Forum editorial: Minn. tax on tobacco is a health tax

Opponents of Minnesota’s new tobacco tax seem to believe the $2.83 per pack of cigarettes tax is about only revenue and business. It’s not. It’s first and foremost about public health.
While the tax has had expected impacts on revenue and business since it went into effect July 1, its primary purpose is to discourage smoking. The tax is having the predicted results: Sales of cigarettes are down. Early evidence suggests the steep rise in the tax will generate a corresponding decline in smoking. That has been the experience of every other state that raised its cigarette tax substantially. Young smokers or potential smokers are especially sensitive to price.
Even as sales of cigarettes slipped as the tax took hold, revenue increased, as forecast. The tax is up 30 percent, after all. Some of that additional revenue will be used to fund the new Vikings stadium.
However, as fewer Minnesotans take up the habit and others quit or reduce cigarette purchases, revenue will decline. The ideal situation, of course, would be that tobacco use falls so far as to make revenue from the tax unimportant to the state’s overall financial picture.
Reacting to the decline in sales, one person at a retail store said: “It’s very bad.” No, it’s not. In the long term, fewer people smoking cigarettes is a good thing. It’s good for their health, their medical bills and the nation’s health care system.
Often characterized as “sin taxes,” taxes on cigarettes and other tobacco products are in effect health taxes. There is no sin in public policy that aims to improve and protect health. The real sin is peddling a product that sickens and kills people.

Forum editorials represent the opinion of Forum management and the newspaper’s Editorial Board.
http://www.inforum.com/event/article/id/414349/

E-Cigarette trend catching on, but what are the effects?

by Stephanie Zepelin
BOISE — It might be a trend you have noticed: electronic cigarettes. The devices use battery power to heat a liquid (usually containing nicotine) the user inhales. Some folks are choosing this option over traditional cigarettes.
Electronicstix, a company that started in Utah, just opened their first store in Boise.
“We have three stores that have been pretty seasoned down in Utah,” said Devin Norager, who works at ElectronicStix.
Norager smoked traditional cigarettes before switching to vaping, and says a lot of people are in that same situation.
“Ninety-nine percent of it is people that do smoke and want a healthier alternative,” Norager said.
Kody Girard smoked for more than a decade, and is using vaping to cut costs from purchasing traditional cigarettes. Girard said he doesn’t know much about the health effects of vaping.
“It’s just like smoking,” said Girard. “You don’t know much about it you try to ignore it the best you can because it’s bad. So this might not be, but it’s gotta be better than cigarettes.”
Doctor Jim Souza, Vice President of Medical Affairs at St. Luke’s Medical Center in Boise, talked with KTVB about the health effects of e-cigarettes.
“I think the state of the science right now is there’s not enough information to draw a conclusion,” said Souza.
Dr. Souza said the main concern in health care is e-cigarette marketing targeting to kids.
“It’s estimated now that 10 percent of high school seniors have used e-cigarettes, of that 10 percent, 75 percent of them also use tobacco,” Souza said. “So because nicotine is so powerfully addictive, the concern from a public health perspective is that this could be a gateway into traditional tobacco for young people, and that would be a public health disaster.”
However, the reserve effect could be good for public health.
“I think most folks in health care think that if all smokers could convert to e-cigarettes, that would probably be a public health boon, although we don’t know that for sure,” said Souza.
He said it does help people kick the habit.
Audra Johnson started smoking years ago, and has been vaping for about three months.
“I figured it would help because I’ve tried patch, the pill, everything else, Chantix, nothing has really worked,” said Johnson.
Johnson said she is saving money by switching over to e-cigarettes, and feels better.
E-cigarettes range anywhere in price from a few bucks for a disposable one to several hundred dollars for the high-end products.
http://www.ktvb.com/news/E-Cigarette-trend-catching-but-what-are-the-effects-226619581.html

Our view: State, feds can step up for e-cig safety

Duluth News Tribune Editorial
Three weeks ago today, Duluth made headlines across the state, becoming the first city in Minnesota to ban e-cigarettes indoors where tobacco use already is forbidden, among other restrictions and regulations.
Then, last week, Hermantown made news by passing a moratorium on the sale and use of electronic cigarettes inside public spaces. In addition, Mankato restricted e-cig sampling; North Mankato placed a moratorium on sampling; and Beltrami County, Bemidji and other communities all are considering their own restrictions, bans, regulations and other measures related to a suddenly booming e-cigarette industry, an industry dogged by serious and legitimate questions and concerns about health and safety.
“There are so many communities that have taken action or are percolating right now on this issue,” Pat McKone of Duluth, director of the American Lung Association of Minnesota, told the News Tribune Opinion page on Friday. “There’s so much unknown. We have to take a serious look. It’s not just a fad.”
With so many communities in Minnesota and around the country scrambling to catch up to ensure safety, especially the safety of a growing number of young people who are using unregulated e-cigarettes, the Minnesota Legislature and the federal government could step up and take a lead. Then, rules, regulations and restrictions would be uniform rather than the patchwork of policies taking shape now that change from border to border and community to community.
“Would it be better if the state regulated this? I do believe that’s the way, but we’re going to have a short legislative session, and I don’t think (lawmakers) are swift enough to do anything this (coming) year,” McKone said. “We do the heavy lifting at the local level and then the state takes it on. That’s a common pattern. And that appears to be what’ll eventually happen here. But every month (we) delay another group of young people is making decisions and poor choices.”
In most communities, kids can buy e-cigarettes easily and legally. And they are. The percentage of U.S. middle school and high school students taking their first drags on e-cigarettes more than doubled from 2011 to 2012, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced this month. In 2012, more than 1.78 million middle school and high school students nationwide had tried
e-cigarettes, a precursor to tobacco cigarettes.
And no wonder. E-cigarettes, as addictive, dangerous and harmful to health as they may be, are actively being marketed to kids, just the way tobacco cigarettes used to be. Remember Joe Camel and the portrayal of smoking as cool and hip and what everyone who’s anyone was doing? This time — powered by nearly $21 million in advertising in 2012, according to the New York Times — it’s kid-friendly flavors such as watermelon and cookies-and-cream milkshake and the portrayal of e-cigarette use as cool and hip and what everyone who’s anyone is doing.
And just what are those kids inhaling? Because e-cigarettes aren’t regulated, no one can say for certain.
So shouldn’t the U.S. Food and Drug Administration step in, test e-cigarette products for safety and regulate what’s in them to ensure continued safety?
Attorneys general from around the country think so. Minnesota Attorney General Lori Swanson joined 40 of her colleagues in a letter last week to FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, urging her “to take all available measures to meet the FDA’s stated deadline of October 31, 2013, to issue proposed regulations that will address the advertising, ingredients and sale to minors of electronic cigarettes.”
The American Heart Association, American Academy of Pediatrics and 13 other agencies think so, too. They sent a letter Sept. 19 to the president, urging him to ensure that the FDA “moves forward promptly with a rule that would assert the agency’s authority over all tobacco products, including
e-cigarettes, little cigars, cigars and other tobacco products not currently under its jurisdiction. More than two years ago, FDA announced its intent to take this action, yet no progress has been made. This delay is having very real public health consequences.”
Delay no more, FDA.
Or state Legislature.
Local communities are scrambling and doing their best to do what’s right. They and the health and safety of our nation need authority and leadership that can only come from St. Paul and other state capitols and from Washington, D.C.
http://www.duluthnewstribune.com/event/article/id/279202/group/Opinion/

E-Cigarette Ads Spark Lawmakers’ Concern for Youths

By 
An advertisement for Blu electronic cigarettes shows a glitzed-up, scantily clad Jenny McCarthy seated in a club, smoking—or “vaping”—a sleek black tube with a blue glow at the tip. “Blu satisfies me,” she says, as the camera pans out to show her chatting with an attractive male suitor who is also holding an e-cigarette. “I get to have a Blu without the guilt, because it’s only vapor, not tobacco.”
Blu is owned by Lorillard, maker of Newport and other tobacco cigarettes. Lorillard was one of nine recipients of a letter sent Thursday from 12 Democratic senators and representatives asking a series of questions about the marketing techniques of the e-cigarette companies. The letter raised concerns that e-cigarette companies are marketing their products to children and teens. Lorillard did not respond to a request for comment from National Journal Daily.
E-cigarettes—which resemble cigarettes but use battery power to vaporize a nicotine-derived solution that the user inhales—are not subject to the same regulations as traditional cigarettes, and their marketing is not limited by the restrictions placed on tobacco cigarettes in recent decades. E-cigarette companies can legally sell to minors, run television and radio ads, and distribute free samples.
“The marketing of e-cigarettes is re-glamorizing smoking and associating young, attractive celebrities with smoking,” Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids President Matthew Myers told National Journal Daily. “Their participation in the last 12 to 24 months has used the exact same images and tactics that made [traditional] cigarettes so appealing to generations of Americans.”
E-cigarettes are available in a variety of different flavors, including cherry and cookies-and-cream milkshake, and they may be purchased online and in mall kiosks. Critics cite these marketing techniques, along with the use of celebrities such as McCarthy, as evidence of targeted advertising toward young people.
“[The ads] are virtual duplicates of the Virginia Slims woman from 40 years ago,” Myers said. “That imagery has been banned precisely because of its powerful impact on kids.”
The issue of this targeted advertising has received attention following a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report released this month that showed dramatic increases in the use of e-cigarettes among middle- and high-school students. The percentage of young people who have used e-cigarettes doubled in both groups from 2011 to 2012, jumping from 1.4 percent to 2.7 percent among middle-school students, and 4.7 percent to 10 percent among high-school students.
While e-cigarettes are often presented as the less harmful alternative to traditional cigarettes, lawmakers worry that e-cigarettes could become a gateway to nicotine addiction and increased use of conventional tobacco products. “It would be a terrible public health outcome if children and young adults who do not smoke thought it was safe to begin using e-cigarettes because they do not believe that they pose a risk to their health,” Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., ranking member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee and an author of the letter, wrote in an e-mail to National Journal Daily.
What has most worried some critics, however, is CDC’s finding that 80.5 percent of high-school students who use e-cigarettes also currently smoke conventional cigarettes. “This is a fly in the ointment of people saying e-cigarettes are good for harm reduction,” said Stanton Glantz, professor of medicine at the University of California (San Francisco) and director of the Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education. According to Glantz, so-called dual users generally smoke fewer traditional cigarettes each day, but smoking tobacco means they are still suffering the full cardio risk. E-cigarettes still contain some carcinogens—albeit less than tobacco—and deter quitting, Glantz says.
These findings increase concern that the advertising of e-cigarettes to young people will increase use of more-harmful tobacco products, and the marketing efforts are only growing.
According to the Kantar Media unit of WPP, the Blu e-cigarette brand spent $12.4 million on ads in major media for the first quarter of the year, compared with $992,000 in the same period a year ago, The New York Times reported. Annual sales of all e-cigarettes are expected to reach $1.7 billion by the end of the year.
Meanwhile, the Food and Drug Administration does not oversee the industry. The FDA’s Center for Tobacco Products has the authority to regulate only certain categories of “tobacco products.” The FDA “intends to propose a regulation that would extend the agency’s ‘tobacco product’ authorities—which currently only apply to cigarettes, cigarette tobacco, roll-your-own tobacco, and smokeless tobacco—to other categories,” an FDA spokesperson said.
The FDA can regulate e-cigarettes only if the manufacturers make a therapeutic claim—including use as a cessation device. According to the agency, none are currently approved for therapeutic purposes.
“Many of the most overt claims as a cessation device were made in earlier years, but they’ve gotten more sophisticated in recent years for fear of the FDA bringing regulatory action,” Myers said. Companies now target adults by making the less direct health claim that they are the safer alternative to cigarettes.
Lawmakers hope the letter and their calls for hearings will bring oversight not only to marketing of e-cigarettes, but to the industry more broadly. “Marketing e-cigarettes to children is problematic,” Waxman wrote in the e-mail. “But FDA also needs to undertake a broad assessment of e-cigarettes, the risks they pose, and the regulation of these products that is necessary to protect the public’s health.”
If the FDA were to institute broader regulations—something that has been discussed for a while now—then a simple claim that e-cigarettes are safer than cigarettes would require FDA approval.
This article appears in the Sep. 30, 2013, edition of National Journal Daily as E-Cigarette Ads Spark Lawmakers’ Concern for Youths.
http://www.nationaljournal.com/daily/e-cigarette-ads-spark-lawmakers-concern-for-youths-20130929

Minnesota cigarette sales down, but tobacco revenue up

By: Mark Zdechlik, MPR News 90.3 FM, INFORUM
Cigarette sales in Minnesota have dropped since a $1.60 per pack tax increase took effect July 1, as tobacco sellers have feared.
Early Minnesota Department of Revenue numbers show cigarette stamp sales dropped more than 35 percent this July compared to July a year ago. Tobacco stamp sales for August were down 12 percent compared to the same month a year ago.
Although sales are down, because of the higher tax, the money the state collects from cigarette taxes has grown, according to the department.
“It’s very bad,” said 28-year-old Abdul Habit, who works at New Smokes in Maplewood. “It went down, like people [are] cutting back. People who used to buy a carton, now they buy five packs. People who used to buy a pack, now they just ask for single cigarette.”
Habit said his customers complain a lot about the tobacco tax increase.
“They cry a lot,” he said. “Nobody’s happy about it.”
Before cigarettes can be legally sold at shops like New Smokes, wholesalers apply tobacco stamps they buy from the state to each pack.
The stamps prove the state taxes have been paid.
The stamp machine at M. Amundson Cigar and Candy Co. in Minneapolis has not been as busy as it was before the tobacco tax increase, even though the company still sells more than $1 million in cigarettes each month.
“We’ve lost one-third of our sales,” company co-owner Ross Amundson said. “Stores that we sold to along the Wisconsin border have basically lost most of their volume and the larger cigarette stores around the cities here that we sell to, their volume in cigarettes is probably in half.”
Amundson said while cigarette sales are down sharply he’s selling more “roll-your-own” tobacco and more electronic cigarettes.
“I’m not going to just be laying people off,” he said. “We’ll figure it out somehow. We’ll bring on other products, we’ll bring on new stores — whatever we have to do to survive.”
Amundson said he’s heard cigarette sales are up dramatically in North Dakota where the state tax on a pack is just $.44 compared to Minnesota’s $2.83.
North Dakota Department of Revenue statistics show cigarette sales there were up a little more than 9 percent in August over the same month last year.
Minnesota officials predicted that increasing the cigarette tax by roughly 30 percent would lead to a roughly 30 percent reduction in cigarette consumption.
There’s no way to quantify whether that’s happening. But officials at ClearWay Minnesota, a group that offers free services to help people stop smoking, said interest in its programs is up sharply over last year.
“It’s pretty striking in terms of the number of web visits of people who are checking out Quitplan.com,” ClearWay spokesman Mike Sheldon said. “We’re talking about a 240 percent increase year-over-year. That’s a huge increase and certainly the tax is a big effect of that in making people think about quitting.”
Sheldon said he expects cold weather and New Year’s quit smoking resolutions will sustain that increased demand into the winter for ClearWay’s smoking cessation programs.
Although cigarette stamp sales to Minnesota wholesalers dropped significantly, tax revenue the state collects from cigarettes is up more than 56 percent for July and August compared to the same two months last year.
Tax collections on other-than-cigarette tobacco products such as ‘roll-your-own’ tobacco also are up.
Still, while tobacco tax receipts are up sharply, the initial numbers show tax revenue is $7 million below projections for July and August.
http://www.inforum.com/event/article/id/413402/group/News/

Report: Cigarette sales down, tax haul up in Minn.

By: Associated Press,
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — Minnesota’s tax increase on cigarettes has dampened sales since taking effect on July 1, just as tobacco sellers and anti-smoking groups predicted would happen.
Early Department of Revenue figures show a sharp drop in demand for the stamps affixed to each pack of cigarettes, Minnesota Public Radio News reported Thursday. The stamps are proof that state taxes have been paid. Wholesalers and retailers pin the dip on the extra $1.60 per pack tax, especially in border towns.
For July, stamp sales fell more than 35 percent over the same month a year ago. For August, the drop was 12 percent.
The department reports that tax collections are up by more than 56 percent anyway, though that figure slightly lags projections used when lawmakers built the tax increase into their newly enacted state budget. Tax collections on other-than-cigarette tobacco products such as ‘roll-your-own’ tobacco also are up.
Abdul Habit, who works at New Smokes in Maplewood, said customers complain regularly about the tax increase.
“It’s very bad,” Habit said. “It went down, like people (are) cutting back. People who used to buy a carton, now they buy five packs. People who used to buy a pack, now they just ask for single cigarette.”
Minnesota officials knew that demand for cigarettes within the state would fall when the tax went up. They predicted a 30 percent reduction in cigarette consumption.
Anti-smoking groups say the higher cigarette tax is having its intended effect: Getting people to consider quitting.
“It’s pretty striking in terms of the number of web visits of people who are checking out Quitplan.com,” ClearWay Minnesota spokesman Mike Sheldon said. “We’re talking about a 240 percent increase year-over-year. That’s a huge increase and certainly the tax is a big effect of that in making people think about quitting.”
Ross Amundson, co-owner of a candy and tobacco wholesaling company, said his bottom line has taken a hit, too. He thinks the tax has shifted where purchases are made.
“Stores that we sold to along the Wisconsin border have basically lost most of their volume and the larger cigarette stores around the cities here that we sell to, their volume in cigarettes is probably in half,” Amundson said.
In North Dakota, where the per pack tax is $.44 compared to Minnesota’s $2.83, cigarette sales rose by more than 9 percent in August over the same month last year, according to state statistics.
http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/274244/group/homepage/

40 AGs urge tight regulation of e-cigarettes

By: Associated Press , INFORUM
BOSTON — Forty attorneys general sent a letter to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday urging the agency to meet its own deadline and regulate electronic cigarettes in the same way it regulates tobacco products.
The letter, co-sponsored by Massachusetts Attorney Martha Coakley and Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine, says e-cigarettes are being marketed to children through cartoon-like advertising characters and by offering fruit and candy flavors, much like cigarettes were once marketed to hook new smokers.
At the same time, e-cigarettes are becoming more affordable and more widely available as the use of regular cigarettes decline as they become more expensive and less socially acceptable.
“Unlike traditional tobacco products, there are no federal age restrictions that would prevent children from obtaining e-cigarettes, nor are there any advertising restrictions,” DeWine wrote.
Electronic cigarettes are metal or plastic battery-powered devices resembling traditional cigarettes that heat a liquid nicotine solution, creating vapor that users inhale. Users get nicotine without the chemicals, tar or odor of regular cigarettes.
E-cigarettes are being advertised during prime-time television hours at a time when many children are watching, according to the letter, which has led a surge in sales and use.
The health effects of e-cigarettes have not been adequately studied and the ingredients are not regulated, the letter said.
“People, especially kids, are being led to believe that e-cigarettes are a safe alternative, but they are highly addictive and can deliver strong doses of nicotine,” Coakley said.
Citing a National Youth Tobacco Surveys conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the attorneys generals said 1.8 million middle and high school students said they had tried e-cigarettes in 2012, mirroring increases in the use of the product by adults.
The letter urges the FDA to meet an Oct. 31 deadline to issue proposed regulations that will address the advertising, ingredients and sale to minors of e-cigarettes. The decision has been delayed in the past.
Tom Kiklas, co-founder and chief financial officer of the industry group, the Tobacco Vapor Electronic Cigarette Association, agrees that e-cigarettes should be regulated as tobacco products. The group represents dozens of companies involved in the manufacture and sales of e-cigarettes.
“We’re in agreement with responsible restrictions on the marketing and sales of these products,” including a ban on marketing aimed at children, he said. “What I cringe at is when e-cigarettes get demonized.”
The other states and territories joining the letter to the FDA, according to Coakley’s office, are: Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Guam, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Puerto Rico, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Virgin Islands, Washington, and Wyoming.
http://www.inforum.com/event/article/id/413148/group/homepage/

Exploding e-cigarette set toddler’s clothes afire, Utah fire marshal says

By Michael McFall | The Salt Lake Tribune
The Provo fire marshal is warning people not to leave their charging e-cigarettes unattended after one exploded and burned a toddler.
A North Dakota woman, staying for a while in Mount Pleasant, was driving through Provo on Friday morning with her 3-year-old son when heated coils shot out of her e-cigarette. The coils bounced off the ceiling and landed in her son’s car seat, setting his clothes on fire, said Provo Fire Marshal Lynn Schofield.
She first tried to pat the flames out, but when that did not work, she tossed her iced coffee on him. That did the trick.
“The e-cigarette had a catastrophic failure,” Schofield said. “… The batteries overcharged and the batteries failed and expelled the coils at the end of the tube.”
The boy suffered first- and second-degree burns, which, though relatively minor, are painful, Schofield said.
The fire marshal said that this is the second time he has investigated an e-cigarette fire. In the other case, a charging e-cigarette shot out its coils into a laundry basket, burning the laundry but causing no injuries, he said.
Schofield, who has heard similar stories from fire marshals around the country, alerted the Food and Drug Administration, which regulates e-cigarettes. He received notification Monday afternoon that the FDA received his report.
The driver had been charging the e-cigarette with the charger that came with the product, though Schofield has heard the device failure also happens with after-market chargers.
“It’s a fairly new product so our data on device failure is pretty limited,” Schofield said. “…This is not a device that I would plug into my wall and leave unattended. We were fortunate, the [boy’s] burns were relatively minor, but it was certainly a wake up call.”
mcfall@sltrib.com
 

5 Things You Need to Know About E-Cigarettes

By  (@lizzyfit)

The electronic cigarette was invented in the 1960s, but it didn’t really take off until a decade ago. Currently, there are more than 250 brands of “e-cigarettes” available in such flavors as watermelon, pink bubble gum and Java, and in more colors than the iPhone 5C.

The Tobacco Vapor Electronic Cigarette Association estimates about 4 million Americans now use battery powered cigarettes. They project sales of the devices to cross the 1 billion mark by the end of this year. Here, a look at the e-smoke trend, the good, the bad and the unknown.

What are e-cigarettes?

E-cigarettes are battery operated nicotine inhalers that consist of a rechargeable lithium battery, a cartridge called a cartomizer and an LED that lights up at the end when you puff on the e-cigarette to simulate the burn of a tobacco cigarette. The cartomizer is filled with an e-liquid that typically contains the chemical propylene glycol along with nicotine, flavoring and other additives.

The device works much like a miniature version of the smoke machines that operate behind rock bands. When you “vape” — that’s the term for puffing on an e-cig — a heating element boils the e-liquid until it produces a vapor. A device creates the same amount of vapor no matter how hard you puff until the battery or e-liquid runs down.

How much do they cost?

Starter kits usually run between $30 and $100. The estimated cost of replacement cartridges is about $600, compared with the more than $1,000 a year it costs to feed a pack-a-day tobacco cigarette habit, according to the Tobacco Vapor Electronic Cigarette Association. Discount coupons and promotional codes are available online.

Are e-cigarettes regulated?

The decision in a 2011 federal court case gives the Food and Drug Administration the authority to regulate e-smokes under existing tobacco laws rather than as a medication or medical device, presumably because they deliver nicotine, which is derived from tobacco. The agency has hinted it will begin to regulate e-smokes as soon as this year but so far, the only action the agency has taken is issuing a letter in 2010 to electronic cigarette distributors warning them to cease making various unsubstantiated marketing claims.

For now, the devices remain uncontrolled by any governmental agency, a fact that worries experts like Erika Seward, the assistant vice president of national advocacy for the American Lung Association.

“With e-cigarettes, we see a new product within the same industry — tobacco — using the same old tactics to glamorize their products,” she said. “They use candy and fruit flavors to hook kids, they make implied health claims to encourage smokers to switch to their product instead of quitting all together, and they sponsor research to use that as a front for their claims.”

Thomas Kiklas, co-owner of e-cigarette maker inLife and co-founder of the Tobacco Vapor Electronic Cigarette Association, countered that the device performs the same essential function as a tobacco cigarette but with far fewer toxins. He said he would welcome any independent study of the products to prove how safe they are compared to traditional smokes.

The number of e-smokers is expected to quadruple in the next few years as smokers move away from the centuries old tobacco cigarette so there is certainly no lack of subjects,” he said.

What are the health risks of vaping?

The jury is out. The phenomenon of vaping is so new that science has barely had a chance to catch up on questions of safety, but some initial small studies have begun to highlight the pros and cons.

The most widely publicized study into the safety of e-cigarettes was done when researchers analyzed two leading brands and concluded the devices did contain trace elements of hazardous compounds, including a chemical which is the main ingredient found in antifreeze. But Kiklas, whose brand of e-cigarettes were not included in the study, pointed out that the FDA report found nine contaminates versus the 11,000 contained in a tobacco cigarette and noted that the level of toxicity was shown to be far lower than those of tobacco cigarettes.

However, Seward said because e-cigarettes remain unregulated, it’s impossible to draw conclusions about all the brands based on an analysis of two.

“To say they are all safe because a few have been shown to contain fewer toxins is troubling,” she said. “We also don’t know how harmful trace levels can be.”

Thomas Glynn, the director of science and trends at the American Cancer Society, said there were always risks when one inhaled anything other than fresh, clean air, but he said there was a great likelihood that e-cigarettes would prove considerably less harmful than traditional smokes, at least in the short term.

“As for long-term effects, we don’t know what happens when you breathe the vapor into the lungs regularly,” Glynn said. “No one knows the answer to that.”

Do e-cigarettes help tobacco smokers quit?

Because they preserve the hand-to-mouth ritual of smoking, Kiklas said e-cigarettes might help transform a smoker’s harmful tobacco habits to a potentially less harmful e-smoking habit. As of yet, though, little evidence exists to support this theory.

In a first of its kind study published last week in the medical journal Lancet, researchers compared e-cigarettes to nicotine patches and other smoking cessation methods and found them statistically comparable in helping smokers quit over a six-month period. For this reason, Glynn said he viewed the devices as promising though probably no magic bullet. For now, FDA regulations forbid e-cigarette marketers from touting their devices as a way to kick the habit.

Seward said many of her worries center on e-cigarettes being a gateway to smoking, given that many popular brands come in flavors and colors that seem designed to appeal to a younger generation of smokers.

“We’re concerned about the potential for kids to start a lifetime of nicotine use by starting with e-cigarettes,” she said.

E-cigarettes can not be sold to minors yet vaping among young people is on the rise.

A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study found nearly 1.8 million young people had tried e-cigarettes and the number of U.S. middle and high school students e-smokers doubled between 2011 and 2012.

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/facts-cigarettes/story?id=20345463#

More restrictions for smokers at Ralph Engelstad Arena

By: Jennifer Johnson, Grand Forks Herald
Those who want to take a smoke break during events at Grand Forks’ Ralph Engelstad Arena will be free to leave but they won’t be allowed back in starting Oct. 6, the night of the first UND men’s hockey game, according to arena spokesman Chris Semrau.
This will affect all events at the arena itself and the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center.
The arena’s new policy would be consistent with UND’s tobacco policy, and is another step to ensure a healthier workplace for employees on event nights, Semrau said on Monday.
UND became a tobacco-free campus in 2007, but the Ralph was among the places exempted. The arena was able to offer guests an outdoor smoking zone.
Arena officials have considered getting rid of those zones for years, Semrau said. Though he estimates the number of people who smoke at arena events is low, he said tobacco smoke drifting into the building while children were present was enough to trigger complaints. “Most guests and staff said they didn’t want smoking allowed anymore.”
“The community itself has voted to remove smoking from most establishments, and this is another step in that direction,” Semrau said, referring to city laws restricting smoking indoors.
“We thought this was the right next step for the facility,” he said. “With any change, you’ll always have some negative feedback. But we hope to address what we’re doing and why we’re doing it, and we believe it will not have a major impact on guests.”
Information about the new policy will be sent to season ticket holders in the next week, he said.
http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/273965/