“For example, the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids boasts that the new FDA tobacco legislation will "empower the FDA to require changes in tobacco products, such as the removal or reduction of harmful ingredients or the reduction of nicotine levels."
Today I reveal, however, that these very same groups recently attacked the tobacco companies for making exactly the same argument. At that time, these groups told the public that this very argument was fraudulent.”
Michael Siegel,
Were these anti-tobacco groups correct in their claims earlier, or are they correct now (even though they are contradicting their earlier position)? Correct then, or correct now?
_
Were these anti-tobacco groups correct in their claims earlier, or are they correct now (even though they are contradicting their earlier position)? Correct then, or correct now?_
RickDP
It's not the correctness of the question that concerns the Doc, only the hypocrisy that FDA regulation implies a "safer product" when the movement and the Doc have continually claimed there is "no safe cigarette".
It's the hypocrisy of decrying about tobacco industry lies and then saying the same thing you accuse the industry of saying.
The hypocrisy of praising a product that claims to reduce the carcinogens while at the same time praising a regulation that doesn't allow the product makers to actually make that claim.
The Doc doesn't give a crap about the truth of the matter...........just the blatant hypocrisy that he sees ruining HIS "no safe cigarette" beliefs.
TC politics by "over reaching strategies" [fear mongering to influence supply and demand] With unrestricted growth of the stakeholder process tentacles of Public Healthscare agencies.
Coming to a government near you.
Thanks TC...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K...h?
v=KT62LNcbJBI
This woman was previously with the Cancer Society, she found it insulting that her former business model was described as unethical and fraudulent when applied to tax payers funding; 1.2 billion invested to date with an additional 1.6 billion commitment and nothing was produced beyond a large consumption of coffee and donuts, while swapping emails billed out at 250.00 an hour?
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2...lth-
kramer.html
The public are still surprisingly calm, although some of the comments suggest the level of anger is growing.
Not in America? Think again...
http://www.newsmax.com/
insidecov...27F545675BF9D6F
The notion that a less hazardous cigarette can be developed (via FDA regulations or by technology) defies the laws of physics and chemistry.
It's the repeated inhalation of tobacco smoke that causes 99% of tobacco morbidity, disability and mortality (e.g. lung diseseases, cancers, cardiovascular diseases).
Trying to make cigarette smoke less hazardous has been a Quixotic quest for the past 60 years, while trying to make cigarettes less addictive (by reducing nicotine) would result in many smokers inhaling longer, deeper and more often (due to nicotine compensation), which would increase increasing the amount of smoke inhaled.
In sharp contrast, smokefree tobacco products commmonly used in the US are 99% less hazardous alternatives to cigarettes, while snus and other low nitrosamine smokefree tobacco products, e-cigarettes, and NRT (gum, lozenge, skin patches) are even less hazardous alternatives.
But thanks to CTFK, ACS, AHA, ALA and Congressional Democrats, the new FDA law misleads consumers to believe that smokefree products are just as hazardous as cigarettes and prohibits tobacco companies from truthfully informing smokers that smokefree products are less hazardous than cigarettes.
Meanwhile, CTFK, ACS, AHA, ALA have been lying to the public and Congress to believe that a safer cigarette can (and should) be developed by FDA regulations.
"Were these anti-tobacco groups correct in their claims earlier, or are they correct now (even though they are contradicting their earlier position)? Correct then, or correct now?_"
Is the NOSH guide to chemical hazards to be burned and banned soon?
It lists known safe levels and precautions when dealing with a variety of chemical toxins. The logic is based in a linear dose response relationship which "no safe cigarette" absolutely denies.
Where they right then or are they right now?
Or all they just a pack of self serving liars and Hypocrites, fighting over the proceeds of crime?
I vote for option three...
What we have all just witnessed was a sly but brilliant move by the tobacco companies who for the last 60 years have shown themselves to be smart, deft and far more effective at protecting their interests than their opponents. TC continues infighting and seems incapable of putting differences aside so that it can rally around the issues they agree on.
In the end, its the public who loses.
While package warnings may have some effect, and continued erosion of public support for the industry may ultimately help bring this ongoing public health holocaust to an end, big tobacco has done a very good job of creating a perception they are cooperating, while in reality they are doing everything they can to protect their market so they can continue to kill close to half a million people a year.
Bill,
I forget if I asked this before. But you talked about some cigarettes containing ammonia so smokers were "freebasing" (your word) them, making them more addictive, and you felt this was wrong of the tobacco companies.
Are you saying that, say, legislation to force tobacco companies to remove this would not make things even a bit safer? Even though adding them would, in your view, make them more addictive? Talking about increased/decreased risk is a two way street.
BTW, now that you know how it feels to have to stand 15/25 feet outside the door and be ignored when negotiations are being discussed and/or awards for service are handled out, maybe you can start to understand how smokers feel.
"while in reality they are doing everything they can to protect their market so they can continue to kill close to half a million people a year."-Mark
Do you realize how ridiculous this sounds???
These phrases do not work here, we have brains and thought processes, we question things...don't you?
ladyraj;
It sounds like the original and now outdated chanting rendition;
Half of smokers will die eventually by smoking related diseases. [regardless if they inhale or not]
A number identical to the rate experienced in the general non smoking public.
A little nip and tuck and evolution found "half of smokers will die because they smoke", and of course "smoking kills half a million smokers every year".
By evaluation of the 2.4 million who die in total, just about equal with their smoking prevalence numbers.
So do they die because they smoke, or because they are called smokers?
Doctor Siegel, - "But when the health groups then make the very same argument - that fewer carcinogens and toxins will mean a safer cigarette - they apparently now suddenly believe that argument to be true."
It doesn't matter if they (Tobacco Control) believes it or not, and it never has.
The goal is to get John Q. Public to believe it and since they are spending plenty of my money to convince him of it, .. he most certainly does, or will believe it.
Even more importantly, they get politicians to believe that simply by making the claim, that they (politicians) can secure the tobacco excise tax base for another 25 years while at the same time issue press releases about how they are committed to doing something about the evil empire of Big Tobacco.
Will you ever learn that Tobacco Control has absolutely NOTHING to do with TRUTH, and everything to do with cash flow?
Kevin, these tired old lines repeated over and over again make me wonder if the eyes are blank while robotically spouting them??? I suspect that your analogy with religion is a spot on and we are left with a "my god is better than your god" mentality. That their god is infallible and the one true god smacks the freedom of religion aspect of our society right in the kisser. It defies imagination that we have come to this place in a free society where bigots can dictate the lives of people not of their belief system.
And that is just from the religious perspective...what about free-thinking??? As a scientist, I was taught that if I was so positive of a stance that I need to step away from my own bias, and attempt to prove the opposite. As a person with an open mind...I would walk a mile in another's shoes and be free to disagree. Where is the frigging humanity in these people so eagerly wanting to dictate my life choices?
It appears the hand in my wallet is the only consideration that I am offered...rather telling isn't it? (possible end of rant)-Ruth
CTFK on additives and constituents...they can make them safer if the FDA is involved!!!
"Under the proposed legislation, product standards would apply to products already on the market as well as to new products. For example, if the FDA were to determine that adding ammonia to cigarettes is harmful because it is a carcinogen when burned and enhances the absorption of nicotine, the agency could issue a standard prohibiting the addition of ammonia to any cigarette. Other possible standards could include a requirement to eliminate the use of menthol and eugenol, which numb the throat and make smoking easier."
http://www.tobaccofreekids.org/
r...ortChapter3.pdf
Doc you did know they can eliminate menthol...right?
Back to Menthol - here's a tidbit:
http://online.wsj.com/article/
SB...4398811283.html
Menthol happens to be the most popular cigarette flavor, and the Journal reports that the Congressional Black Caucus pressed for the carve-out. ... Black public health officials understandably have opposed the exemptions. But black lawmakers apparently believe that banning an unhealthy product used by a disproportionate number of black voters is the greater evil.
Menthol cigarettes are initially exempt from the ban because of demands from the Congressional Black Caucus.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB...l?
mod=relevancy
Per Andrew's comment, it was Philip Morris' competitors (i.e. other cigarette companies) that found out and reported that PM was adding ammonia to Marlboro cigarettes to release and deliver more nicotine, and freebasing is an appropriately descriptive term.
But even without added ammonia, cigarettes (and most smokeless tobacco products) are highly addictive and very effecive nicotine delivery devices.
BTW I don't share Andrew's self pity for choosing to stand outside and not participate in the policy process, as I excercise my right to actively engage in policy processes.
Dr. Siegel: “In other words, the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, ACS, AHA, and ALA are two-faced, double-sided, smoke-blowing hypocrites”.
Yeah. And, they tell lies too.
Mark: “What we have all just witnessed was a sly but brilliant move by the tobacco companies who for the last 60 years have shown themselves to be smart, deft and far more effective at protecting their interests than their opponents”.
Let’s see. The tobacco companies outsmarted their opponents by masterminding the MSA which funnels funds extorted from smokers into government coffers and anti-smoker groups. They outsmarted their opponents by masterminding the FDA legislation which will protect those funds and keep the money extorted from smokers flowing to government and anti-smoker groups.
If that’s the case, the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, ACS, AHA, and ALA are not just “two-faced, double-sided, smoke-blowing hypocrites” who tell lies they’re also dumb as hell.
Have you ever considered that neither the anti-smoker crowd nor government wants to end the alleged “holocaust” of which you speak; that they too are protecting their bottom line?
“The notion that a less hazardous cigarette can be developed (via FDA regulations or by technology) defies the laws of physics and chemistry.” - Bill
Are you referring to the physics and chemistry laws of planet earth?
“But even without added ammonia, cigarettes (and most smokeless tobacco products) are highly addictive and very effec[t]ive nicotine delivery devices” – Bill
The idea of addiction is already in question. However, what does the term “highly” add to addictive? Why has BigPharma failed to develop an alternate “very” effective nicotine delivery device? Not only are the “therapeutics” not “very” effective or even “plain” effective, they barely rate on the effectiveness scale. Does this reflect an understanding or a failure of understanding of the circumstance?
Michael &/or Bill,
Is there any once-held anti-smoking belief/claim (i.e., concerning the purported effects of smoking) that you now doubt or question? If so, what? For example, you don’t believe the 400,000 toll? Do, you??
_
"This impulse of people in public office to pass laws and regulations to prevent people from doing what they are going to do no matter what the laws says is so base, so vile, and so useless that one need only cast one's eyes back to the 18th Amendment to the Constitution to understand how wrong it is."
http://www.expertclick.com/
NewsR...,200927441.aspx
re: A Safer Cigarette
The anti-smoker cartel consistently claims that reducing the amount of nicotine in cigarettes causes tobacco consumers to consume more cigarettes and to inhale their smoke more deeply.
If this is true then it must also be true that increasing the amount of nicotine in cigarettes would cause tobacco consumers to consume fewer cigarettes and inhale them less deeply.
I think that all of this is BS and there is no way to make a "safe" product "safer".
But if we work out the logic of the anti-smoker cartels contention, to its ultimate conclusion, then cigarettes could be made safer simply by adding more nicotine to them.
Maybe that's why more doctors smoke (unfiltered) Camels than any other cigarette.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g...h?
v=gCMzjJjuxQI
BTW Public Health + Social Justice = A Special Interest that has nothing to do with health or justice.
Tobacco is FDA approved and insuring the healthcare of millions.
BTW I don't share Andrew's self pity for choosing to stand outside and not participate in the policy process, as I excercise my right to actively engage in policy processes.
Self pity? No, a clumsy joke at worst. Bill, I think you know what I was referring to, and if you don't, then maybe you are not as good at judging people's opinions etc as you think you are. I'm talking about your ideas getting the boot, and being sluffed off too early for consideration. You do tend to bang on about smokeless tobacco's repression at every turn.
Now the FDA regulations slam the door on you for the greater good, and you are increasingly seeing the importance of dissent being given its turn. Meaningful dissent--like with the big posters on this blog.
I just don't see how your idea can gain any popular traction since the meme has been that Big Tobacco has purposely been putting more and more into their cigarettes over time. And I believe you've gone along with that re: ammonia and other posts, and you can't have it both ways.
Thanks for the information, though, and the clarification, if not for taking what I thought was a pretty obvious analogy out of context. I always have a good cigar after you take a comment of mine out of context. It's a sign I'm doing something right.
I'll maybe even enjoy it at a place that allows me within ten feet (gasp) of an entrance while I enjoy it. Just a warning--we smoker addicts are closing back in.
Well the thing is the health groups haven't said that there is a safer cigarette out there - yet. You make a good case that they may well do so in the future given the bill that was approved, however they haven't done it yet. In the absence of such a statement you seem to be jumping the gun Dr. Siegel.
"It's the repeated inhalation of tobacco smoke that causes 99% of tobacco morbidity, disability and mortality (e.g. lung diseseases, cancers, cardiovascular diseases).
" - Bill.
With the exception of animals that seem to be resistant to most, if not all, forms of tobacco smoke caused death. Maybe BT has spotted a little something hidden in the leaves that kills humans only and have decided to remove it, before TC spots the trick.
I agree with ES.
Well the thing is the health groups haven't said that there is a safer cigarette out there - yet. You make a good case that they may well do so in the future given the bill that was approved, however they haven't done it yet.Mark
They have to now consider the existence of a 'safer cigarette' - the FDA is now set to declare it to be so. If not, the FDA will not be doing their job - Again...
The FDA will now be able to hang their hat on a 'safer cigarette'
I hope they do - there's a bunch of patents out there that never saw the light of day - re: Star Scientific, etc.
Michael Jackson dead at the age of 50.
Did he smoke?
Nah MJ didn't smoke...perhaps ETS did him in!
Nah MJ didn't smoke...perhaps ETS did him in!
ladyraj
Or maybe it was all those smoky stage props that he danced around in.
Smoke is smoke is smoke!
per ladyteal, "Or maybe it was all those smoky stage props that he danced around in."
That would have been deadly propylene glycol vaporized with a fog machine. Deadly, deadly, deadly propylene glycol ...
Public Health + Social Justice = A Special Interest that has nothing to do with health or justice.
That would have been deadly propylene glycol vaporized with a fog machine. Deadly, deadly, deadly propylene glycol ...
EinsteinSmoked
Isn't that the stuff found in ecigs?
So ban happy sheeple can use Michael as the poster boy to ban ecigs. At least he will not have died in vain.
Siegel: If anything, products which have documented lower yields of carcinogens have been found to pose a much greater risk of lung cancer among smokers. In other words, lower yield products are believed to be more dangerous, not less dangerous
Lower yields of which specific carcinogens? (Each of the alleged 40 or 60 or 4000? ) Greater actual risk has been found how/ where? (ie, by what method in which studies/ journals? ) what actual human or animal studies conducted over what period of time have convincingly indicated a correlation between smoking cigarettes with lower yields of these specific carcinogens and a higher incidence of lung cancer?
Inquiring minds want to know.
Meanwhile, what was Gori's prescription for a safer cigarette? That's a genuine question.
:
I have been reading about unfortunate nonsmokers who get categorised as smokers and object strongly.
"Brankin's toll includes every Scot who has died of "smoking-related complaints". To get into that category, alleged victims of smoking do not need to have smoked. They are counted in on the basis that killers including heart disease, strokes and bronchitis can be caused by smoking. Nobody checks the lifestyles of the victims to ascertain if they smoked."
"Even that would have been tenuous. Some of these dead Scots did smoke but died at or beyond the average Scottish lifespans of 73 years for men and 78 for women. The same applies to many of the 140 000 Englishmen and women Britain's leading anti-smoking charity, ASH, asserts die each year as a result of smoking. ASH justifies including them on the grounds that deaths from smoking can follow years of painful disability and are thus worth preventing even if they have not technically shortened a life."
http://
www.sundayindependent.co....ticleId=2307326
So if everyone who dies of lung cancer or other alleged "smoking related diseases" is included in the numbers whether they smoked or not,all the statistics and calculations based on them will be incorrect by design.
So all Anti-tobacco figures must surely be a deliberate nonsense.
How does that help anyone?
Still, I suppose it gives a little false reassurance to the sitting ducks living next to freeways and powerplants or in the heart of cities.
That urban-rural divide is still there, whether the people smoke or not.
"I think that all of this is BS and there is no way to make a "safe" product "safer".
ES
You can always improve any design, I think the key is less complexity.
I have made a smokeable cigarette using plain boiled water, from a tobacco plant grown without any chemical enhancement,just using very basic cookery, but thats not really possible in a commercial setting.
Rose, You are quite a unique individual. I too, would like to meet you sometime. You "make my day", as Clint Eastwood would say.
If a risk is said to be increased by the inclusion of carcinogens to incite fear, reduction of exposures makes the risk less.
This is the argument in selling smoking bans by "less exposures" and not "no exposures"; people will be safer.
Cause and effect or dose response. If a "cigarette" is described in a wide berth reputation, without evaluation of what each might actually contain? Yes there is no safe cigarette because a cigarette is a mythical creation and so too is the fear imaginary.
Real cigarettes originate from a number of sources, plant varieties and production methods and no attempt is being made to discern which might be more dangerous than others and that is a crime known as callous indifference, which all of the Public Health community share an equal hand.
These claims of "no safer cigarette" are simply theoretic musings with no connection to as Bill describes it "the laws of physics and chemistry"
which are normally much more exacting in their descriptions and evaluations, especially when evaluating a product or many similar products, which might be dangerous to human health.
Is a Camel more dangerous than a Winston? They say no because they are speaking as politicians not because they have taken the time required to do a comparison. Lazy is just easier and the oratory of the Church of Public Health will protect us all as long as we keep the faith as they do, and cut the same corners.
The one eye closed approach in the creation of this political tripe known figuratively as a cigarette, is actually quite a good measure of credibility when evaluating a political scientist and his lobby pronouncements.
David
The fun part is that its only a vegetable, with the same chemicals, as any other nightshade,you have to have the aura of mystery to sell it at a high price.
It occurs to me that the ludicrous death rates are mostly used in justifying massive taxes on a plant leaf that should really sell at the price of a head of cabbage.
But in overdoing it, they give themselves away.
For instance, traces of thirdhand smoke in nonsmoking houses.
"Many plants of the Solanaceae family, which includes the genus Nicotiana, of which the tobacco
plant is a member, contain solanesol; particularly those that contain trace amounts of nicotine.
These include the tomato, eggplant, potato, and pepper. The potential interference due to these
sources is negligible, COOKING being the only likely potential source of interference.
An interference of this type would bias results high, overestimating the contribution of ETS to RSP
http://www.coresta.org/Recommend...hods/
CRM_52.pdf
However many people stop smoking, the death rates must remain high or the whole pyramid scheme collapses.
They have gone too far now to stop.
Personally, I think people either like the plant or they don't, if they prefer it processed out of all recognition and dressed up in food additives like a pantomime dame, perhaps they should reconsider.
Imagine the scandal if they were caught charging ££££'s for a bunch of dried potato leaves wrapped in paper.
They've got solanesol and nicotine in too.
Don't do it, solanine is not nice stuff, and doesn't seem to convert to anything useful when burned.
SOLANINE AND CHACONINE
EVALUATION
The Committee considered that,despite the long history of human consumption of plants containing glycoalkaloids, the available epidemiological and experimental data from human and laboratory animal studies did not permit the determination of a safe level of intake.
http://www.inchem.org/documents/...ono/
v30je19.htm
"These claims of "no safer cigarette" are simply theoretic musings with no connection to as Bill describes it "the laws of physics and chemistry"
which are normally much more exacting in their descriptions and evaluations, especially when evaluating a product or many similar products, which might be dangerous to human health."
...........................
A 'SAFER' cigarette??
Cigarettes are already just as 'safe' as normal living!!
Let's look at just how long a 10 year would have to smoke in order to reach the age at which about 50% of the 'smoking related' deaths would have occurred.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/regulat...gulat...gv21n4/
lies.pdf
Page 29,table 4
We see that a 10 year old would have to smoke for 25 years to reach the age at which the CDC says such deaths start to occur.
At age 50,after 40 years of smoking,the child will have reached the age at which 95% of those 'smoking related' deaths have NOT yet occurred.
At age 60,after 50 years of smoking, the child will have the age at which 76.5% of the 'smoking related' deaths have NOT yet occurred.
At the age of 70,after 60 years of smoking, the child will have reached the age where over 50% of those deaths have yet to occur.
The average age of death from 'smoking related' diseases is about 72.
At that time,
http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/Pub...Pubs/
98.025.PDF
the average age of death from all causes was 71.1 years
That 10 year old has just as much chance of dying from something else as from a 'smoking related' disease.
Look back 60 years at the advances that medicine has made and then try to guess what advances will be made over the coming 60 years.
I wonder what will be the leading cause of death in 2070?
Probably the govt!!!
The average age of death from 'smoking related' diseases is about 72.
At that time,
http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/Pub...Pubs/ 98.025.PDF
the average age of death from all causes was 71.1 years
That 10 year old has just as much chance of dying from something else as from a 'smoking related' disease.
....................
Some might complain that this is comparing apples to oranges because of all of the deaths to non-smokers below the age of 35.
However,here:
http://www.data360.org/dsg.aspx?
...et_Group_Id=587
we see that there are very few deaths below the age of 35.
My previous post does,indeed,compare apples to apples. 
Further note,the averages are the mean age(mathamatical average),the median age(50th percentile) is higher and is a different animal.
This is a wonderful informative website and I applaud your efforts and all the important hard work you're doing. It gives me hope! I created a blog about the same critical issue and I'm doing what I can to raise awareness on this critical vital issue from my own personal experience. The blog discusses everything related to big tobacco, non-smokers' rights, and all the health dangers related to smoking and having to breathe secondhand smoke and secondhand smoker's breath. I invite you to please take a few moments to take a look and share it with those you love and care about and help them quit the nasty ugly habit.
http://www.smoke-screen.org
Thank you
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