Home to the world's tallest mountain, Nepal also has big ambitions for improving health: It has just enacted a tough, comprehensive tobacco-control law that requires smoke-free public places and workplaces, mandates pictorial health warnings covering 75 percent of tobacco packages, and bans tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorships.
Lung cancer — not breast cancer — is the leading cancer killer among women, and smoking causes 80 percent of these deaths.
So there's no better gift for Mom this Mother's Day than giving her the encouragement, support and information she needs to help her stop smoking.
It's been nearly a century since Lucky Strike first used the slogan 'Reach for A Lucky Instead of A Sweet' and decades since the early Virginia Slims advertising campaign depicted women who smoke as independent, stylish, sexy — and of course slim — to market to women and girls.
But slogans and sophisticated images weren't the only tricks in the tobacco industry's scheme to keep people smoking.
According to a new study published in The European Journal of Public Health, the companies added appetite suppressants to cigarettes 'to enhance the effects of smoking on appetite and body weight' — and to stoke smokers' fears of gaining weight if they quit.
Health ministers meeting in Moscow last week declared that speeding up implementation of the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control is critical to addressing the growing threat from non-communicable diseases, which cause nearly two out of three deaths around the globe. They also called on more countries to ratify the pact.
Native Americans have the highest rates of smoking and other tobacco use of any population group in the United States.
So it was an historic step this week when Navajo Nation President Ben Shelly signed an executive order stating, 'It is the policy of the Navajo Nation Executive Branch to establish a commercial tobacco free environment in all workplaces and public places within the Navajo Nation.'
Effective tobacco control policies are among the top 10 'best buys' that governments can implement to combat the growing threat from non-communicable diseases such as cancer, heart disease, chronic respiratory disease and diabetes, the World Health Organization says in its first worldwide report on such diseases.
Tobacco use is a risk factor for all of these illnesses — diseases that have now surpassed infectious disease as the leading cause of death worldwide and threaten 'impending disaster' in some countries, according to WHO Director-General Dr. Margaret Chan. The WHO released new figures showing that nearly 6 million people die from tobacco use and exposure to secondhand smoke each year. By 2020, that is expected to increase to 7.5 million — accounting for 10 percent of deaths across the globe.
Health ministers from around the world are meeting in Moscow this week to discuss the growing global health threat from non-communicable diseases (NCDs) such as cancer and heart disease. Russia’s severe tobacco epidemic makes it a case study in NCDs.
The good news is that the Russian public strongly supports effective solutions: Eight in ten Russians — including nearly two-thirds of daily smokers — support a national tobacco control policy to help reduce tobacco use.
As we celebrate Earth Day on April 22, new research shows that cigarettes not only are a grave health hazard, but a serious threat to the environment as well.
Research funded by Legacy and published in the journal Tobacco Control shows that, “Tobacco is the No. 1 cause of preventable death in the United States, and cigarette filters/butts are the No. 1 littered item found on beaches and in urban environments.”
By a 60-40 percent margin, voters in Bismarck, North Dakota, on Tuesday approved a ballot measure extending the city's smoke-free law to bars, truck stops and tobacco stores. Voters rejected a separate measure that would have allowed 'smoking huts' outside bars. The new law will take effect in about a week.
The Bismarck vote underscores once again the strong public support for smoke-free laws that apply to all workplaces and public places. As demonstrated by ballot initiatives and polls across the country, the public strongly supports everyone's right to breathe clean air, free from the toxic chemicals in secondhand smoke. That support is strong across party lines and in every region of the country.
The world was shocked last summer to see videos of an Indonesian toddler chain-smoking as part of his daily routine.
Now China has doubled the trouble: A video of two toddlers in a train car, puffing on cigarettes and blowing smoke in each other's faces, has surfaced on the Internet.
Adults nearby watch, comment and even chuckle at the kids' disturbing use of deadly tobacco.
See for yourself ...
Maybe you thought you’d heard everything when the executives of Big Tobacco companies raised their right hands and swore to Congress that they didn’t believe nicotine was addictive or that cigarettes cause cancer.
Well, you were wrong.
Now they’re saying that the statements the Justice Department wants them to make under a federal court order stemming from the companies’ racketeering conviction are designed to “shame and humiliate” them.
The 21st-century version of the 'light' and 'low tar' ruse that kept smokers hooked despite their health concerns may well be the emergence of a new marketing strategy for smokeless tobacco that pushes these harmful products as an alternative to cigarettes.
A new study conducted by Legacy clearly documents a shift in smokeless tobacco magazine advertising away from a determined focus on men's sporting and leisure publications toward general-interest magazines aimed at a much broader market. The industry is increasingly pushing flavored products — which could influence kids to start using smokeless tobacco. And it's trying to attract smokers who are restricted from lighting up due to the success of smoke-free air policies — when the best step they could take for their health is to quit.
How do big pay packages for top tobacco executives stack up against state funding for programs to keep kids from smoking and help smokers quit?
It's a lopsided mismatch that the tobacco execs win. Guess the lifestyles of the Big Tobacco Execs are worth more than the health of our kids.
Tobacco use is a risk factor for all major categories of non-communicable diseases — heart disease, cancer, chronic respiratory disease and diabetes — and tobacco control must be the 'top priority' if the world is to reduce the toll of diseases that now cause two out of every three deaths worldwide, according to a global alliance of scientists and non-governmental organizations.
Cigarettes were never sexy, sophisticated or a sign of independence — despite tobacco industry marketing that targets women for profit. Now women are truly breaking free by quitting smoking and finally lowering their death rate from lung cancer.
Thanks to Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig, who has just stated his view that 'smokeless tobacco should be banned at the Major League level' and that MLB will propose such restrictions in contract talks with the players' union.
Baseball's Opening Day has started with a burst of energy, excitement and momentum in the campaign to get smokeless tobacco out of the ballgame.
The movement to get tobacco out of Major League Baseball is gaining momentum.
Top public health officials from coast to coast — representing a majority of cities where Major League Baseball is played — have joined in asking MLB Commissioner Bud Selig and Michael Weiner, executive director of the Major League Baseball Players Association, to prohibit use of tobacco by players, coaches and other baseball staff at games.
CBS News, with the help of Americans for Nonsmokers’ Rights, has found some of the smokiest cities in America and shows exactly why: They're places where elected officials have refused to take strong action to protect everyone’s right to breathe clean air.
Nowhere is the devastating toll of tobacco more evident than in China. Smoking kills more than one million Chinese people each year — one-fifth of the world total.
This week, China's Ministry of Health announced its strongest action to date to reduce this terrible toll: A new smoke-free policy that will prohibit smoking in indoor public places starting May 1.