Reactions to the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act

President Obama signed this bill in to law on 22 June 2009. Below are some of the reactions to this controversial bill.

NPR notes the President's own struggles with nicotine addiction.

CNN highlights the support from the voluntary health organizations, and also includes a dissenting opinion from Stan Glantz - "The bill creates a 12-member advisory board through which all regulations will flow. Tobacco industry representatives will hold three nonvoting seats. Putting three guys on this committee would be a little bit like putting three mobsters on the Department of Justice committee on organized crime." This article also notes the objection to the Philip Morris involvement in drafting the bill from rival tobacco companies.

Michael Siegel - is frustrated by the PR coup that Philip Morris is experiencing from this bill.

The Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids highlights the harms of tobacco and the key benefits of this bill

Lance Armstrong Appeals for More Funding for Cancer Prevention and Research

Seven-time Tour de France winner pushes Washington to put more dollars to cancer research and prevention in this op-ed from the The Hill. In recognition of the role of tobacco in cancer, Armstrong highlights the need for higher tobacco taxes and more smoke-free legislation. He also cites the importance of the FDA Bill to regulate tobacco (it passed the Senate today).

Taxes on Junk Food

The NYT recently published an editorial on the issue of using taxes on junk food to reduce obesity. This editorial highlights two of the major issues facing obesity researchers; 1) the obesity epidemic is a complex problem, and there is no magic bullet that will solve this problem (moreover, many of the proposed remedies are not yet sufficiently supported by the literature), and 2) many of the potential remedies face stiff opposition due the cost of implementation or - as in this case - industry opposition.

Cigarettes in Popular Films Are Target of Health Groups

The NYT has piece on a summer public health campaign being led by the American Medical Association Alliance. “Which Movie Studios Will Cause the Most Youth to Start Smoking This Summer?" is designed to increase awareness of illegal product placement of tobacco products in movies and the impact that this product placement has on youth smoking. This movement is based on research led by Jim Sargent (Dartmouth). Dr. Sargent's research and the response to this research provide a fascinating look into inferring causality from correlational research.

The 50 Cent increase in the state cigarette tax

Mississippi no longer has the third lowest cigarette tax in the Nation. On 15 May, the state raised the cigarette tax from 18 to 68 cents. There are several reasons why raising this tax is good for the state. Whereas the most important reason is that it will improve health by reducing smoking, this tax will also create new revenue for the state. This clip demonstrates the history of state cigarette tax and revenue over the past 9 nine years. The chart displayed in this clip illustrates how far Mississippi had fallen behind the other states - and the increased revenue that other states generated after raising the cigarette tax.

Mississippi Health Summits

The Communities for a Clean Bill of Health are hosting a series of Health Summits this week to discuss the health and economic benefits of increasing the state cigarette tax. Anna Hill and I spoke at the summits in Meridian and Tupelo. WCBI's coverage of the summit in Tupelo can be found here under the News section

BPA and the Precautionary Principle

On Morning Edition this morning, NPR spent several minutes covering the issue of BPA and the Precautionary Principle. The story does a good job of capturing the tension between the need to protect public health and the complexities of interpreting the precautionary principle. Guest on the program, Ted Schettler defines the Precautionary Principle as such "When there are credible threats of harm from some proposed activity, precautionary action should be taken even if some cause-and-effect relationships are not fully understood."

And there is the rub. How do we establish the point at which the evidence of risk from correlational research is sufficient to justify government regulation of some product or activity? The situation is obviously complicated by the fact that the product or activity in question may be very profitable to an industry or the activity might be very popular among many voters.