everywhere he went there were groups of well-dressed women idling in doorways smoking.
- A lifelong Baptist, Tom Lanier credits his apparent recovery from inoperable lung cancer to his strong religious beliefs. . . Tom Lanier blames his lung cancer on heavy smoking over a long period of time. That's why he has renounced his family's tobacco heritage. . . He says such talk outrages his cousins, who still raise tobacco in Harnett County. He won't back off, however.
- My journey toward fitness began two years ago with the giant step of quitting a 35-year smoking habit. After many halfhearted attempts to quit before, I had resigned myself to always being an obese smoker, and I might as well just accept it. After spending a long weekend playing music in a particularly smoky bar, I awoke the next morning feeling terrible. . . Two days later, I put on my first patch and never looked back.
- Harbortown Market, the grocery and specialty food store at the gates of the Harbortown Community on East Jefferson, is snuffing out cigarette sales. "Recent government actions against smokers have caused Harbortown to reexamine its commitment to sell this product," says Tom George, Harbortown co-owner. "Being forced to collect a tax which appears to be punitive to our customers seems counterproductive in a store which strives to serve its customers."
- The nation's fight over tobacco came to Baltimore yesterday with the introduction of a City Council bill that would tax cigars and pipe and chewing tobacco 36 cents to 90 cents per sale. The bill, introduced by Southwest Baltimore Councilman Norman A. Handy Sr., comes a month after the state legislature balked at adding a $1.50-a-pack tax to cigarettes. . . Maryland is one of only seven states that does not tax cigars and other tobacco.
- Maryland gubernatorial candidate EILEEN M. REHRMANN, currently Harford county executive, yesterday called for an increase in state cigarette taxes and a new tax on smokeless tobacco. Rehrmann (D) said the amount of the increases should be decided after Congress acts on proposed cigarette taxes at the federal level. But Rehrmann said any money collected should be used to reduce youth addiction to tobacco and to help farmers convert to new crops.
- In Chicago, Cook County and across Illinois, tax collectors are finding it harder to count on so-called sin taxes from alcohol and cigarettes. Cigarette sales are down 300 million packs in the past 10 years, a 24 percent drop.
- The new ad, part of the state's $22-million-a-year anti-smoking campaign, portrays a black-tie gala. A debonair man wearing a tuxedo eyes an elegant young woman dressed in a clinging gown. She gazes at him. He lights a cigarette. His cigarette goes limp. She smirks, shakes her head and walks away.
- California is unloading on the tobacco industry with a new $22 million ad campaign that takes aim at smokers -- directly below the belt.
- The Marlboro Man needs Viagra. That's the implied message from a not-so-subtle California ad campaign illustrating a link between smoking and impotence.
- Images of men smoking limp cigarettes, suggesting a link between smoking and impotence, are among the latest ads in the state's $22 million assault on tobacco this year. The 25 radio, TV and print ads begin airing next Monday as part of a three-year, $67.5 million anti-smoking state campaign.
- Ads Target Tobacco Industry Marketing to Kids, Secondhand Smoke ... and Impotence
- California's top health officials will unveil the state's new tobacco education advertising campaign -- 25 ads that target the tobacco industry's marketing to kids, secondhand smoke... and impotence. Impotence?
- The British Columbia government is clamping down on tobacco companies and the people who sell their products. It introduced amendments to the TOBACCO SALES ACT on Tuesday that call for the public disclosure of ingredients and additives in cigarettes. The amendments also seek the disclosure of toxic emissions and health hazards of tobacco products sold in the province.
- WEST Australian Premier Richard Court yesterday moved to stem Cabinet infighting over anti-smoking regulations to prevent key ministers from feuding publicly over the issue. . . In an extraordinary prelude to the Cabinet meeting, Labour Relations Minister Graham Kierath and Health Minister Kevin Prince took to commercial radio yesterday to sell their conflicting positions on passive smoking regulations. Mr Kierath claimed the Occupational Health and Safety regulations he snuck past Cabinet last year, combined with an employer's legal responsibility to provide a safe workplace under the OHS Act, would effectively ban smoking in all enclosed workplaces.
- Labelling requirements for cigarette tar levels are to be tightened next month and overall content cut by 2000, Xinhua reported yesterday. Packaging will be required to specify tar content in milligrams per cigarette, replacing vague statements like "medium" or "low" tar, State Tobacco Monopoly Bureau official Yu Minfang said.
- Poor people have a death rate as much as three times higher than that of other groups. But smoking, drinking, overeating and lack of exercise account, at most, for 13 percent of the gap, researchers concluded in a study in Wednesday's Journal of the American Medical Association. Instead, experts speculated that lack of medical care, the stress of poverty, dangerous jobs and polluted homes and neighborhoods account for much of difference. "For a long time, we've been focusing on trying to reduce risky health behaviors, such as smoking, drinking and being physically inactive," said PAULA M. LANTZ, the study's author and a professor of public health at the UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN. "That's an important goal, but it won't fully close the gap between poor people and other people."
- Of the stinky workplace smells reported in the BANISH(TM) Smoke Odor Survey, tobacco smoke odor offends 72 percent of Americans, ranking behind only body odor (95 percent) and bad breath (92 percent). "Whether you smoke or not, smelling like an ashtray can burn bridges to employment and career growth," said workplace etiquette expert Susan Morem. "A spritz of perfume or cologne won't overcome the lingering smell of tobacco smoke on hair or clothing -- nor the consequences."
- The second fire started at about 11:10 p.m. at 15 Crawford St., at a two-story single-family home, Lt. Richardson said. The cause appeared to be a cigarette left burning in a couch in the second-floor living room. The fire was confined to the room, a nearby hallway and concealed space between the second floor and the first-floor ceiling.
- A woman suffered second-degree burns on her leg and smoke inhalation when a fire erupted on the couch where she had fallen asleep with a lit cigarette, authorities said. Martha Lopez was treated at St. John's Regional Medical Center after the 3 a.m. fire Sunday at Plaza Vista, a city-run apartment building for senior citizens at 801 South C St.
- Time to dis the derriere patch, smokers. There's a hip new way to stub out cigarettes -- and it tastes good, too. Lick a lollipop! "It's been embraced as the healthy and sexy alternative to smoking, as well as something fun and childish," explains Greag Heanue of Chupa Chups (pronounced CHOO-pa choops), the world's largest producer of lollipops.
- When NASA travels to Mir for the last time, an ex-cosmonaut who lost 55 pounds to fit into a spacesuit will be along for the ride. VALERY RYUMIN, the tough-talking, gruff-looking director of Russia's Mir-shuttle program, hasn't been in space for 18 years. . . Despite his space credentials, Ryumin strikes many as a politically incorrect choice for reasons other than weight and language. This is the guy, after all, who: . . Supposedly snuck a smoke aboard Salyut 6, a serious violation even by Russian standards. When asked recently if this was true, Ryumin guffawed and replied: "All sorts of experiments may occur in the environment."
- The call by black religious leaders here to ban tobacco billboards near homes, schools, churches and wellness and recreation centers here should come as no surprise. . . Tobacco industry officials are no fools. They spend lots of money in minority communities. Various minority organizations and events rely on the industry to survive. . . . Black publishers may be less likely than others to decry the effects of tobacco on African-American communities because of that. . . In the last two years, R.J. Reynolds has given out more than $800,000 to groups ranging from the Congressional Hispanic Caucus to the Korean American Liquor Market Association. Meanwhile, Phillip Morris spent $24 million last year doing business with minority-owned companies, much of it on advertising with struggling ethnic papers and magazines. . . . those in the advertising industry know that savvy billboards and ad placement can make a significant difference in sales. The tobacco industry knows that. It will take courage for some aldermen to vote for the measure.
- "Since cigarettes are still being sold illegally to children, what needs to be done to stop this and help keep children from smoking?" Bugg-Bey asked. Satcher is used to being grilled about tobacco regulation, but usually the questions come from reporters, politicians, or lobbyists. However, Bugg-Bey and other students ages 9 to 14 had Satcher in the hot seat to ask about tobacco concerns.
- A corner grocer whose business dried up after he quit selling alcohol and tobacco said he will likely lose his store after it was sold for back taxes. Lenzlea Mosby Jr. said he closed the business in January and declared bankruptcy because of the decline in sales after he stopped carrying beer, wine and cigarettes in March 1997. . . "I didn't want to be the cause of any more young people starting to smoke." He said his sales plunged as much as 75 percent, and most people who supported him when he publicly poured out beer and made a bonfire of tobacco products didn't shop at his store afterward. "I can understand," he said. "They didn't live in this area and it was out of their way for them to come by."
- The Fairfax County Attorney's office has snuffed out a proposal to prohibit county employees from smoking off the job. County Attorney David P. Bobzien, in a letter sent Monday to the Board of Supervisors, said the county does not have the legal authority to require its employees to be nonsmokers. The board, at the request of Supervisor Gerald W. Hyland, D-Mount Vernon, voted unanimously last month to explore whether the county could hire only nonsmokers, force new employees to stop smoking or give preference to abstainers in the hiring process.
- Most of the late campaign money came from big business and organized labor. Tobacco giant PHILIP MORRIS, for example, gave $60,000 to Assembly Republican Leader BILL LEONARD last weekend, and its beer-making subsidiary, Miller Brewing, gave $10,000 to Assembly candidate Tom Calderon, a Whittier Democrat and brother of state Sen. Charles Calderon (D-Whittier), who ran for attorney general.
- Mirjana [Spasic] died in February from cancer her doctors say was linked to two decades of heavy smoking. But her legal war on the tobacco industry will continue. She had launched a $1-million lawsuit against British American Tobacco and Imperial Tobacco . . But she knew she would die before the case ever went to trial, so her lawyers had her testimony recorded. Mirjana's 4,000 answers, tears and all, are preserved on close to 80 hours of videotape that is now in the possession of a downtown Toronto law office. The tapes are her legacy. "It is powerful testimony," said the family's lawyer, Andreas Seibert. "The cross-examination was rigorous. This is a woman who had terminal lung cancer and brain cancer facing a team of probing lawyers. But she persevered."
- The privatization of the state-run Spirit and Tobacco Administration is aimed at complying with a customs union deal with the European Union that requires the elimination of state monopolies. The 1995 customs deal is designed to make Turkish firms more competitive within the 15-nation EU. Along with the privatization of spirit factories, the government also moved to lift the state monopoly on tobacco production.
- Heavy advertising of alcohol and tobacco may be encouraging young people to take drugs, a damning Government report warns today. . . "For many young people alcohol, tobacco and illicit drugs inhabit one and the same world," says the Home Office's ADVISORY COUNCIL ON THE MISUSE OF DRUGS. . . Welcoming the report, Home Office drugs minister GEORGE HOWARTH said: "It recognises that drug problems do not exist in isolation and can only be tackled by considering the wider social environment."
- Heavy advertising of alcohol - particularly alcopops - and cigarettes may be encouraging young people to take illegal drugs according to a report published yesterday. If young people are to avoid taking illicit drugs, the way we treat alcohol and tobacco must be seen as part of the whole context
- Though the management of Khyber Tobacco Company Limited (KTCL) has portrayed a picture as if the company was not operational during 1996-97, but official record and comments of the Employees Old Age Benefit Institution (EOBI) Mardan regarding the affairs of KTCL revealed that the company during that period was operational. Official record revealed that the factual position is that M/S KTCL was closed . . . Later, the new management started production, keeping EOBI and other department in dark so that to avoid payment of contribution to EOBI of their labourers.
- If all Maoris gave up smoking they could save the equivalent of the $1 billion "fiscal envelope" allocated for Treaty of Waitangi settlements, National MP Georgina Te Heuheu says. Mrs Te Heuheu said that 48 per cent of Maori adults -- 172,000 people -- smoke, spending $34.4 million dollars a year on cigarettes.
- NICOTINE puffers may not find an ally in JOSEPH ESTRADA. The President-elect plans to ban smoking in government offices. The pending move elated SEN. JUAN FLAVIER, former health secretary of the Ramos Cabinet . . . Flavier also said he will file a bill curbing smoking especially among teens. His bill is known as Stop Tobacco and Other Products or (Stop) for Health Act, or the Health Act of 1998.
- Spanish tobacco company Tabacalera SA's (E.TAB) latest alliance means its stock has an upside of around 32%, Grupo BBV's brokerage arm said Wednesday.
- "We will align our marketing and selling practices here in the USA and overseas so that we cannot be accused of marketing cigarettes to youth," GEOFFREY C. BIBLE, chairman of the nation's largest tobacco company, told employees in New York. Pledging to put the youth-marketing issue "behind us once and for all," Bible said he recently appointed a senior executive to "design more actions" to back up the company's long-held claim that it does not try to appeal to youngsters.
- DIMON Incorporated this week announced that it has successfully merged on to the information superhighway with the opening of its home page on the Internet. In doing so, DIMON became the first of the world's major leaf tobacco dealers to open an official site on the World Wide Web. The interactive Web page can be accessed at www.dimon-inc.com
- Lexington Mayor Pam Miller said yesterday she will create a task force on immigration. Miller's announcement came amid discussion of several other initiatives aimed at improving services for Central Kentucky's growing numbers of Hispanic workers, both legal and illegal: . . Miller met yesterday with Lexington Hispanic Association President Ben Figueras, who asked the city to help families left behind after INS officials arrested more than 80 illegal immigrants at a Lexington tobacco company in May and sent them back to Mexico.
- Two of Spain's largest retailers -- the tobacco company TABACALERA SA and clothing distributor CORTEFIEL SA -- have teamed up to create one of the first electronic-retail chains in Europe. . . The chain, called ViaPlus, will offer products ranging from theater tickets, books and records, to television sets, flowers, gourmet foods and clothing. Tabacalera will own 75% of the venture and Cortefiel will own the remainder. . . Scheduled to begin operating in October, ViaPlus will have electronic stores in tobacco shops, Cortefiel stores, supermarkets and other public areas "where large numbers of people pass through every day"
- Here was a man who, in 1964, went to Florida to argue against Social Security, to North Carolina to attack tobacco subsidies
- For the mostly new faculty [at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill], it's a sweeping, and at times superficial, seminar on wheels, looking at the geography, history, culture and economics of North Carolina. Between hurried stops, the faculty members lecture each other on a range of topics, from the importance of tobacco farming in the state's economy to local politics.
- As they roar at fantastic speeds around the curves of the Belle Isle Grand Prix race course this weekend, the NicoDerm-Nicorette Champ Car and the Kool Team Green car will target cigarette smokers. Those behind the Kool Team Green car and other tobacco-sponsored cars in the Grand Prix want smokers to identify with their brands and light up. The NicoDerm team is the first in major league auto racing whose sponsor wants people to quit smoking.
- Rochester City Councilman Tim O. Mains is reviving legislation that calls for a limit on tobacco advertising in the city. . . Now, Mains is focusing only on tobacco ads within 1,000 feet of schools, recreation centers, playgrounds and day-care centers.
- NEW YORK, June 4 (UPI) - A 44-year-old Queens man is accused of using a home computer and a printing press in his garage to run a multimillion dollar counterfeit operation. German Sevillano has been charged with creating cigarette tax stamps and selling them to tobacco smugglers.
- The city of Buffalo is considering an ordinance that would ban outdoor advertisements for cigarettes within 1, 000 feet of schools, community centers and playgrounds. City Council President JAMES PITTS says the council realizes there should be legislation like this because of the effect cigarette advertising has on young people. The ordinance could be voted on as early as July.
- After fielding several inquiries from smoking opponents in southern Orange, county leaders are studying the idea of of taxing federal allotments for tobacco, a crop that is grown almost exclusively at the other end of the county. Maybe the county will tax the allotments and maybe it won't, but one thing is sure: The issue will strike sparks in the rural and more conservative north, where residents often complain that Chapel Hill and its larger population have too much influence in county matters.
- Winston Bryant, generally attacking, and Blanche Lincoln, usually responding, pestered each other over Medicare, debates, campaign contributions, Social Security and other things. . . In closing remarks, Bryant criticized Lincoln for signing a letter opposing the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's regulation of tobacco while in Congress. . . "Giving FDA the capability to regulate the sale of a product, the advertising of a product, all of those things, goes a little bit beyond FDA's constitutional capabilities, or certainly their constitutional rights," Lincoln had said.
- Fourteen candidates for statewide office publicly swore off tobacco money for their campaigns Wednesday, joining 15 others who previously took the pledge promoted by the American Heart Association. . . . Lawyers who represent tobacco companies aren't covered by the pledge. Since the pledge was unveiled in July, all of the major-party candidates for governor except LT. GOV. JOANNE BENSON and Waverly businessman DICK BORRELL, both Republicans, have taken it.
- A new poll says Minnesota Attorney General HUBERT H. HUMPHREY, surfing waves of publicity from his legal victory over the tobacco industry, leads other DFLers and also the leading Republican candidate for governor.
- In the Pioneer Press/MPR/KARE-TV poll, 30 percent said the tobacco case makes it more likely they will vote for Humphrey, while 21 percent said it makes them less likely to do so. Forty-nine percent said it would have no effect. The Minnesota Poll said the trial boosted Humphrey' s name recognition to 95 percent from 90 percent. But 53 percent of that poll' s respondents said the trial would make no difference in their vote, and roughly equal numbers said the trial made them more likely or less likely to support Humphrey, 23 percent to 20 percent. " Tobacco is over. Now it' s time to talk about all the other issues, " said Freeman.
- The first test, however, comes this weekend when state DFL Party convention delegates in St. Cloud decide whom to endorse.
- Four leading tobacco companies are fighting moves to ban smoking in public places and cigarette advertising.
- Britain's tobacco companies said on Wednesday they had launched leading a legal challenge against what they said was a flawed official report that made recommendations to government on the dangers of smoking. In a joint statement, B.A.T Industries Plc, Gallaher Group Plc, Imperial Tobacco Group Plc and Rothmans (UK) said they had applied for a judicial review of the process which led to the report of the Scientific Committee on Tobacco and Health (SCOTH), published in March. SCOTH advises the ruling Labour government's Department of Health on tobacco issues. The companies contend that SCOTH failed to consult the tobacco industry and experts, so that many of the report's conclusions are "unsubstantiated and flawed." "The tobacco companies hope that the courts will instruct SCOTH to revise or withdraw its report, and that the government will not use (it)," said the four in a statement.
- An influential group of British scientists hit back at the tobacco industry on Thursday, saying it had considered their views before submitting a damning report to the government's chief medical officer. . . On Wednesday Britain's four leading tobacco firms launched a legal challenge to what they said was a flawed report that made recommendations to government on the dangers of smoking. In a joint statement, B.A.T Industries Plc, Gallaher Group Plc, Imperial Tobacco Group Plc and Rothmans (UK) said they had applied for a judicial review of the process which led to the report by the Scientific Committee on Tobacco and Health (SCOTH), published in March.
- With Imperial Tobacco sponsoring SPRUCE MEADOWS' MASTERS tournament under its du Maurier brand name with $725,000 in prize money, Rock's announcement was greeted with relief by Spruce Meadows' founder Ron Southern. "Du Maurier has been super to us here and their support of the event is not just the prize money," Southern said. "They've helped in transporting people and networking of advertising. It's far more than the prize money that the competitors and the fans see."
- She reiterated the industry's view the Tobacco Act is unconstitutional because it violates cigarette manufacturers' freedom of expression. Ironically, Lapointe's views coincide with those of many health activists who predict the sponsorship ban, scheduled for 2004, is unlikely to stand up to industry pressure over the intervening years. "We are profoundly worried," said Louis Gauvin of the Coalition for Tobacco Control, a Quebec anti-smoking group. "We know very well the organization and power of the tobacco industry."
- JOHN STERNE admits to a "little tear" when he read about the latest federal regulations for tobacco companies' sponsorship of cultural and sporting events. The executive director of ORCHESTRA LONDON, which recently completed its du Maurier-sponsored Russian festival, says of the rules: "It's another source (of funding) taken away from us."
- Health Minister ALLAN ROCK has received qualified praise from both sides of the country's polarized tobacco debate with his five-year reprieve to arts, sports and cultural events dependent on cigarette sponsorship. But the minister drew angry fire in the House of Commons from opposition parties, which accused him of pandering to the tobacco lobby and watering down existing legislation.
- Health activists are angry but not surprised at the federal decision to permit tobacco-industry sponsorship of arts and sporting events for another five years. They say the latest move fits a pattern of steady concessions to the industry which has characterized the Liberal government since it was first elected. "It's consistent with what this government has done so far on tobacco," said Cynthia Callard of Physicians for a Smoke-Free Canada. "On a scale of one to 10, I'd give them a zero."
- Antismoking groups, along with Reform and NDP health critics, say it is the young Canadians entering high school now who will pay the price for the amendments to the Tobacco Act tabled yesterday by Health Minister Allan Rock. "I look upon those just entering high school now . . . those are the kids that are being left without the protection of this government," said Reform critic Dr. Grant Hill.
- The Canadian government announced plans to restrict tobacco sponsorships of sports and cultural events in two years and ban them in five years.
- The federal government must stop bargaining with the tobacco companies. These companies have known for years about the damage their products have inflicted. They have hidden the evidence of that damage. They should be in absolutely no position to dictate anything to the Canadian public or its government. Ottawa was wrong to give in to them.
- In a retreat from the Liberals' hard-line anti-smoking stand, Health Minister Allan Rock will table a watered-down amendment to the Tobacco Act in the Commons today.
- Canadian Health Minister Allan Rock, battered from fights over a tainted blood scandal, now risks igniting the wrath of health workers with a plan expected to help groups such as the Grand Prix keep their tobacco sponsorships. Rock will unveil amendments on Wednesday to last year's tough new law restricting tobacco advertising, his spokesman Derek Kent told Reuters.
- SANDRA POST is thrilled at the growth in Canadian women's golf. . . That's why Canada's best-known female golfer hopes the LPGA du Maurier Ltd. Classic, and the five-event series for the development of women in the country, will continue despite a new tobacco bill coming into effect Oct. 1. . . "I really hope the Classic survives. That's my first concern because it does so much for our country nationally and internationally," said Post
- Provincial officials said the disclosure requirement, along with new rules aimed at shaming and fining retailers who sell tobacco to minors, are part of an effort to reduce youth smoking and make the industry more accountable. "If we can force the tobacco companies to tell the public the whole truth about deadly poisons in tobacco and tobacco smoke, then people can make more informed choices about what they put in their bodies," Health Minister Penny Priddy said in a statement.
- AN accused tobacco executive told a jury he was paid $33 million for giving legitimate help to a multi-billion-dollar Taiwanese cigarette smuggling operation. JERRY LUI KIN-HONG, 42, said he helped CHEN YING-JEN find distributors for Japanese cigarettes smuggled in from Hong Kong and passed on market intelligence. At the time of the first payment Lui was working for BROWN AND WILLIAMSON Tobacco Corporation in Taiwan but said he did not see helping Chen as a clash of interests. Lui denies conspiring with former directors of GIANT ISLAND, including Chen, to accept $33 million in advantages between August 1988 and May 1993.
- Lui said that at the time he met Mr Patten, he knew the Independent Commission Against Corruption had raided his Hong Kong home and sent officers to look for him in the Philippines. He told the Court of First Instance he had not been acting like a fugitive and hiding away, but had been running his business in Subic Bay.
- One of the most copied B.A.T products is 555 cigarettes, Vietnam's top-selling brand. Not a month goes by without several new versions popping up, Mr. Wilson says. Variations include "5555" and "333." The top of the 5555 packaging boasts the purported autograph of Omar Sharif, a Hollywood heartthrob from a bygone era.
- Zimbabwe's High Court is to be asked to rule whether President Robert Mugabe's government is liable for up to Z$1bn worth of fraudulent bills issued by Roger Boka's failed United Merchant Bank on behalf of the parastatal Cold Storage Commission.
Government liability for the Z$2bn debts of Boka's failed group of companies, including giant Z$200m tobacco floors, could again push the budget deficit beyond targets agreed with the International Monetary Fund and endanger further support, announced by the IMF board in Washington on Monday.
- Blue mold has arrived in Lancaster, threatening the county's $22 million tobacco crop. The fungal disease already hastaken up residence on three county farms, according to county agronomy extension agent Bob Anderson.
- As if financial losses, lawsuits and allegations of cigar counterfeiting were not enough, Miami-based Caribbean Cigar now faces yet another problem: finding a new top executive. The maker of premium stogies announced on Wednesday that its president and chairman, RONALD G. FARRELL, had resigned -- just two months after he'd taken the helm.
- Caribbean Cigar Co said Tuesday that RONALD FARRELL resigned effective immediately as president, chief executive officer and chairman of the board. . . Until a replacement is found, EDWARD WILLIAMS will serve as interim president, the company said in a statement. STEPHEN WERTHEIMER also resigned from the board of directors due to conflicts with other responsibilities.
- 40% of GMs report that cigarettes and liquor combined account for the most frequently shoplifted items of 1998 -- that's an increase of 180% from 1997 for these two product categories.
- [A]ccording to a survey by the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University in North Carolina. . . . Sixty-four percent of respondents said they would not work in certain industries because of ethical concerns. Top of the blacklist were tobacco producers (91%) - perhaps surprising in an area where economic prosperity has been built on tobacco. Second came alcohol manufacturers (22%).
- Before the music begins, the audience will be shown an anti-smoking public service announcement starring those caring, young, good Boyz. "There are a lot of teen-agers that smoke a great deal," vocalist SHAWN STOCKMAN says. "A lot of the teen-agers that are smoking are getting into it because of peer pressure. We're just trying to make teen-agers more aware and more conscious of their decision."
- "I said, `No, I'm not going to smoke a cigarette of TV.' Davis was clear in his conviction. "The reason I wouldn't do it was that somewhere out there, there would be one person watching, looking and saying, `Well, he smoked. So I'll smoke a cigarette, too.' "In doing that (smoking on TV), I figured that I might be the reason that that person's chances to be in sports, even be an Olympian, might be ruined. I just didn't want to be the reason that someone would do that."
- The House action also corrected errors in legislative language that would eliminate $15.4 billion in veterans health benefits for tobacco-related ailments to partially offset the increase in highway spending.
- A legal opinion from the state's attorney's office said the proposed ordinance goes "way beyond any express or implied authority the county has." So the County Board's Public Health and Human Services Committee on Thursday decided to ask the state's attorney's office to help write a new ordinance to regulate cigarette-vending machines.
- That proposal went down in flames after restaurants and bars complained they might go out of business if the Village Board approved such a ban. In recent days, the health board has begun kicking around a new idea: providing financial incentives to encourage restaurants and bars to ban smoking in the way of reduced licensing fees and possibly lower sales tax.
- Lobbyists for scores of national interests - including tobacco, HMOs and Indian gambling - will host a Washington fund-raiser this month for GOV. GEORGE W. BUSH. . . Mr. Bush's Democratic foe, GARRY MAURO, has sought to capitalize on such events . . . Those lobbyists represent clients that include BROWN AND WILLIAMSON Tobacco Co. . . A Bush campaign spokeswoman noted that Mr. Mauro is the only candidate in the governor's race who has accepted a campaign contribution directly from the tobacco industry, through a company political action committee.
- The proposal sailed through a subcommittee of the Recreation and Park Commission yesterday and appears likely to win final approval from the full commission in two weeks. Larger parks, including Golden Gate Park, would not be included in the ban. . . "These are defined areas where children play," said Michael Morlin, assistant superintendent of neighborhood services for the Recreation and Park Department.
- LAWS banning duty-free shopping in the European Union from next June will not apply to shops that move - ferries, cruise ships and planes - P&O has been advised. . . "There is nothing in the legislation stopping you selling duty-free goods in international waters," Vic Moorcraft, P&O's indirect tax manager, said yesterday.
- A tripartite four-day national seminar on globalisation and its impact on industrial relations organised by the INTERNATIONAL LABOUR ORGANISATION (ILO) was concluded in Colombo recently. In the keynote paper presented by Institute of Policy Studies Executive Director Dr. Saman Kelegama called for enhancing the capacity of Labour Department Officials. . . CEYLON TOBACCO COMPANY Director of Personnel J.D. BANDARANAYAKE in his presentation noted that there must be the will of the people in the enterprise particularly the leadership to protect the enterprise from destruction and raise the standards to generate excellence.
- On Monday, an international anti-smoking day, the government decided to activate its anti-smoking law, but tobacco smoke still filled public offices and courthouses around the Jordanian capital, Amman, throughout the week. The public, government employees, public prosecutors and even judges smoke in their offices and in hallways where ash trays line walls plastered with large "No Smoking" signs.
- The Israel Medical Association petitioned the High Court of Justice against Minister of Health Yehoshua Matza and Israeli cigarette companies in an application to declare nicotine and tobacco as "dangerous drugs." The Association demands to have controls and restrictions imposed on the growth, production, sale, import and use of tobacco, nicotine and cigarettes in Israel.
- SJI Group, Inc., one of the country's leading distributors of premium cigars, today announced that the Premium Product Lines of Swisher International Group Inc., which recently entered into a joint marketing agreement with SJI that named Swisher as the exclusive sponsor of SJI's CIGAR BUS, has unveiled an extensive appearance schedule for the Cigar Bus. The schedule includes appearances at a number of Senior PGA Tour events this year, including the upcoming BellSouth Senior Classic in Nashville, Tennessee (June 12 -14). Swisher also plans to use the Cigar Bus during the course of the year at upcoming industry trade shows and in conjunction with events and promotions it will be conducting with certain of its and SJI's retail accounts.
- Indonesia listed cigarette maker PT Gudang Garam (P.GGR) posted first quarter earnings of IDR227.1 billion, up 33% from IDR170.4 billion in the year-ago period.
- Duke loved modern dance, an art form born and bred in this country. She studied with Graham and, in fact, supported the modern dance pioneer, who was one of ADF's founders. Duke supported Alvin Ailey and Katherine Dunham, too, long before most of America knew or cared about modern dance.
- SHERINGHAM's photo was splashed across British newspapers Friday, showing him with a cigarette in his mouth and his arm draped around a young woman in a bar on Portugal's Algarve coast.
- ENGLAND'S soccer squad arrived at their Buckinghamshire headquarters yesterday with one player, TEDDY SHERINGHAM, the focus of attention because of his moonlight activities. Sheringham, 32, was reported to have spent two successive nights this week drinking in Portuguese bars. . . Newspaper reports said Sheringham had been drinking, smoking cigarettes and in intimate proximity with an English blonde in a nightclub in Albufeira at 6.45am on Wednesday.
- OF all the clobber England's footballers take to the World Cup - tracksuits, eucalyptus creams, cans of miracle cold spray - the most important objects will be 22 black and yellow plastic keys. . . The key is an electronic spy that unlocks a machine called a Technogym. . .The machine also monitors heart beats, using a chest belt that transmits the pulse to a receiver on the treadmill. This was Gazza's "fagbuster", the device that could not lie about the impact smoking was having on his performance
- And a 12-year-old boy wasn't able to share a joyful hug with the father who led him down this academic road to victory.Instead, the boy was up in his room venting his anger and hurt -- writing a letter to tobacco manufacturers. . . Brian [Weiss] had come up with a better plan. With his rabbi's blessing, he was using the letter as his act of good deed for his bar mitzvah next year--using it to gather signatures for a anti-smoking petition to send to tobacco manufacturers and politicians. A 12-year-old boy going out and spreading the word to anyone who will listen about how it is to lose a father you love very much to a bad habit that kills.
- David Walsh, the maverick Canadian mining promoter who died in the Bahamas on Thursday, pocketed millions of dollars as a key figure in one of the world's biggest gold frauds and left a legacy of recriminations and lawsuits. The pot-bellied, chain-smoking former president of BRE-X MINERALS LTD. died at Doctors Hospital in Nassau just four days after a massive stroke left him on life support. He was 52. "David was overweight, he smoked and he drank. If anybody was a candidate for a heart attack, I would say he was a good one," family friend George Damianos told Reuters from the Bahamas.
- WE MIGHT NEVER KNOW why it took Fairfax County Attorney David Bobzien two whole weeks to snuff out Mount Vernon Supervisor Gerry Hyland's ridiculous idea of hiring only non-smokers or forcing county employees to quit smoking. It was obvious back on May 18, the day Brother Hyland floated his proposal, that it would flat-out violate state law and be an egregious violation into the personal lives of county employees besides.
- What would you do about cigarettes? As a provincial politician, you know cigarettes are deadly and that more Quebecers die of lung cancer than just about anywhere else on the continent. That's why you: A. Offered restaurants another 10 years to put in a no-smoking section. B. Gave dealers in contraband cigarettes an attractive tax break.
- House Republican leaders overcame enormous resistance within their own ranks Friday to pass a controversial 1999 budget plan . . TOBACCO: The House budget does not factor in the potential effects of tobacco legislation lawmakers are considering. . . If a bill becomes law, it would determine how the money is used, overriding any proposals in the budget.
- In what lawyers acknowledge is an unusual move, the industry asked the Court of Appeals on Thursday to overturn the decision of Baltimore Circuit Judge EDWARD ANGELETTI allowing a case to proceed as a class action instead of as suits filed individually by smokers seeking money from tobacco companies. GARY LONG, a lawyer for the industry, said the extraordinary nature of the suit warrants what he acknowledged was an extremely rare attempt to overturn a ruling authorizing a class action suit. . . . "Why let the action proceed for years and years ... if it's only going to be reversed later?" Long said.
- U.S. District Judge Jose Antonio Fuste has denied a series of motions by the defendants to dismiss the case against them. Of particular note, Judge Fuste rejected a move by four industry law firms to remove themselves as defendants in the lawsuit, a ruling which is the first of its kind. He also ruled that there is sufficient evidence to allow Puerto Rico's claim under the civil Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act to go to trial.
- Little-noticed court rulings, including a recent state supreme-court decision, have gone its way, undercutting the ability of some states and local governments to recover health-care outlays for treating sick smokers. A wave of similar suits brought by union health funds to recover their payouts linked to smoking also has, by and large, hit a wall.
- Attorney General SCOTT HARSHBARGER, the earnest statewide office holder who has received a cool reception from party regulars, won the Democratic convention by a hair on Saturday. . . A relaxed-looking Harshbarger doffed his suit jacket to give his speech to delegates and hit some light notes when he criticized CELLUCCI, who has the advantages of incumbency as well as a massive war chest. The criticisms came in the form of a mock letter to Cellucci, telling hime what Harshbarger had been doing in recent years. ``While you were busy vetoing health care for poor kids - I was tackling Big Tobacco,'' Harshbarger said.
- When KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON first ran for the Senate she depended on contributions from tobacco interests to help fill her campaign coffers. But more recently, the Texas Republican decided to kick the habit, joining an increasing number of lawmakers trying to distance themselves from an unpopular industry. . . "I decided they were not telling the truth," she said.
- Minnesota Secretary of State Joan Growe says she plans to offer a resolution next Thursday at the State Investment Board to ban new tobacco investments.
- Raising cigarette prices, a central element of proposals to reduce teen smoking, is viewed as a meaningless exercise by more than 60 percent of Minnesotans. Indeed, nearly half of the respondents to a Star Tribune/ KMSP-TV Minnesota Poll -- 48 percent -- strongly disagreed with the notion that higher state and federal excise taxes would discourage smoking.
- Billboard and alcohol companies are fighting hard against City Councilman MIKE FEUER's plan to virtually eliminate alcohol and tobacco billboards from the city of Los Angeles.
- Maryland anti-smoking activists asked all gubernatorial candidates to sign a tax pledge . . . Only GLENDENING has signed the pledge to increase the cigarette tax by $1.50 a pack and begin taxing other tobacco products such as cigars, snuff and chewing tobacco. Ms. REHRMANN would increase the tax, but will not sign the pledge because she does not want to commit herself to the spending program it contains, said George Harrison, her campaign spokesman.
- Overdue debt rescheduling, fresh loans to pay debts and tax exemptions or reductions will be curtailed for distilleries, breweries, sugar mills, cigarette makers and garment and textile manufacturers.
- A third of new zealand's MAORIS die from diseases caused by smoking, according to a new study. This toll, described as "devastating" by the New Zealand Ministry of Maori Development, is almost twice as high as that caused by smoking in the country's non-Maori population--and higher than that recorded in any indigenous population worldwide. The study was conducted for the ministry by Health New Zealand, a consultancy in Auckland.
- The parent company of Zimbabwe's main tobacco auction floor says the volume of the crop being sold will make up for the disappointingly low prices being paid.
- The fine print in Health Minister Allan Rock's tobacco amendment contains a huge loophole allowing the government to delay the sponsorship ban indefinitely, critics say. Health groups and opposition MPs are up in arms over the final clause of Rock's controversial amendment to the Tobacco Act introduced Wednesday. It says it's up to cabinet to "prescribe a day" for the amendment to kick in. Although Rock said he intends to make cultural and sporting event organizers wean themselves from tobacco sponsorship money by 2003, the fine print reveals that time-line is entirely arbitrary.
- Among the schemes they use to hide the money trail is ``smurfing.'' Here's how it works: . . The brokers hire people in the United States to open checking accounts at U.S. banks with small deposits. One broker can employ dozens of people, who are known as ``smurfs'' after the diminutive blue cartoon characters. . . Businesses in Colombia that need U.S. dollars to import goods buy the checks from the currency brokers with Colombian pesos, fill in the payee's name, and cash the checks. The businesses then ship or smuggle the goods -- most often computers, cars, appliances, liquor and cigarettes -- into Colombia.
- When the ban on event sponsorship kicks in in 2003, cigarette makers will lose one thing that prevents them from all looking the same in consumers' eyes: the alchemy of image. . . They will lose their back door into the magic of modern marketing: their access to the alchemy of image. Corporate sponsorships allow cigarette makers to imbue boxes of otherwise indistinguishable white sticks with personality, say marketers.
- For years, a hush-hush committee of lawyers -- the Tobacco Institute's Committee of Counsel -- was allegedly the primary architect of the unyielding fight-and-deny strategy that turned Big Tobacco into such a national pariah. An investigation of recently released documents to be published in the June 15 issue of Business Week reveals the inner workings of a group allegedly so powerful that even high-level executives felt unable to challenge it
- It usually is better, as you suggest in your letter, to give her "a few months" to make other living arrangements if she can't or won't quit . . . If the tenant still won't cooperate after the notice of change of terms of tenancy expires (i.e., she keeps smoking and won't move), you will have to give her a three-day notice to abide by the rental agreement, which now includes the no-smoking provision, or move out.
- Followers of the legal saga of Lyle and Erik Menendez firmly believe in Menendez karma. . . Now, it seems, Menendez karma is paying a visit to SUPERIOR COURT JUDGE NANCY BROWN. . . The California Commission on Judicial Performance announced last week that it has initiated formal proceedings against Brown, a 62-year-old courthouse veteran. She also is accused of displaying an artificial marijuana plant in court, banning an administrator from her courtroom and smoking cigarettes (not the funny kind) in her chambers, where lighting up is banned, as it is throughout the courthouse.
- Charles A. Whipple of Falmouth and Naples, Fla., a retired Philip Morris Co. executive, died Friday at Brighton Gardens Nursing Home in Naples. He was 75. Mr. Whipple worked for Philip Morris for 37 years, the last 14 years as a vice president of retail sales for Miller Brewing Co. He retired in 1986.
- His name was Barry Morris Goldwater, and he was a most unlikely revolutionary. He was the grandson of a Jewish peddler-turned-millionaire; a college dropout whose book "The Conscience of a Conservative" (1960) sold more than 3.5 million copies and was once required reading at Harvard; a man who never smoked a cigarette or drank a cup of coffee but kept a bottle of Old Crow in his Senate office for after-five sippin'
- "Life Prerecorded" maps out the moods and transgressions of a pregnant reformed smoker. . . But she doesn't stop night-dreaming and day-dreaming about smoking, about her past and her fears for the future. At story's end, her young daughter is pretending to smoke. " 'I'm pretending it's long, long ago. Back when cigarettes were good for you,' " little Gwendolyn says. "With that she takes another puff and blows her smoke my way, and I lean close to breathe it all in."
- "For example, the story "Life Prerecorded" [about a pregnant woman looking forward and back] began with a lot images, dreams, fragments that I wanted to put into words. I didn't think how they would all connect. At the start I thought they wouldn't. The glue that connected them was the smoking image that emerged in the writing. Quitting smoking, early memories of smoking, growing up in a town that thrived as a tobacco market, images of my father long before I knew him, I saw I could use that to pull together this story about birth and rebirth."
- I explained the rationale behind the gun and tobacco litigation is that the producers have knowingly sold what they know to be potentially life-threatening products and, in the case of tobacco, may actually have conspired to make their product more addictive. . . "And I suppose burgers and fries are being marketed to Steve Forbes, Bill Gates and the du Ponts," the cabby said. "You think they're not trying to make Big Macs and Quarter-Pounders as addictive as they can? You think I enjoy looking like this? They've hooked me is what they've done, and I'm suing them for all they're worth."
- Maybe, just maybe, before the second stage of the reprieve kicks in, those rocket scientists who want to tell us what and what not to do with our lives will realize the tobacco industry's sponsorship of events - estimated to be more than $60 million a year - isn't hurting anyone.
- Mr. Starr was the lawyer who invoked attorney-client privilege, however irrelevantly, before an appellate court in 1995 to further his client's efforts to intimidate and frustrate Henry Waxman and Ron Wyden . . . The red-hot evidence Mr. Starr was trying to shield with attorney-client privilege and other legal red herrings was not of perjury about an alleged sex act but of a possibly criminal conspiracy to destroy the health of millions of Americans. . . What can't be explained, even by us armchair psychiatrists, is what possessed the independent counsel to deliver a speech trumpeting his guilt. . . Or is there an internal struggle going on here that's more Robert Louis Stevenson than Harper Lee?
- After denying that nicotine is addictive four years ago, company executives have since testified before Congress and in court that it might be. Revisiting those inconsistencies as Congress weighs national legislation now, said Mr. Black, was likely viewed inside Philip Morris as counterproductive. . .
- As part of the settlement announced Friday, Philip Morris is creating a $105 million fund for the benefit of shareholders who bought stock in Philip Morris from June 11, 1991 through May 6, 1994. . . Philip Morris and former officers named in the suit "continue to deny any liability with respect to the claims alleged" in the suit, the statement said. . . It accused Philip Morris and some of its officers and directors of violating securities laws by making false and misleading statements about cigarettes' addictive qualities. The settlement is subject to a number of conditions, including approval by the court. A hearing has been set for Oct. 16.
- Philip Morris Cos. Inc. (MO - news) said Friday it will establish a $105 million fund as part of an agreement to settle a pending shareholder securities class-action litigation against it and several former officers. The fund for the benefit of the class will include people who purchased common stock from June 11, 1991 through May 6, 1994 and will also cover attorneys' fees and other expenses ordered by the court, the company said in a statement.
- The town wants to prevent kids from smoking with a law that would prohibit stores from selling tobacco products from racks that are accessible to customers. School and town officials say the law is needed because Freeport schoolchildren are getting cigarettes by stealing them from the racks.
- Anti-tobacco crusader WARREN TOLMAN has won the Democratic party's endorsement for his shot at lieutenant governor. . . Tolman is known for championing a first-in-the nation tobacco ingredients disclosure law. But that bill has been tied up in court, where tobacco companies are arguing that it would force them to reveal trade secrets. He also supports campaign finance reform.
- The White House says tobacco companies knew about and facilitated a huge Canadian/U.S. Indian cigarette smuggling operation. TONY LAUGHING, a Mohawk Indian, is accused of smuggling almost $700 million in cigarettes into Canada.
- Barry Ford, a 35-year-old lawyer with the firm of Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton, announced that he would seek to unseat [Rep. Edolphus] Towns in the Sept. 15 primary. . . Ford's sharpest attacks have been on Towns' relationship with the tobacco industry . . . Ford said Towns had "always voted the interests and concerns of the tobacco industry." . . "Barry Ford claims that the tobacco industry has given me $60,000 over a period of 10 years," the congressman said. "Legally, they could have given me $780,000. I've gotten most of my money from the health-care community."
- And Weiqing says they saw similarities between southeast China and northeast Kentucky. "In terms of the climate, in terms of the precipitation, even the (limestone) mountain ranges, the physical environment is so similar to Guangxi," he said. There are also economic similarities. Guangxi has some coal mining. Tobacco is a major cash crop there. Guangxi doesn't have a surgeon general. But smoking is under attack there, too. Cigarette packages carry health warnings, smoking is prohibited in many public places, and tobacco products are heavily taxed, says Huang Shengjie, 35, planning division director for Guangxi Tobacco Co.
- Gov. Frank O'Bannon has accepted tobacco money while supporting a lawsuit that accuses the industry of violating Indiana law and deliberately marketing cigarettes to children. The state's major party organizations, both U.S. senators and all four Indiana legislative caucuses also have taken campaign money from defendants in the suit.
- Admitting a conflict with his "children's agenda," GOV. FRANK O'BANNON will return some of the $30,000 he accepted from the tobacco industry during the past three years. He received nearly a third of those campaign contributions since the state of Indiana filed a lawsuit accusing the industry of deliberately marketing cigarettes to children, according to an analysis by The Times of Northwest Indiana. The Times study showed O'Bannon wasn't the only politician to take a campaign handout from tobacco interests.
- Although he is one of the Senate's top recipients of campaign contributions from the tobacco industry, D'Amato has been voting with the anti-smoking forces in the early rounds in the fight over tobacco legislation. . . Those votes help undercut Democratic charges that D'Amato is often willing to help special interests in return for their campaign contributions.
- Hollywood producer and actor ROB REINER and MIKE ROOS, head of the education reform group LEARN, are sponsoring a proposition to raise cigarette taxes 50 cents per pack to pay for various child education and health programs.
- Blanche Lincoln picked up the state teacher union's endorsement Friday in her race with Winston Bryant for the Democratic Party endorsement for the U.S. Senate. . . Bryant also criticized her after a news report said she had not carried over tobacco contributions from 1996 to this year's Senate race.
- South Korea will start to sell state-run corporations to foreign investors in the second half of this year, Korean television said on Sunday. . . The corporations would include . . . Korea Telecom and Korea Tobacco and Ginseng Corp, it said.
- For centuries, what the Chinese call "the swallowing disease" has been a main killer in this rugged region; these days a stunning 20 percent of the deaths in this area of several million people are from this cancer alone. . . Dawsey expressed frustration that more than a decade of work has not unraveled the riddle of what causes esophageal cancer in Linzhou. Part of it is diet: Scalding hot tea, a persimmon cake with coarse husks, moldy pickled turnips, grain laced with silica fragments and consumer priorities that favor TVs over refrigerators all might play a role in causing the disease. Widespread smoking may also be a factor, as well as genes.
- Cuba is vowing to maintain the quality of its world-famous cigars, but smokers are unhappy about plans for increased production. "Quality always comes before quantity," said Francisco Linares, president of Habanos and the man responsible for marketing Cuba's stogies abroad.
- Cuba boasted on Friday that every one of its world-famous Havana cigars was still "a work of art" despite fears abroad of a possible decline in quality as output soars to a record 160 million this year. "The number one priority is quality before quantity," said Osvaldo Encarnacion, head of Cuba's state-run group of tobacco producers. "Each cigar that leaves the hands of a Cuban tobacco-maker is a work of art in its own right."
- COHEN said the company is putting more money behind its Marlboro brand, an effort that is improving volume trends. The analyst is also encouraged that Congressional efforts to increase the dollar amount of the proposed multi-billion-dollar tobacco bill are not floating.
- Nabisco's restructuring plan that will cut its workforce by six percent does not appear to be a prelude to a long-expected spin-off by majority parent RJR Nabisco Holdings Corp., Wall Street analysts said.
- RJR Nabisco Holdings Corp. said on Monday it would take a second-quarter charge of $216 million for the restructuring at its Nabisco food business, of which RJR owns an 80.7 percent stake. The after-tax charge, which translates into $0.67 per diluted common share, is to cover the sweeping restructuring announced on Monday that includes shutting some facilities, streamlining others and sharply hiking promotional spending for its biscuit unit.
- A key to diversifying Kentucky's farming economy is being hatched in a barn in southern Kenton County. Efforts to raise shrimp in ponds on Kentucky farms have been under way for several years now.
- "As they've replaced Joe Camel, they've replaced it with a campaign that's very enticing to young people," says Cathryn Cushing. She is media coordinator for Tobacco-Free Tri-Counties, an anti-smoking coalition in the Portland, Ore., area. The hidden camel reminds Cushing of the children's book "Where's Waldo?" "Kids love where the image eventually pops out if you look at it long enough," she says. "If anything, it's probably more appealing than Joe Camel ever was. It appears more grown-up."
- Risky health behaviors such as smoking, drinking, lack of physical activity, and being overweight account for only a small part of the excess mortality among low-income and less educated Americans, according to a new University of Michigan study. . . "After taking baseline health status and personal health behaviors into account, we found that people with lower incomes still had a much higher risk of dying," Lantz said. . . A combination of other factors associated with lower income likely play a greater role than personal lifestyle factors in explaining the elevated mortality risk. These include the greater chronic and acute stresses of daily life, decreased social supports, lower self-esteem, heightened levels of anger and hostility, and a decreased sense of control. Other key elements thought to be associated with high mortality rates among the disadvantaged include increased exposure to occupational and environmental health hazards, and lack of preventive medical care.
- Super strong mints offered from chic little tin boxes have become the must-have accessory for the trendy -- particularly after all those caffe lattes and expensive cigars. . . "The mint and the tin have become the latest gentlemanly accessory," said Cydney Halpin, Dunhill's director of marketing. "It's one more item in the arsenal for the polished gentleman." While originally made for cigar smokers, 50 percent of Dunhill's mint buyers don't smoke cigars.
- Would you trust the government with your most private medical records? How about a tobacco company? . . . Massachusetts has sued the industry, as did 40 other states, in part to gain reimbursement for tobacco-related health care costs. . . Michael York, an attorney who speaks for tobacco giant Philip Morris Inc. on litigation matters, said the information is important at every stage of the trial: . . . "In order to test the model or rebut the model or challenge the model, at the very least there should be a due process right" to the underlying data that a state used, York said.
- Lobbyist: SUE HESS has spent the last two decades working for Maryland arts. . . Hess already has many plans in the works for her retirement. . . And possibly more lobbying: Her husband, who smoked, died in 1994 of cancer. "I may see if there's anything I can do to stop the tobacco companies."
- "With Rebecca, there's no smoking in our home," she says. "So I end up sneaking cigarettes behind a tree in the playground and enduring other mothers' disapproving looks. Right now, that's keeping me to well under half a pack per day. So I just have to hang in there."
- Tips for Parents: Many studies confirm that adult behavior has a profound effect on young people's decisions about alcohol and tobacco. The National Parent-Teachers Association's program, "Common Sense Strategies for Raising Alcohol- and Drug-Free Kids," provides 10 tips to help parents model healthy behavior for kids. We've excerpted four here: 1. Share your values. . . . If you can't think of how to complete the sentence, here's an example from Tiffany, age 14: "Something I wish I could teach parents is not to smoke or do any drugs around kids . . . or even at all. You're supposed to be our role models for how to behave, not for how not to behave."
- Stan Glantz is already yelling into the receiver, even though the door to his office is wide open and a reporter is sitting nearby. As he excitedly plots with a colleague the best rejoinder to critics of his latest research paper, Glantz leans back in his chair until his short legs leave the floor. One foot starts swinging as an incongruous smile gradually betrays his pleasure at the controversy.
- Governments could kill two birds with one stone if they raised taxes on cigarettes and used the additional funds to bankroll those events currently funded by tobacco companies. They could even throw a nod to the cigarette folks by including a line in every poster or program, noting: "This event brought to you by the unfortunate victims who are addicted to such-and-such cigarettes."
- Dear Ann: As I watch my mother struggling for breath, dying a horrible death from emphysema, I feel resentment and rage. Though she's in and out of a morphine haze, my mother still manages to sneak cigarettes. She has an oxygen tube in one hand and a cigarette in the other. Meanwhile, she is choking to exhaustion. . . I pray that something said here may serve to prevent some other mother from dying slowly in her daughter's arms, choking and drenched in tears.
- The city does not need more laws on the books that mean nothing and have no teeth. . . The Rec-Park subcommittee that urged the draconian smoking ban is not alone in wanting to stamp out teen smoking and to eliminate the rude behavior of leaving cigarette butts in children's sandboxes. And we endorse and encourage such civility. But in this case, a law is not the answer.
- Tobacco company executives had begun to team up with smugglers more than ever before in an attempt to force the Canadian government to lower its steep tax on tobacco, according to Laughing. Laughing's claim is backed up by another accused smuggler, Larry Miller of Massena, who said tobacco executives helped him move cigarettes back into Canada to avoid taxes. The number of Canadian-brand cigarettes exported to New York state rose from 500,000 in 1989, when a hefty tax was imposed, to 20 billion in 1993. Those brands, such as Export A's and DuMauriers, don't have near that many American customers. They were clearly headed for the black market in Canada, according to tobacco industry experts.
- A Florida jury adjourned on Tuesday without reaching a verdict after a day of deliberations in a product liability lawsuit against Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp. filed by the family of a long-time smoker who died of lung cancer.
- An attorney representing the family of a smoker who died of lung cancer suing Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp. told the jury, ``Don't let them get away with it.'' The three-man, three-woman jury will begin deliberating Tuesday morning after being instructed by Duval Circuit Judge Charles O. Mitchell.
- Former co-workers of a West Palm Beach man whose family is suing a tobacco company said he often joked about cigarettes, calling them cancer sticks and coffin nails. "Let's put another nail in our coffin," Betty Powell said Roland Maddox joked when the two Winn-Dixie supermarket employees would take a cigarette break together.
- A long-time smoker whose family sued cigarette companies over his death knew about the dangers of smoking and joked about "coffin nails" and "cancer sticks," defense witnesses testified on Friday as the product liability trial drew near its close. Florida Circuit Judge Charles Mitchell dismissed the jury until Monday morning after it heard the videotaped deposition of Eugene Gladstone, the former son-in-law of Roland Maddox.
- The lawsuit is one of more than 30 suits filed across the country, coordinated by the Coalition for Workers' Health Care Funds. One of the suits has been certified as a class-action in Washington state . . . The Utah suit . . . also names the industry's trade association, The Council for Tobacco Research, and law firms that represented the industry. . . The suit also names the KIMBERLY-CLARK CORP., which manufactures cigarette papers, and EASTMAN CHEMICAL CO., which makes cigarette filters.
- Three union trust funds representing Utahns working in construction have sued cigarette manufacturers, demanding reimbursement for millions spent on medical costs related to smoking or chewing tobacco. . . The proposed class-action lawsuit, filed Thursday in U.S. District Court, contends such workers' trust funds have paid for damages inflicted by addiction to tobacco. "Blue collar workers spend from 10 to 14 percent of their medical expenses each year on tobacco-related illnesses and deaths," said lead counsel Windle Turley, an attorney from Dallas.
- The vast majority of tobacco cases that would have been settled under the 1997 accord are still in the courts. But some of them, in particular a number of class-action cases, risk being pre-empted by federal tobacco legislation or are given little chance for success at trial. Fears that the fees will be scaled back has inspired intense lobbying by trial lawyers from more than 65 firms nationwide, who are spending millions of dollars in an effort to insure that the fees are paid.
- The association says the ''uneven playing field'' will result from the ban applying to restaurants but not to bars, private clubs, or hotels and motels with private function rooms. The lawsuit - dubbed by one observer as a ''line in the sand'' by the tobacco industry to head off smoking bans throughout Massachusetts - will seek a judge's ruling preventing the ban from going into effect on the basis that regulations imposed by city public health officials must be ''reasonable'' and generally applied.
- Arecent survey conducted in California revealed a majority of adults support the state's six-month ban on smoking in bars. Simply put, nonsmokers no longer want to breathe in secondhand smoke. To that end, a number of restaurants across Ohio will go smoke-free during "Eat, Breathe and Dine Smoke-Free Day" on June 11, 1998. Sponsored by the Ohio Department of Health, the goal of the campaign is to eliminate exposure to cancer causing secondhand smoke by asking restaurants to go smoke-free for the day.
- Cigarette makers' heavy contributions in Florida are part of a national mosaic, according to an analysis of state party financial records conducted for The New York Times by the Campaign Study Group, a private research firm. . . The $1.8 million in tobacco contributions to the state parties is important in light of legislation being debated in the House of Representatives to ban corporate and labor union contributions to the national parties. If such legislation is enacted, other industries could follow the tobacco manufacturers' lead and begin contributing much larger amounts to state parties. Many states allow unlimited contributions to a state party. . . According to the analysis of the tobacco industry's state-level political contributions, one cigarette maker, the Philip Morris Cos., accounted for 62 percent of the $1.8 million given by tobacco interests to the state parties. And 70 percent of the $1.8 million went to Republicans.
- The smokers don't want their picture taken. They don't want to be branded. . . the heat is on smokers again -- and not just in Fairfax County. . . But the mere fact that the county is talking about such issues is disturbing, say the American Civil Liberties Union and others. "I don't know what those [supervisors] are smoking," said Lewis Maltby, director of the ACLU's national workplace rights office. "They can't do that. It's illegal --and for very good reason." . . The roadblock in Virginia is a 1989 state law, amended in 1997, which explicitly forbids the state or its subsidiary political jurisdictions from dictating employees' private-time smoking habits. But other locales around the country aren't prohibited from keeping smokers off the payroll. Several Florida cities have such a policy
- A South African laboratory posing as a legitimate company was a secret murder factory making poisons for the apartheid-era military to use against its opponents, a scientist who worked there said Tuesday. Schalk van Rensburg, a former director of Roodeplaat Research Laboratories (RRL), said the facility produced more than 500 items ranging from chocolates laced with botulism to cigarettes with anthrax and whiskey with weedkiller.
- Smuggling on a small scale across the border into France and Spain has traditionally played an important role in Andorran life, but in recent years it has shown worrying signs of expanding and turning the principality into a mecca for criminal gangs. They buy up millions of imported cigarettes and smuggle them back to their country of origin, particularly Ireland and the UK, where they sell them on the black market. The European Union is taking steps to investigate the problem.
- Prime Minister Jean Chretien said yesterday compensating all hepatitis C victims could open the door to demands for compensation from victims of cancer caused by smoking. "What about those who have cancer because of tobacco? Should we compensate them?" Chretien said. "We've known for years that tobacco is not very healthy. Not only that, we're making money with tobacco. Most of the price of a cigarette goes in taxes. Should we compensate everybody that has cancer because of tobacco?" It's the second time Chretien has lumped tainted-blood victims of hepatitis C in with victims of non-related diseases to defend his decision to compensate only those who contracted hep C between 1986 and 1990.
- Quebec's law on tobacco sponsorship will not jeopardize the future of the Canadian Grand Prix, Premier LUCIEN BOUCHARD said Sunday. "The Grand Prix was distinguished in the bill," Bouchard said as he attended the auto race. . . Under the provincial bill, he said, "there is a two-year moratorium where (tobacco companies) can continue to sponsor events. "For the remaining three years, when tobacco companies can no longer sponsor them, the Quebec government will create a fund to pay for the events."
- : Shoplifting increased at the nation's grocery stores last year, according to a survey by the Food Marketing Institute. . . Cigarettes were again the most frequently stolen item, followed by health and beauty care items.
- Bennett S. LeBow, chairman and chief executive of Brooke Group Ltd. (BGL), updated previous filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission to sell up to 9.18 million shares of common stock.
- Standard Commercial Corporation (NYSE: STW - news) today reported record earnings of $26.9 million for its fiscal year ended March 31, 1998, compared to $16.9 million for fiscal 1997
- The poignant, difficult predicament of the farmers is captured in "Tobacco Blues," a new film from "P.O.V.," the PBS summer series of documentaries with a "point of view."
- There are pretty scenes in ''Tobacco Blues'' but no clear sense of the cycle of the growing year or what's happening at the picturesque auction we see. The deeper qualities of the subjects themselves are missed in the course of talking-head interviews dominated by moralistic questioning.
- Tobacco Blues" is a fresh, humanizing approach to a subject that has been thoroughly demonized in recent years. In answer to the question, "Can good people grow tobacco?," the producers, Christine Fugate and Eren McGinnis, visit with four Kentucky families who bear no resemblance to the cigarette executives who have come to personify the ills of smoking: it's innocence by dissociation.
- After the hearing ended, both sides declared that they were pleased with how the argument had gone but neither was willing to predict victory. "I thought [Justice Department lawyer] Gerald Kell did a brilliant job of laying out the law," said David A. Kessler, who had pressed for tobacco regulation as FDA commissioner until early last year. But he cautioned: "This is a long haul. I've learned never to get up or down on the basis of any one point." Charles A. Blixt, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co.'s general counsel, lauded the presentation of the industry's lead lawyer, Richard M. Cooper, but added: "You never can tell how the arguments are going."
- No decision was issued after nearly three hours of oral arguments. It is unclear when the judges will rule on the case, which potentially could continue to be appealed all the way to the Supreme Court.
- "This is how our political process is supposed to work, with action by Congress," said Cooper, a partner in a Washington law firm. "If the public wants additional restrictions on tobacco, then the Congress surely will enact them."
- "At the heart of this case is whether Congress intended the FDA to have the authority to ban tobacco products," said Charles A. Blixt, Executive Vice- President and General Counsel, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company. "Clearly, the elected representatives of the people -- the U.S. Congress -- did not intend to delegate such sweeping authority to the FDA."
- Tobacco companies and the Clinton Administration are battling this week over a landmark appeal of a lower court decision that would have allowed expanded federal regulation of tobacco products but blocked additional restrictions on cigarette advertising. . . "The word last time was that the government didn't do a very good job of presenting their case, so I think this is a good opportunity for them to regroup," said Scott Ballin, a policy consultant with health advocacy group Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids.
- Wisconsin officials cannot join a Janesville couple' s lawsuit suing the tobacco industry for illness caused by smoking, a federal judge ruled Wednesday. State officials failed to prove the couple represented a class of people who have been harmed by smoking and thus cannot be part of the lawsuit, U.S. District Judge BARBARA CRABB ruled.
- Tenants who refused to pay the rent at an apartment where smoke seeps in from a bar downstairs cannot be evicted and the landlord must stop the smoke from getting in, a judge ruled. Boston Housing Court Judge E. George Daher ruled Tuesday that secondhand smoke was a health threat that interfered with Kristy and Reece Haile's right to "quiet enjoyment" of their apartment.
- In what is believed to be a first-in-the- nation ruling, a Boston housing court judge has decided that exposure to second-hand smoke can be used by tenants as a defense against an eviction by a landlord.
- Yesterday, the board voted to hold a July 14 public hearing on a proposed ban that would restrict nearly all tobacco ads visible from streets and sidewalks. Stores that aren't within 1,000 feet of a school, playground, park, bus stop or other sites regularly used by minors would be allowed to display "tombstone" ads, which are black-and-white signs bearing only price and brand information.
- A public hearing on the SNOHOMISH COUNTY proposal was set for