smoking rates

Gruesome images on cigarette packs seem to be working

Source: http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/ Sometimes it takes a good swift kick to open a person's eyes. That's the federal government's strategy in its "scared straight" campaign urging Canadians to butt out by forcing tobacco companies to adorn their addictive products with gruesome images showing the consequences of smoking. The graphic pictures include that of a human tongue rotting in the mouth of a person inflicted with mouth cancer. Other images portray cancer victims, literally human skeletons, at various stages of cancer with the Grim Reaper knocking at their back door. Another shows a man with a hole in his neck -- a victim of throat cancer -- through which he now breathes. His message on the smoke pack: "I wish I had never started smoking." It's a frank message that had to be brought home, and it's apparently working. Statistics Canada reported this week smoking rates have dropped dramatically in the last 10 years, with steep declines in the number of teen smokers. Ottawa credits, in part, its mandatory, graphic anti-smoking packaging for tobacco products. The new rules became official Tuesday. Tobacco companies must now label three-quarters of a cigarette package with grisly pictures showing the horrific consequences of smoking. The image of an emaciated, cancer-stricken Barb Tarbox, curled up in a fetal position in a hospital bed not long before her death, takes up three-quarters of some of the packages. Tarbox became well-known as a powerful anti-smoking activist who, while inflicted with brain and lung cancers, gave numerous public [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2012-06-22T21:18:49-07:00June, 2012|Oral Cancer News|

Menthol

Source: snus-news.blogspot.com Author: Sarah O'Connor There is a strong preference for menthol products in a number of Asian markets such as Japan and it is also growing in some Central European and Latin American markets. (Marlboro menthol cigarettes: strong preference in Asia by O'Connor Sarah, cheapweb.info, 6/24/2009) Study Abstract: Japan presents an excellent case-study of a nation with low female smoking rates and a negligible menthol market which changed after the cigarette market was opened to foreign competition. Internal tobacco industry documents demonstrate the intent of tobacco manufacturers to increase initiation among young females through development and marketing of menthol brands. Japanese menthol market share rose rapidly from less than 1% in 1980 to 20% in 2008. Menthol brand use was dominated by younger and female smokers, in contrast with non-menthol brands which were used primarily by male smokers. Nationally representative surveys confirm industry surveys of brand use and provide further evidence of the end results of the tobacco industry‘s actions—increased female smoking in Japan. These findings suggest that female populations may be encouraged to initiate into smoking, particularly in developing nations or where female smoking rates remain low, if the tobacco industry can successfully tailor brands to them. The Japanese experience provides a warning to public health officials who wish to prevent smoking initiation among young females. Surveys identified menthol as a major reason for female experimentation and use. Menthol cigarettes tended to be viewed as "a special type" of "light" cigarette and were widely considered to be an [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2011-01-19T13:38:06-07:00January, 2011|Oral Cancer News|

U.S. cancer death rates continue to fall

Source: www.ajc.com Author: staff Some 650,000 people are alive today who wouldn't be were it not for advances in cancer prevention, detection and treatment over the past 15 years, new statistics show. The American Cancer Society's Cancer Statistics 2009 report finds an encouraging 19.2 percent drop in cancer death rates among men from 1990 to 2005, as well as an 11.4 percent drop in women's cancer death rates during the same time period. Overall, cancer death rates fell 2 percent per year from 2001 to 2005 in men and 1.6 percent per year from 2002 to 2005 in women. By comparison, between 1993 and 2001, overall death rates in men declined 1.5 percent per year and, between 1994 and 2002, 0.8 percent in women. "We continue to see a decrease in death rates from cancer in both men and women and this is mainly because of prevention - mostly a reduction in smoking rates; detection which includes screening for colorectal cancer, for breast cancer and for cervical cancer; and also improved treatment," said report author Ahmedin Jemal, strategic director for cancer surveillance at the American Cancer Society. "To put this in perspective, the number of lives saved is more than the population of Washington, D.C.," said Dr. Louis M. Weiner, director of the Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center at Georgetown University. "In my mind, that's a cause for some celebration. However, there are some sobering trends that we have to be aware of. The death rate for cardiovascular disease has dropped [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2009-05-27T14:47:13-07:00May, 2009|Oral Cancer News|