WASHINGTON - Congressional Democrats have chosen an unlikely source to pay for the bulk of their proposed $35 billion increase in children's health coverage: people with relatively little money and education.
The program expansion passed by the House and Senate last week would be financed with a 156 percent increase in the federal cigarette tax, taking it to $1 per pack from the current 39 cents. Low-income people smoke more heavily than do wealthier people in the United States, making cigarette taxes a regressive form of revenue.
CBCTue, 18 Sep 2007 21:56 UTC
If you're a smoker trying to quit, your genes may determine how effectively a common smoking cessation drug will work, a new study suggests.
Well, what a surprise. An authoritative new report published in medical journal The Lancet has confirmed that artificial colouring in children's foods can cause physical and mental damage, leading to hyperactivity, poor behaviour and allergic reactions.
The study, carried out by the Food Standards Agency, only confirms what all too many parents have known for years, that excessive additives do a great deal of harm to vulnerable youngsters.
Comment: The author of this article falls for the common lie that the government regulations are driven by altruistic motives. Apart from that, it
is useful as a reminder of our ever more poisoned food supply.
Unfortunately, it does not at all discuss the reasons
why our food has become poisoned: that society has fallen under the iron grip of rule by pathological greed and self-interest, a
pathocracy, in which giant corporations corrupt the very air we breath and food we eat, in the end destroying the planet we inhabit, for the sake of personal short-term profit.
New Zealand's high rate of antidepressant prescriptions is being boosted by people using the drugs to help them quit smoking.
The trend became clear after the release last week of new smoking cessation guidelines. Health Ministry figures show antidepressant use has nearly doubled in the past decade, with almost two million prescriptions written for the drugs each year.
Gruesome images highlighting the harmful effects of smoking will be printed on all cigarette packets sold in the UK from next year, the government said today.
The graphic images, which include pictures of diseased lungs, must be printed on all tobacco products made in the UK by the end of 2009, under the new regulations.
After public consultation 15 images have been chosen to accompany text warnings about smoking related diseases, including lung cancer and heart disease.
An iron-lunged pensioner has celebrated her 100th birthday by lighting up her 170,000th cigerette from a candle on her birthday cake.
Winnie Langley started smoking only days after the First World War broke out in June 1914 when she was just seven-years-old - and has got through five a day ever since.
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| Winne Langley celebrated her 100th birthday the best way she knows how - smoking.
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She has no intention of quitting, even after the nationwide ban forced tobacco-lovers outside.
Speaking at her 100th birthday party Winnie said: "I have smoked ever since infant school and I have never thought about quitting.
As the smoking ban marches on here in Charleston, South Carolina, as have similar bans across the country, anti-smoking activists have been able to implement such legislation by claiming they have science on their side. By convincing a significant portion of the population that secondhand smoke is not merely annoying, but a serious health risk, anti-smoking activists have been victorious, while business owners have been forced to bear the cost of lost rights and revenue. This is a shame, because gutting the primary argument of smoking ban proponents from the get-go - the health argument - might have produced an entirely different outcome.
Nicotine may improve the symptoms of depression in people who do not smoke, Duke University Medical Center scientists have discovered.
New research suggests that nicotine treatment protects against the same type of brain damage that occurs in Parkinson's disease. The research was conducted in laboratory animals treated with MPTP, an agent that produces a gradual loss of brain function characteristic of Parkinson's. Experimental animals receiving chronic administration of nicotine over a period of six months had 25 percent less damage from the MPTP treatment than those not receiving nicotine.
Nicotine is a widely seen drug found in tobacco products. It is usually associated with the negative effects of smoking, including the addiction and cravings. However, nicotine can be helpful for people with pathological disease states such as Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder and schizophrenia. A recent study done here at UVM investigated the cognitive improvements of three groups: smokers, normal volunteers, and contrasts those with trials of nicotinic stimulation in pathological disease states. Chemical receptors for nicotine are found all throughout the central nervous system, and stimulating parts of the brain with nicotinic acid have shown to be vital to memory function. Nicotinic acid is a B vitamin found in yeast, liver, eggs, and other foods and is also known as niacin, or vitamin B3.
Comment: The author of this article falls for the common lie that the government regulations are driven by altruistic motives. Apart from that, it is useful as a reminder of our ever more poisoned food supply.
Unfortunately, it does not at all discuss the reasons why our food has become poisoned: that society has fallen under the iron grip of rule by pathological greed and self-interest, a pathocracy, in which giant corporations corrupt the very air we breath and food we eat, in the end destroying the planet we inhabit, for the sake of personal short-term profit.