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World Heart Day 2008: Knowing your risks could save your life 

The European Society of Cardiology (ESC)(3) is taking the opportunity of this special day to reiterate its strong commitment in the field of prevention, one of its leading year- round activities. By "knowing our risks" - this year's World Heart Day theme - and suitably managing them, we stand a chance to tackle the threatening CVD pandemic. . . .

ESC Clinical Practice Guidelines on CVD Prevention(9) were rewritten in 2007 to put a stronger emphasis on exercise, weight, lifestyle and smoking cessation. The increased involvement of other specialties such as General Practice and Cardiovascular Nursing was instrumental.

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• Rotting teeth photos added to cigarette packs 

Gruesome pictures of rotting teeth and throat cancer tumours will appear on all tobacco products in Britain from next month as the government steps up its campaign to encourage the country's 10 million smokers to quit.

The images will be printed on the back of cigarette packs to illustrate written health warnings introduced in 2003, the Department of Health said on Saturday.

The photos also include a flaccid cigarette to depict male impotence and a comparison of healthy and tar-filled lungs. . . .

The Department of Health said its hands are tied by the rules of a 2001 European Union directive on tobacco health warnings, which also covers which pictures can be displayed.

But it said it had made representations to the European Commission seeking to increase the size of the pictures as well as placing them on pack fronts.

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MOLIMARD: The European Report "Lifting the SmokeScreen": Epidemiological study or manipulation? 

BACKGROUND: This report ends up with a large increase of the number of estimated deaths from passive smoking in Europe. Its conclusions have been decisive to passing laws banning smoking in public places.

RESULTS: However, analysis of this report for France reveals considerable anomalies, such as changing the usual definition of passive smoking. . . .

CONCLUSION: Nevertheless, the number of estimated deaths in the field where restricting laws might be applied and efficient is so low that it makes you wonder which the real aim of this report is, and which conflicts of interests hide behind it.

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CM and the Future of Tobacco Packaging 

A conversation with Phil Smith of CM Packaging.

The Dutch-based CM Packaging has been behind some of the most recent innovative packaging trends. They're the go-to company for tobacco companies looking to make a visual point-of-purchase impact for everything from cigarillos to snus. With years of experience in metal packaging, the company expanded their scope with the takeover of D&F Plastics in 2007, giving the company the means to a world of new possibilities with packaging incorporating both plastics and tins. We sat down with CM Commercial Director, Phil Smith, at this year's EuroTab exhibition in Warsaw to talk about the future of the tobacco packaging market. . . .

we took over the plastics factory so we could combine plastics and metal. For example, we produce tins with dual possibilities. We have excellent print quality on tin plate because we offset-print the metal sheets just like you print on paper. Most designs are made up of four colors but often you need two house colors, so four plus two covers most eventualities. This produces brilliant decoration on tin plate, plus the functionality of plastic to facilitate easy opening by customers, display features - that sort of thing. The beauty of two materials. . . .

TI: What trends do you see for tobacco packaging?

Smith: I think the big trend in cigars is to smaller cigars and smaller packages for small cigars because cigarillos are taking over from cigarettes in a big way. You can't smoke indoors very much. You can go outside to smoke, so it's just getting a nicotine rush as quickly as possible - things are getting away from the old idea of enjoying a cigar. You enjoy a cigarillo, but it's done in a hurry.

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• Croatia moves to toughen anti-smoking law  

The Croatian government is to forward to the parliament a tough anti-tobacco bill introducing a public smoking ban, a minister said Thursday.

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"With the new law, we want to change people's (smoking) habits and protect non-smokers," Health Minister Darko Milinovic said.

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The bill, in line with standards of the European Union

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• Lung Cancer Rates Among Nonsmokers Not on the Rise  

The most comprehensive global snapshot ever taken of lung cancer diagnoses and related death rates among patients who have never smoked has found that, contrary to prior indications, lung cancer risk is not on the rise.

The analysis also revealed that the lung cancer death rate among those who have never smoked is higher among men than women.

Both findings stem from an enormous collaborative international effort that draws on information from 13 large studies and 22 cancer registries, and represents upwards of 2 million men and women living in 10 countries across North America, Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

"The great majority of lung cancers are caused by smoking," stressed study author Dr. Michael Thun, head of epidemiological research at the American Cancer Society. . . .

Thun and his colleagues collectively published their observations in the September issue of PloS Medicine.

Their conclusions are based on incident and mortality rates for lung cancer among more than 630,000 and 1.8 million men and women (respectively) who had never smoked, and who had participated in one of 13 different large studies (each involving a minimum of 20,000 participants) conducted in North America, Europe or Asia.

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A Look at Nonsmokers Who Get Lung Cancer  

A huge new study conducted in Europe, North America and Asia, based on 2.4 million nonsmokers who had lung cancer, provides new information about just who is at risk.

Male nonsmokers are more likely than female nonsmokers to die of the disease, the study found, and the overall risk to nonsmokers is not increasing.

“Concerns have been raised that the risk was higher in women and that the risk was increasing, but this study counters those two misperceptions,” said Dr. Michael J. Thun, the lead author of the study and the head of epidemiologic research for the American Cancer Society. The study is being published online in PLoS Medicine.

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• Patients with high risk of stroke and heart attack 'ignoring doctors' advice' 

Britons at high risk of heart attack and stroke are ignoring doctors' advice to change their lifestyle, says a new survey.

More than three-quarters are obese or overweight, with dangerously big stomachs, and most smokers have refused to give up.

More than half have out-of-control blood pressure and 40 per cent have high cholesterol levels. . . .

The findings from a major European survey were released today at the European Society for Cardiology congress in Munich. . . .

The new survey of 12 countries looked in detail at 381 patients in the UK, who had been diagnosed as 'high risk' at least six months earlier by their GPs. . . .

Almost 80 per cent of those who were smokers at the time had not given up

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• Europe lights up to fire-safety rules for cigarettes  

A decision by Finland to test the ignition ability of all cigarettes sold in the country could be extended across Europe as of 2011 in an attempt to prevent domestic fires and related deaths.

Last month, the Finnish government suggested adopting the international standard ASTM E2187 to test the ignition performance of cigarettes on bedding and upholstered furniture.

About 700 fires are caused by cigarettes in Finland each year, causing some 35-40 deaths. In Europe, the Commission estimates that a minimum of 1,000 fatalities are caused by such fires each year. Burning cigarettes are also responsible for many forest fires, it adds.

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Philip Morris Leads 16.6 Billion Euros of Bond Sales in Europe  

Philip Morris International Inc., the world's largest publicly traded tobacco company, and utility E.ON AG led 16.6 billion euros ($24.5 billion) of European corporate bond sales this week, the most in two months.

Sales jumped from 6.8 billion euros last week and from 6.5 billion euros the week before, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. New York-based Philip Morris raised a total of 1.75 billion euros in its first sale in the common European currency, prompted by concern credit conditions may deteriorate.

``We wanted to be ahead of the game and issue a smaller- sized transaction at current market spreads,'' Marco Kuepfer, vice-president and treasurer of Philip Morris, said in an interview.

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• Fire-safer cigarettes mooted for smokers in Switzerland. 

Switzerland could follow in the footsteps of a European initiative in requiring companies to sell exclusively self-extinguishing cigarettes from 2011.

The European Commission announced plans this week for new cigarette fire safety standards to cut down on the number of related fires and deaths.

Insurers and tobacco manufacturers welcomed the move and the Swiss Federal Health Office said such a measure was in their interests.

"Should the European Union allow only self-extinguishing cigarettes, it is quite possible that Switzerland will follow suit," said Health Office spokesman Michael Anderegg.

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EU plans 'fire-safe' cigarettes 

All cigarettes sold across the European Union will have to be "fire-safe" by 2011, the European Commission has said.

The commission will require the tobacco industry to use extra layers of thickened paper wrapped around the cigarettes to slow the burning process.

"We think that by 2011 at the latest these cigarettes will be on the market," said a commission spokesman.

In 2005-2007 there were 11,000 fires annually across the EU caused by cigarettes, with 520 deaths.

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Use Of RIP Technology Eyed By EU For Self-Extinguishing Cigarettes 

The European Union wants members of the 27-member bloc protected not only against lung cancer from cigarette smoke, but also deaths caused by cigarette fire.

By introducing self-extinguishing cigarettes, 2,000 lives could be saved in the EU annually, the EU Commissioner for Consumer Affairs said. The German Fire Departments' Association supported the initiative.

To make self-extinguishing cigarettes, the technology Reduced Ignition Propensity -- ironically with the acronym RIP -- would be tapped. it involves placing bands of cellulose or alginate inside the cigarette paper, which will snuff the burning tobacco if not puffed on.

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• EU to Require Fire-Safe, Self-Extinguishing Cigarettes by 2011  

All cigarettes sold in Europe by 2011 will be required to be ``fire-safe'' brands that automatically go out if not puffed on for a minute, the European Commission said.

European standard-setters are working on rules to mandate self-extinguishing cigarettes to prevent accidental fires, following as many as 37 U.S. states and Canada, commission spokesman Ton van Lierop said.

Data from 16 European countries show that careless use of cigarettes such as smoking in bed caused 11,000 fires annually between 2005 and 2007, killing 520 people and injuring 1,600.

``We think that by 2011 at the latest, these cigarettes will be on the market,'' Van Lierop told reporters today in Brussels. He challenged contentions by tobacco companies that fireproofing would drive up cigarette prices.

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• How cigarettes funded Balkan wars 

In the second of two pieces on organised crime accompanying his Radio 4 series How crime took on the world, Misha Glenny reveals the details of a cigarette-smuggling scam that funded many of the paramilitary killing machines in the Yugoslav wars.

The first counterfeit cigarettes appeared on the markets of the former Yugoslavia just days after the war broke out in June 1991.

These were fake Marlboros, Rothmans, Winstons and other well-known brands that had been manufactured in different parts of the Balkans and beyond. . . .

The cigarettes often arrived in the Balkans via Rotterdam and Asia

There was only one drawback - when you drew your first puff, instead of the familiar blend of Virginia tobacco, the back of your throat was assaulted by a taste akin to a mixture of sawdust and goat's dung.

It took a restless Serbian entrepreneur called Vladmir "Vanja" Bokan to provide the market with an improved product a couple of years later. . . .

He swiftly secured Greek citizenship and once again prospered as a master smuggler.

But on 7 October 2000, as he emerged from his Mercedes 500 in front of his villa, Bokan's face was obliterated by 29 bullets fired from a couple of semi-automatics. The killers were never brought to justice.

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