Stop press!!!!! Nicotine is a DRUG!

Yesterday the House of Representatives at long last passed a bill giving the FDA the authority to regulate tobacco products.

Rep. Henry Waxman (D., Calif.), for years a thorn in the tobacco industry's side, sponsored the bill, which will further restrict tobacco advertising and will ban flavored cigarettes which are designed to appeal to young people.

The bill is almost certain to be vetoed by a tobacco industry friendly White House. President Bush's ties to the tobacco industry are strong and deep. Karl Rove, until last year Bush's Deputy Chief of Staff and political Svengali, was formally on Philip Morris's payroll from 1991-1996 as a political intelligence operative. Another of Bush's close friends and advisors, Haley Barbour, who was Chairman of the Republican National Committee from 1993-1997 and is considered by many to be a potential Vice-Presidential candidate in 2008, has strong tobacco ties. In 2001 his lobbying company Barbour, Griffith & Rogers was named by Fortune as the most powerful in the nation and it has made millions in fees from lobbying on behalf of tobacco companies.

Back in September 1999 Martin Feldman, a tobacco industry analyst with Salomon Smith Barney said "The prospect of Bill Clinton gone and a George Bush presidency makes the industry almost giddy." And President Bush has not disappointed. He has resisted federal tax hikes on tobacco products, he has advocated tort reform which heavily favours the makers of dangerous products such as cigarettes, he has refused to ratify the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control - the worldwide agreement to prevent children from starting to smoke and restricting tobacco companies advertising and promotional activity designed to recruit new, young smokers.

In outlining White House opposition to the FDA taking authority over tobacco, Health & Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt suggests that the FDA has no expertise in the field.

It's funny - I'd have thought that an organzation that was "responsible for protecting public health by assuring the saftey, efficacy and security of human drugs..." and has been doing so effectively since 1862 was EXACTLY what we needed here. If they don't have expertise in the field, who does?

Ontario bans in-store cigarette displays

On May 31st (coincidentally World No Tobacco Day) the government of Ontario banned so-called 'power wall' displays of tobacco products in stores selling cigarettes.

With so many restrictions on advertising and promotion of tobacco products, the power wall in the convenience store was one of the last bastions of tobacco promotion. Some critics have labelled this move as petty and vindictive, but they are missing the larger point. The display bans are not to 'remove temptation' among former smokers or to hope that smokers somehow forget they smoke if they don't see the display. The bans are designed with children in mind.

Tobacco companies want children to think that it is normal and natural for people to smoke, that smoking is popular among adults and that it is OK to smoke. The power wall displays are designed to reinforce these beliefs. By covering the displays, the products are de-normalised. Cigarettes are no longer perceived as being equivalent to soap powder or candy - regular products consumed by regular people.

I worked in tobacco marketing for seven years and the idea of covering up of power walls absolutely terrified the tobacco companies, to the degree that they fought its introduction tooth and nail in court. They felt that it would seriously limit their ability to establish brand awareness of their products among young children. And they are right to be frightened. These bans will lead to fewer teens perceiving smoking as normal, which will lead to lower levels of teen smoking. And if they don't get you as a teen, then they probably won't get you at all...

To find out more about how the tobacco inductry manipulates children, visit us at http://www.theeasywaytostopsmoking.com/ and take a look at our links page.

Quit smoking drug companies slug it out...

Drug comany Glaxo has been quick to try to take advantage of their comeptitor Pfizer's problems.
With the recent announcement by the Federal Aviation Authority banning the use of Pfizer's Chantix among commercial pilots and air traffic controllers due to concern over its' safety, Glaxo marketers have generously offered pilots and air traffic controllers 48 free nicotine lozenges.
However they are not publicising two things: firstly that a full programme of lozenges comprises over 900 lozenges and that the program will cost the pilots an additional $500 to complete, and secondly, that according to research published by industry consultants, the success rate of the lozenge is around 7%.
So, if you're a pilot wanting to quit, you can spend $500 on a product with a 7% success rate or you can visit us www.theeasywaytostopsmoking.com

Chantix - more bad news...

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has banned the use of Chantix among America's pilots and air traffic controllers. The move comes as a response to research released by the Institute for Safe Medication Practices. The research details 988 'serious' incidents involving Chantix in the fourth quarter of 2007.


This follows hot on the heels of the FDA's February's public health advisory about Chantix, which warned users of the elevated risk of 'serious psychiatric symptoms' and even that some users had committed suicide.


For a natural, safe, effective, drug-free approach to quitting smoking, please visit us at http://www.theeasywaytostopsmoking.com/

Quit smoking objective: tobacco-free or nicotine-free?

I have just received in my inbox a wonderful self-congratulatory press release from a major smoking cessation service provider. In it they pat themselves on the back for achieving their highest ever success rate in the first quarter of 2008. The problem is that they are defining 'success' as being tobacco-free rather than nicotine-free.

When we dig deeper we find that a significant number of the 'successes' are continuing to use the nicotine patch or gum. Research shows that of the 6-8% of gum users who successfully quit smoking, more than half become addicted to the gum. Further research shows that many people who remain addicted to nicotine ultimately relapse back to smoking.

I also note from their research that they were only able to follow-up with the 51% of their customers who completed the survey. What about the rest?

So, of the 14,428 people surveyed, the 'success rate' is based on the responses from just 7,300, and some of the people counted as successes are still using nicotine. In this kind of research it is usually the protocol to count non-respondents as still smoking. In this case their much-trumpeted 'success rate' of 44.5% (tobacco-free, not nicotine-free remember) at six months falls to 22.7%. As those still addicted to nicotine drift back to smoking, this figure would be expected to drop further...

Compare this to the 12-month, nicotine-free success rate of 53.3% for attending Allen Carr's Easyway to Stop Smoking seminar.

To get the facts, not the spin, please visit us at www.theeasywaytostopsmoking.com

Light and mild? Deadly and deceitful

Are light and mild cigarettes 'milder' or 'lighter' (by that what we really mean is 'safer' or 'less dangerous') than so-called full-flavor cigarettes?

To answer this question, we must first understand what a light or mild cigarette is. A light cigarette is identical to the full-flavor version with the exception of two things: first, the filter is longer. This gives the smoke more time to cool down before entering the airways and this reduction in temperature gives the illusion of a milder 'taste'. (This is why most smokers can't smoker non-flitered cigarettes: the smoke is too hot for them and they find the 'flavor' too harsh). Second, many manufacturers also put microscopic ventilations in the filter. Again, this allows the smoke to cool down giving the illusion of a milder taste. Also some side-stream smoke escapes through the ventilations, which gives these cigarettes lower tar and nicotine levels when the cigarette is tested by the FTC's smoking machines.

However, we do not smoke like a machine smokes. We cover the ventilations with our lips or fingers. We rip the filter off, or tape it up. We drag deeper, smoke further down the butt or smoke more cigarettes to compensate for the loss of this side-stream smoke.

Because we smoke light and mild cigarettes differently, we actually end up getting very similar amounts of nicotine (and therefore tar, carbon monoxide etc.) from ultra-light cigarettes as we do from full-flavor brands, it's just that the smoke is cooler giving the illusion of mildness.

In Canada this scam has been blown wide open and tobacco companies and now no longer allowed to use the deceitful descriptors 'light' and 'mild'.

As with so many other walks of life, in quitting smoking knowledge is power. To get more knowledge and power, visit us at www.theeasywaytostopsmoking.com

Stop Smoking online with Allen Carr's Easyway to Stop Smoking webcast

We are delighted to announce the launch of our Allen Carr's Easyway to Stop Smoking webcast service.

This service has been launched to service the US and Canadian smokers who do not have easy access to an Allen Carr seminar center (currently NY, LA, Dallas, Denver, Toronto and Vancouver).

The webcast is split into six segments and lasts four hours. As with the live seminars, smokers are invited to continue to smoke throughout the program, right up until the ritual final cigarette.
The webcast is delivered by one of the most experienced facilitators in the Allen Carr network, who has personally helped thousands of smokers - including many members of LA and NY's A-list.

We are getting tremendous feedback from webcast users. One user - a doctor who works in the field of addictions said: "So far, so good. I am amazed at how effectively your program has completely removed my desire to smoke. It really is easy..."

For more information about the webcast, please click here. If you are a smoker, or if there is a smoker in your life, we urge you to take a look...