Stop Teens from Smoking, Ontario News

In its recent article, The Windsor Essex Community Health Centre provided some excellent information about keeping our teens smoke-free. But there was an important component missing - calling for a ban on youth possession of tobacco. Convenience stores play a vital role in keeping tobacco from teens. In fact, Ontario Convenience Stores Association (OCSA) members perform well over 100,000 age-checks every day. Our We Expect ID program technology allows stores to accurately verify the age of customers by reading data off the magnetic strip on driver's licences.

Unpleasant Smoking Outside Ban for Delawareans

As unpleasant as a ban on smoking outside state office buildings will be for some Delawareans, the twofold benefit is irresistible. The rise in residents' quitting a dangerous health habit directly linked to their tobacco addiction will continue. And the residual benefits of slowing the growth of a $1 billion health care tab -- almost 40 percent of the state's budget -- created by smoking workers, retirees and Medicaid recipients can be aggressively attacked. Making government campuses smoke-free removes the state's dubious role as an enabler of a habit that is both unhealthy and "will heavily burden future generations of taxpayers." As is the case with the pace of government innovation, this change precedes private industry moves to discourage smoking on or near the job, after Gov. Ruth Ann Minner pushed for Delaware's Clean Indoor Air Act of 2002. Since then the state's largest employers have slowly made their outdoor campuses smoke-free.

Hungary Tobacco Company Expands

Hungary’s tobacco industry grew almost 10% to HUF 500bn last year, industry insiders said at a press conference organised by the Hungarian Association of Tobacco Industry Investors (DBMSZ) on Thursday. Hungarian tobacco companies BAT Pecsi Dohanygyar, Continental Dohanyipari, Imperial Tobacco Magyarorszag and Universal Leaf Tobacco Magyarorszag established DBMSZ at the beginning of last December. This year tobacco sales are expected to fall because of the economy, the higher excise tax, expected stricter rule on tobacco sales and the expansion of the no-smoking policy in public places, they said. Making more public establishments smoke-free has resulted in as much as a 5% reduction in sales, judging from experience abroad, they added. An increase in the excise tax on tobacco products from the middle of this year is expected to raise retail prices by 20%, the association estimates. The association is pressing for a loosening of planned additional regulation of retail tobacco sales.

Adult Smoking Rates Could Fall

Smoking rates could fall below 20 per cent this year as thousands of Kiwis are expected to kick the habit. Quitline's Bruce Bassett said adult smoking rates could fall to the lowest levels since records began. He said 21 per cent of adult New Zealanders smoked and about 9000 people were expected to use Quitline services in January. "It's going to be really busy." He said more than a fifth of those who used quitting services stayed smoke-free. Leone Landells chose to stop smoking cheap Davidoff cigarettes just before the New Year brought a wave of resolutions and a price rise reaching more than $15 for popular packs of 20. "I feel so much better," she said. "I didn't realise how unwell I felt as a smoker." Landells, 53, said seeing her close friend's mother suffer from emphysema was the tipping point.