DoD asks troops to kiss the spit goodbye

Source: www.tradingmarkets.com Author: staff When the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) weighs in on kissing and spitting, it's with good reason--two good reasons, in fact: love and health. Using smokeless tobacco--spit, dip, chew, snus, etc.--can pose a stinky, unsavory obstacle to sharing a kiss with a loved one, parent, child or sweetheart. It also may cause a slew of serious health problems. That's why DoD/TRICARE(R) wants military personnel to participate in the Great American Spit Out (GASpO) on February 24, 2011, and kiss the spit goodbye for a day. Some 19 percent of 18- to 24-year-old men in the armed forces use smokeless tobacco, more than double the national rate. To help cut that number down, the DoD Quit Tobacco--Make Everyone Proud campaign at http://www.ucanquit2.org is focusing this month on helping those who spit and chew tobacco to develop a personalized quit plan and to take action that may get them more kisses and help them gain more years of a healthy life. "Many of our servicemen started using smokeless tobacco at a young age due to peer pressure and became addicted before realizing the negative effects it could have on their personal relationships and health," said Cmdr. Aileen Buckler, M.D., M.P.H., U.S. Public Health Service officer and chairman of the DoD Alcohol and Tobacco Advisory Committee. Throughout the month, the DoD website will host a special GASpO page, http://www.ucanquit2.org/facts/gaspo/, where service members can publicly post their pledge to quit. Capt. Larry N. Williams, U.S. Navy tobacco clinical cessation champion, [...]

2011-02-11T14:22:13-07:00February, 2011|Oral Cancer News|

Tobacco industry adapts to world of fewer smokers

Source: The Tennessean Author: Anita Wadhwani By any name or variety you choose — call it snuff, dip, chew or plug — smokeless tobacco is making a comeback, and Tennessee farmers, factory workers and consumers are playing a major role in the renewed buzz. Farmers here and in Kentucky who once made a good living off raising burley tobacco for cigarettes have had to eliminate 40 percent of acreage devoted to that crop as demand has declined, while farmers who cultivate the dark tobacco used for chewing have been able to expand their fields by 22 percent in three years. Now, the massive marketing muscle of the nation's biggest tobacco companies — Altria Group and its subsidiary Philip Morris USA, which owns the 100-year-old U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Co. factory within view of the state Capitol, and R.J. Reynolds, which runs its smokeless operations out of a Memphis factory — are battling for market dominance. Together, the two manufacturers already control 90 percent of the American smokeless tobacco sector with brands such as U.S. Smokeless' Skoal and R.J. Reynolds' Kodiak. They're competing with new fruit- and mint-flavored products (some packaged to look like miniature cigarette packs) to attract a new generation of consumers and entice ex-smokers looking for nicotine- infused alternatives. Former cigarette smokers like Dave Kenner, 31, a construction worker making a pit stop at a West Nashville convenience store last week, said he switched to Red Seal Wintergreen smokeless because heavily taxed cigarettes cost too much — nearly $300 [...]

2011-02-04T12:24:02-07:00February, 2011|Oral Cancer News|

Dead man will be remembered for spreading oral cancer

Source: The Gawker/ WSJ Author: Steven Miller Louis Bantle, the former marketing director and chairman of U.S. Tobacco, died earlier this month at the age of 81 from emphysema and lung cancer. Bantle was most famous for convincing millions of teenagers to dip. The WSJ chroniclesBantle's work from the 1960s through the 1990s, during which time he helped turn snuff into a billion-dollar business and tripled its use among 18-24 year-olds. "We must sell the use of tobacco in the mouth and appeal to young people," he said, according to the minutes of a marketing meeting in 1968. "We hope to start a fad." "If you go to high school in Texas and you don't have a can of snuff in your pocket, you're out," Mr. Bantle told Forbes in 1980. Your legacy will live on, Mr. Bantle. Original Article from the WSJ: Louis Bantle made dipping snuff into a national pastime. Mr. Bantle, who died Oct. 10 at age 81 after a long struggle with lung cancer and emphysema, was chairman of United States Tobacco Co. for two decades beginning in 1973, a period that saw an explosion in snuff's popularity, particularly among younger users. In the 1970s, sales of the company's Skoal and Copenhagen tobaccos were relatively small and concentrated in the upper Midwest, where Scandinavian woodcutters had spread the smokeless habit in the 19th century. Mr. Bantle ramped up advertising featuring football and rodeo star Walt Garrison and other rugged athletes. He introduced a series of "starter" [...]

2010-10-20T08:39:52-07:00October, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

Oral cancer doesn’t silence North Carolina man

Source: The Cherokee Scout Author: Lizz Harold Marble – Switching out one form of tobacco for another, Rick Miller, 44, learned how to quit smoking and dipping the hard way. Miller went to a doctor in March to see if an ulcer inside his mouth could be removed. He expected a round of antibiotics or oral surgery. He figured he would be back to dipping as usual after it was taken care of. “I really didn’t have any symptoms. I got an ulcer underneath my tongue. They thought it was all it was,” Miller said.     Miller’s wife, Nicolia, did what most people do when they suspect they have an ailment. She went online and did an Internet search. After doing her own research, she was convinced it was mouth cancer, and Miller decided to see a specialist to see if their suspicions were correct. “Everything happened so fast after that,” Miller said. Informed by the specialist that he had oral cancer, he was immediately set up with a chemotherapy and radiation doctor. The father of four, two who are twin toddlers, had to undergo bouts of chemotherapy – including days where it was pumping into him everyday. From dipping to smoking Eight years ago, he stopped a 21-year smoking habit and began dipping tobacco. After more than 30 years of combined tobacco use, Miller has been forced to give up his addiction. “I gave up smoking and needed something to fill the void,” Miller said. He said he got a [...]

2010-06-03T15:55:07-07:00June, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

Smokeless tobacco can take you out of the game

Source: www.healthcanal.com Author: staff Another baseball season is under way and fans are heading to the ballpark to watch their favorite players hit home runs, steal bases, and argue over what's fair and foul. Marshall Posner, MD, says that the first step in reducing oral cancer risk is to avoid tobacco use altogether. Unfortunately, they will also see something else that many consider to be "foul" — players chewing tobacco. Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and the Massachusetts Dental Society (MDS) are partnering to spread the word that chewing tobacco, otherwise known as spit, dip, chew, or smokeless tobacco, is not a safe alternative to smoking. In fact, it's very addictive and a serious health risk. According to a Massachusetts survey released earlier this spring, teens may be turning away from cigarettes to other forms of tobacco, including smokeless tobacco. The report was funded by the United States Centers for Disease Control and conducted by state education and health departments. The survey asked middle- and high-school students about their tobacco habits and found that for the first time, students are using smokeless tobacco and cigars more than cigarettes. Of those high-schoolers who were surveyed, 16 percent admitted to smoking cigarettes in the past 30 days, while 17.6 percent admitted to using other tobacco products, such as smokeless tobacco. "Chewing tobacco is the most dangerous form of tobacco because it comes in contact directly with the oral mucosa," states David P. Lustbader, DMD, an MDS Trustee and an oral and maxillofacial surgeon at [...]

Smokeless tobacco risks ‘overblown’?

Source: www.tobacco-news.net Author: staff The Wall Street Journal “Numbers Guy” blog said that while smokeless tobacco products remain far less popular than cigarettes in the United States, a collection of products that deliver nicotine without smoke—including dip, chew, snuff and newer items that look more like chewing gum—have sparked a heated debate about health risks. Opponents of these products have presented numbers that suggest smokeless tobacco is an enormous public-health threat akin to cigarettes, while supporters, including some scientists, suggest smokeless items could offer a solution to smoking’s toll on public health. Both claims are based on misinterpretations of the data, said the report. Critics of smokeless tobacco have spoken out recently about elevated risks of oral cancer and dangers these items pose to children who accidentally ingest them. All of these risks appear to be overblown, said the blog, particularly compared with smoking, which is far more likely to kill than smokeless alternatives. But researchers who recommend these products as alternatives for smokers seeking to quit also are relying on hazy figures, the report added. Much of their evidence comes from Sweden, where use of smokeless products has risen in recent decades as smoking, and lung-cancer rates, have fallen. Many scientists who study tobacco use remain unpersuaded that the drop in cancer rates stemmed from the increase in use of smokeless products. In pressing the case for more stringent regulation of smokeless tobacco, a National Cancer Institute physician last week testified before Congress that smokeless-tobacco products can multiply users’ [...]

Congress urges major league baseball to ban smokeless tobacco

Source: Associated Press Author: Howard Fendrich WASHINGTON — After hounding Major League Baseball and its players union over steroids, Congress now wants the sport to ban smokeless tobacco. "Good luck," San Francisco Giants reliever Brandon Medders said. "Guys do what they do. We work outside. It's been part of the game for 100 years." At a hearing Wednesday, House Energy and Commerce Committee chairman Henry Waxman, a California Democrat, and Health Subcommittee chairman Frank Pallone, a New Jersey Democrat, called on baseball and its players to agree to bar major leaguers from using chew, dip or similar products during games. MLB executive VP Robert Manfred and MLB Players Association chief labor counsel David Prouty told lawmakers they agree that smokeless tobacco is harmful — Manfred said a ban in the majors is "a laudable goal" — but both pointed out that any ban would have to be agreed to through collective bargaining. They said their sides are willing to discuss the topic during future negotiations; baseball's labor contract is due to expire in December 2011. "I can tell you, anecdotally, there are plenty of players who are against it, who think, 'Of course it should be banned.' There are plenty of players who use it. Do they think it should be banned? I don't know," the union's Prouty said in an interview after the 3 1/2-hour hearing. "We can go back to the players and say, 'Congress feels strongly about this. You ought to think about it. Look what's happened [...]

2010-04-19T22:22:51-07:00April, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

Majors to chew it over as big-league tobacco policy isn’t up to snuff

Source: www.nydailynews.com/sports Author: Filip Bondy Derek Jeter steps to the plate again, his jaw churning ferociously on some foreign, sticky substance. It’s just gum, and Jeter will prove that to the world now and then by blowing a giant bubble. But until the silly pink ball emerges, who knows? It might be gum, yet it also could be a pouch of smokeless or dip tobacco — that stubborn, traditional chew of choice for baseball players throughout history. And this is exactly what drives Jimmie Lee Solomon crazy, because sometimes he just can’t win. There are enough bad examples in his world. The executive VP of baseball operations for MLB worries that kids will get the wrong idea, and that baseball will be hurled back into the Nicotine Age. "It’s gum a lot of the time, not tobacco,"says Solomon, who has worked for 16 years to eliminate chewing tobacco and dip from the big-league culture. "Unfortunately, it can have the same, impressionable effect.” You know the most dangerous of all drugs in baseball? It isn’t steroids, and it isn’t human growth hormone. Those performance enhancers are health terrors in their own right, impacting the very bones of the game. But legal, smokeless tobacco in its multiple chewable forms still provides the addictive poisons linked most conclusively to illness and fatal disease. The Mayo Clinic identifies an assortment of horrors associated with chewing tobacco, whether it is packaged in the form of leaves, paste or twists: Tooth decay, gum disease, high blood [...]

Smoke signals

Source: waldo.villagesoup.com Author: Dr. Jonathan M. Goss, DDS Dr. Jonathan M. Goss and the Staff of Camden Hills Dental Care would like to provide you with the following information from the Academy of General Dentistry for the education and care of your oral health. Smoke Signals Using tobacco can harm your mouth, including your teeth and gums, in a number of ways. There is no safe form of tobacco—using it produces many problems and risk factors, from tooth discoloration and gum disease to throat, lung, and oral cancer, and ultimately, even death. It is important to understand what happens to your mouth when you use any form of tobacco, and to discuss those effects—and how to quit—with your dentist and physician. What happens to my mouth when I smoke? Smoking reduces blood flow and the supply of vital nutrients to your gums, including vitamin C. Without the proper nutrients, you can develop gum disease, bone loss, and even tooth loss. This is because smoking triggers the accumulation of bacteria in plaque. Smoking also reduces the amount of saliva that flows through your mouth. Saliva is important for cleaning your mouth and preventing tooth decay. In addition, when you smoke, the temperature in your mouth increases and the heat kills important cells in your mouth. You also can see the effects of tobacco use. Nicotine and tar, the major ingredients of cigarettes, discolor your teeth—yellow and brown stains will appear and the sticky tar deposits will adhere to crevices. The roof [...]

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