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Health News : CV Risk Seen With Smokeless Tobacco
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| Posted by bigman01 on 2009/8/25 12:01:32 (617 reads) |
CV Risk Seen With Smokeless Tobacco | By Nancy Walsh, Contributing Writer, MedPage Today
Published: August 24, 2009
Reviewed by Dori F. Zaleznik, MD; Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Boston and
Dorothy Caputo, MA, RN, BC-ADM, CDE, Nurse Planner |
| The use of smokeless tobacco products was associated with an increased risk for fatal myocardial infarction (MI) and stroke, a meta-analysis found. For fatal MI, the relative risk associated with ever having used these products was 1.13 (95% CI 1.06 to 1.21), according to Paolo Boffetta, MD, and Kurt Straif, MD, PhD, of the International Agency for Research on Cancer in Lyon, France. And the overall relative risk for fatal stroke was 1.40 (95% CI 1.28 to 1.54), the researchers reported online in the BMJ. The use of oral and nasal smokeless tobacco products such as snuff and chewing tobacco has increased in recent decades, particularly among people younger than 40, based on claims of less health risk than smoking. Recently, North American and Scandinavian researchers found an increased risk of oropharyngeal and prostate cancers. But smokeless tobacco does pose potential health risks related to MI and stroke, possibly because of increases in blood pressure and heart rate, as well as associations with diabetes, metabolic syndrome, and obesity, according to the investigators. "Determining the role of smokeless tobacco in cardiovascular diseases is important," they wrote, "given the high incidence and mortality from these diseases." They therefore undertook a systematic review that included 11 studies, eight from Sweden and three from the U.S. Eight were prospective cohort studies, three were population-based case-control studies, and nine included only subjects who had never smoked tobacco. Most included only men. Among the nine studies that estimated risk for any MI, the risk associated with ever having used smokeless tobacco was 0.99 (95% CI 0.89 to 1.10). The lack of association with any MI included both current and former users, and when the analysis was restricted to cohort studies the relative risk for any MI was 1.04 (95% CI 0.95 to 1.14). Among the eight studies estimating risk for fatal MI, the excess risk was present only for current, not former, smokeless tobaccouse. Based on six risk estimates, the overall risk of any stroke was 1.19 (95% CI 0.97 to 1.47), with increased risk being seen only for current use. In the sole study that investigated risk according to duration or frequency of use, no significant trend was seen for fatal stroke, but the relative risk was higher among those with a long history of use. And in the single study that reported stroke risk by type of event, the relative risk was higher for fatal ischemic stroke (RR 1.63, 95% CI 1.02 to 2.62) than for fatal hemorrhagic stroke (RR 1.05, 95% CI 0.61 to 1.80). The risks for fatal MI and stroke were seen in studies both from the U.S. and Sweden. The proportion of deaths from MI that was attributable to smokeless tobacco products was 0.5% in the U.S. and 5.6% in Sweden, while the corresponding numbers for stroke were 1.7% and 5.4%. The researchers noted potential sources of bias such as the inclusion of case-control studies, confounding by active smoking, and misclassification of users, but they found no strong evidence for effects of bias. "If the association is real, its public health and clinical implications might be substantial, despite the fact that the magnitude of the excess risk is small," they wrote. Further research should attempt to determine how smokeless tobacco products affect the cardiovascular system and to investigate further if risk is also elevated for nonfatal events. The study received no funding and the investigators declared no competing interests. | |
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Smoking News : DIY cigarettes? Some smokers start growing tobacco
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| Posted by bigman01 on 2009/8/24 7:40:25 (47 reads) |
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DIY cigarettes? Some smokers start growing tobacco By STEVE SZKOTAK (AP) – 4 days ago RICHMOND, Va. — Something unusual is cropping up alongside the tomatoes, eggplant and okra in Scott Byars' vegetable garden — the elephantine leaves of 30 tobacco plants. Driven largely by ever-rising tobacco prices, he's among a growing number of smokers who have turned to their green thumbs to cultivate tobacco plants to blend their own cigarettes, cigars and chew. Byars normally pays $5 for a five-pack of cigars and $3 for a tin of snuff; the seed cost him $9. "I want to get to where I don't have to go to the store and buy tobacco, but I'll just be able to supply my own from one year to the next," Byars said. In urban lots and on rural acres, smokers and smokeless tobacco users are planting Virginia Gold, Goose Creek Red, Yellow Twist Bud and dozens of other tobacco varieties. Although most people still buy from big tobacco, the movement took off in April when the tax on cigarettes went up 62 cents to $1.01 a pack. Large tax increases were also imposed on other tobacco products, and tobacco companies upped prices even more to compensate for lost sales. Some seed suppliers have reported a tenfold increase in sales as some of the country's 43.3 million smokers look for a cheaper way to get their nicotine fix in a down economy. Cigarettes cost an average of $4.35 a pack, home growers can make that amount for about 30 cents. It's the latest do-it-yourself movement as others repair their own cars, swap used clothes and cancel yard work services to save money. "Cigarette smokers say, 'Yeah, we're going to die of cancer, but do we have to die of poverty as well?'" said Jack Basharan, who operates The Tobacco Seed Co. Ltd. in Essex, England. Virtually all of his increased tobacco seed sales have been in the U.S., he said. Provided the tobacco isn't sold or traded, the Food and Drug Administration doesn't regulate homegrown tobacco. Most people grow for cigarettes, but some blend their own cigars and chew. The FDA and U.S. Department of Agriculture don't keep statistics on home growers, though seed suppliers and Internet buzz suggest strong interest. Seedman.com has sold more than 100,000 packets of tobacco seeds this year, compared with 22,000 in all of 2008, president Jim Johnson said. The Gautier, Miss.-based company offers 40 varieties of tobacco from around the globe and packages various flavor blends for first-time growers. A grower who purchased one of Johnson's Oriental and Turkish blends for $24.50 could satisfy a pack-a-day habit for more than three years, according to Johnson's calculations. However, growing and processing tobacco can challenge even the best gardeners. The nearly microscopic seeds must initially be grown inside and transplanted after the threat of frost has passed. The plants are susceptible to an army of pests; must be topped, or pruned, to encourage leaf growth; require rotating every few years; and require the proper chemical soil balance. The leaves must be cut and hung to dry. A seed started in March can be ready to smoke as soon as October. Some anxious growers have been known to microwave leaves to hasten the drying. For purists, the leaves can be cured, or aged, like a fine wine for up to three years. "It's actually very labor intensive," said Ed Baker, general manager of Cross Creek Seed Inc. in Raeford, N.C., the No. 1 tobacco seed supplier in the U.S. "There's a reason why cigarette companies make all that money. If it was that easy, everyone would be growing their own tobacco." Cross Creek has seen a big increase in seed requests from home growers but it sells in volume. It's smallest seed offering is 90,000 seeds for $170. Novices and veterans can find smoker-friendly havens like howtogrowtobacco.com, a Web site that offers growing and curing tips, often including angry posts over ever-increasing taxes and smoking restrictions. Many would not discuss their crops with The Associated Press, fearful a high profile would invite government scrutiny and taxes. Others proudly share stories and post photos. Arthur Skora, 42, records his success growing and curing in Greenwood, Wis., on a how-to DVD he sells online. "Most of the people who are ordering are just getting fed up with prices and basically they're not going to take it anymore," Skora said. Saving money wasn't the only motivation for Matt Schoell-Schafer, a landscape architect in Kansas City, who has 50 plants growing in his urban garden. "It's not being a victim to their manipulation of this product," said Schoell-Schafer, 34, who enjoys an occasional cigar or cigarette. "So I'm sort of liberating myself by growing it myself." Some growers contend their tobacco concoctions are safer than commercial products, which have a stew of additives ranging from colorings and oils to ammonia. "The quick answer to that is no," said Thomas Glynn, director of cancer science and trends at the American Cancer Society. Glynn knew of only one study of the health risks of homegrown and commercial blends — and it concluded no difference in safety between the two. Homegrown tobacco can also contain fungus and mold, which can cause chronic bronchitis and other ailments, Glynn said. Philip Morris USA, the nation's No. 1 cigarette maker, and other big companies are unlikely to shudder. Philip Gorham, a tobacco industry analyst with the investment research firm Morningstar, said he had no data on smokers who switched to homegrown. But he doesn't see it as a mass movement. "It's one thing to switch from a premium brand to a discount one. It's quite another to switch from buying a manufactured product to roll your own," Gorham said. At VirtualSeeds.com, Joyce Moore said she typically sold tobacco seeds as ornamental plants to gardeners who appreciated their elephantine leaves. This year, her Astoria, Ore.-based company was overwhelmed by orders from tobacco users slammed by "the market collapse, the recession, then getting hit with exorbitant tobacco taxes." Moore doesn't use tobacco herself but has no misgivings about her business. "If I sold doughnuts in a bakery would I feel guilty because fat people come in and buy them?" she asked. "It just happens to be a very good year for tobacco seeds." Copyright © 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. Article Source
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Health News : List Of Hazardous Chemicals In Smokeless Tobacco Is Expanded In New Study
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| Posted by bigman01 on 2009/8/19 3:17:59 (631 reads) |
List Of Hazardous Chemicals In Smokeless Tobacco Is Expanded In New StudyScienceDaily (Aug. 18, 2009) — Attention all smokeless tobacco users: It's time to banish the comforting notion that snuff and chewing tobacco are safe because they don't burn and produce inhalable smoke like cigarettes. A study that looked beyond the well-researched tobacco hazards, nitrosamines and nicotine, has discovered a single pinch –– the amount in a portion –– of smokeless tobacco exposes the user to the same amount of another group of dangerous chemicals as the smoke of five cigarettes. The research on polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) in smokeless tobacco was reported at the 238th National Meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS). It adds to existing evidence that smokeless contains two dozen other carcinogens that cause oral and pancreatic cancers, the scientists say. "This study once again clearly shows us that smokeless tobacco is not safe," said Irina Stepanov, Ph.D., who led the research team. "Our finding places snuff on the same list of major sources of exposure to polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons as smoking cigarettes." PAHs are widespread environmental contaminants formed as a result of incomplete burning of wood, coal, fat in meat, and organic matter. PAHs form, for instance, during the grilling of burgers, steaks and other meat. The findings come in the midst of a rise in both marketing and consumption of smokeless tobacco, which many consumers regard as less dangerous than other forms of tobacco. Estimates suggest that sales of moist snuff in the United States have doubled since the 1980s. "The feeling of safety among some smokeless users is wrong," said Stepanov, a chemist with Masonic Cancer Center, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. "A total of 28 carcinogens were identified in smokeless tobacco even before our study. Continued exposure to these over a period of time can lead to cancer. Now we have found even more carcinogens in snuff." In addition to the heightened cancer risk, she noted that chronic use of snuff leads to nicotine addiction, just as it does with cigarette smoking. Stepanov said that until recently, scientists believed that only trace amounts of PAH existed in snuff because the tobacco was not burned when used. This assumption proved to be wrong. "Even though smokeless tobacco use does not involve burning, moist snuff is getting contaminated with PAH during its manufacturing," according to Stepanov. The most likely source of this contamination with PAH is the curing process that is used to turn tobacco leaves into snuff. This process is called 'fire-curing', and it puts tobacco into direct contact with the smoke generated by smoldering hardwoods –– a rich source of various PAHs. Looking to the next project, she said the team is working on a study that will examine a wide range of smokeless tobacco brands to compare PAH levels among them. Funding for Stepanov's research came from the National Cancer Institute and the National Institute on Drug Abuse to the Transdisciplinary Tobacco Use Research Center at the University of Minnesota. The research team working on this project includes Dr. Dorothy Hatsukami and Dr. Stephen Hecht, renowned experts in tobacco carcinogenesis and tobacco harm reduction. Article Source |
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Smoking News : Smoking is troops’ right
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| Posted by bigman01 on 2009/7/30 23:23:01 (37 reads) |
Smoking is troops’ rightNo one disputes that using tobacco, in whatever form, carries dire health consequences for users while driving up the costs of health care for everyone. The Department of Veterans Affairs spent $5 billion last year to treat smoking-related emphysema alone. Now, in a study funded by VA, the Institute of Medicine has proposed ending tobacco sales on military bases and setting a deadline for a smoke-free force. Certainly, there is cause for worry about the health of the troops. Oddly enough, in a culture in which fitness is a measure of job performance, one in three troops is a smoker — far more than in the general U.S. population, where one in five people smokes. Like it or not, however, tobacco use is legal for adults. As long as that’s so, efforts to regulate its use must first resolve inherent issues of individual rights. In recent decades, this has been done successfully to impose legal bans on smoking in many public spaces and workplaces; aboard commercial airplanes; and in bars and restaurants in many states. But these initiatives focused mainly on protecting nonsmokers from secondhand smoke; they did not otherwise deny tobacco users the right to indulge. Defense Secretary Robert Gates, in response to the IOM study, indicated interest in a smoke-free force as a broad, long-term goal, but was also adamant that he will not ban tobacco use for troops in the war zones. He’s on the money on both points. It’s hard to argue against a long-term goal of ending tobacco use in the military or in any segment of society. But summarily denying tobacco to deployed forces in high-stress war zones would be to unfairly and unwisely deny them the same rights enjoyed by their fellow citizens for whom they serve in harm’s way. Article Source
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Dip News : Reynolds May Introduce Camel Snuff to Go After Altria
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| Posted by bigman01 on 2009/7/30 23:14:05 (1109 reads) |
Reynolds May Introduce Camel Snuff to Go After Altria July 29 (Bloomberg) -- Reynolds American Inc. may expand its Camel cigarette brand into snuff to take customers from Altria Group Inc., the head of Reynolds’ smokeless-tobacco division said in an interview. In a test in Florida and Colorado, Reynolds is offering its new Camel Dip snuff to distributors for the same price its bigger competitor charges for Skoal and Copenhagen, said Bryan Stockdale, chief executive officer of Reynolds’ Conwood unit. A national expansion of Camel Dip may help the company reverse declining market share in higher-priced snuff, he said. Reynolds and Altria, the country’s two largest tobacco companies, are going after the snuff market to counter shrinking cigarette demand. Altria’s UST division cut the price of Skoal and Copenhagen March 29, spurring Reynolds to lower prices of its more-expensive Kodiak brand in a move that hurt second- quarter profit. Camel’s share of U.S. smokers was unchanged at 7.5 percent in the period, the Winston-Salem, North Carolina- based company said July 23. “We’re stretching the brand to figure out whether or not you can take a well-known cigarette trademark and expand it into this category,” Stockdale, 51, said July 27 in his first interview since taking charge of Conwood in February. “There’s a whole lot of early-on feedback that says we may have something that’s got some legs to it.” Altria won’t comment on Camel Dip, David Sylvia, a spokesman for the Richmond, Virginia-based company, said in an e-mail. Kodiak, Grizzly Grizzly and Kodiak are Reynolds’ top-selling smokeless tobacco brands. It also makes tobacco twists, Levi Garrett chewing tobacco and Tube Rose snuff, according to Conwood’s Web site. Altria’s UST division sells Red Seal and Husky snuff in addition to Skoal and Copenhagen. Reynolds is testing its Camel version of moist snuff as part of an effort to boost sales of higher-priced products. While the Kodiak brand generates lower sales than less-expensive Grizzly, it’s about twice as profitable, Stockdale said. Price reductions on Skoal and Copenhagen may eventually spur growth of higher-priced snuff, creating a need for Reynolds to establish a brand stronger than Kodiak, Thilo Wrede, an analyst at Credit Suisse, said yesterday in a telephone interview from New York. Aggressive Promotions “The challenge for them is to convince consumers to try the product,” Wrede said. Conwood may need to offer aggressive promotions, he said. He rates Reynolds as “neutral” and Altria as “outperform.” Camel Dip’s Wintergreen Wide Cut variety comes in a metal can and contains tobacco that has longer-lasting flavor and is cut wider than other snuff, making it easier to pack in the mouth, Stockdale said. “If you can stabilize Kodiak and establish Camel, then you have growing premium and growing Grizzly,” said Stockdale, a 30-year Reynolds veteran and former senior vice president of marketing operations for the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. cigarette division. “Camel showing the ability to grow in the moist segment is a big deal.” Reynolds rose 74 cents, or 1.7 percent, to $43.31 at 4:15 p.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. The shares have advanced 7.4 percent this year, compared with Altria’s 17 percent gain. Reynolds lowered the price of Kodiak by 72 cents a can April 1, following the move by Altria to decrease distributors’ list price of Skoal and Copenhagen by 62 cents a can. The price reductions on those two brands haven’t slowed Grizzly’s growth, Stockdale said. Reynolds has introduced four new varieties of Grizzly since last year, he said. Retailers in Colorado are selling a 1.2-ounce (34-gram) can of Camel Dip for about $4.65, said David Howard, a Reynolds spokesman. Altria’s Copenhagen sold for a U.S. average of $4.16 a tin in June, the company said last week. Reynolds’ Grizzly brand sold for about $2.75 a can in the second quarter, Howard said. The company started selling Camel Dip in Florida and Colorado in late June. It hasn’t set a timetable for the test or possible expansion, Stockdale said. To contact the reporter on this story: Chris Burritt in Greensboro, North Carolina, at 1348 or cburritt@bloomberg.net Last Updated: July 29, 2009 16:16 EDT |
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