Showing posts with label smoking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label smoking. Show all posts

Marijuana May Be Even Safer Than Previously Thought

by Christopher Ingraham.   Compared to other recreational drugs -- including alcohol -- marijuana may be even safer than previously thought. And researchers may be systematically underestimating risks associated with alcohol use. Those are the topline findings of recent research published in the journal Scientific Reports, a subsidiary     ... MORE

Gilbert Ross: The Madness Of The War On E-Cigs

Corruption + distorted facts = clampdown on vaping.    Is it mass insanity, or something even darker, that has led America’s public-health leaders to engage in a mass assault on electronic cigarettes? To put this in perspective, their target is not smoking, our number-one preventable health problem, but a product that could prove to    ... MORE

Public Health Nannies Won't Admit: E-Cigs Save Lives

by Bill Godshall.     In sharp contrast to the Trib's fear-mongering headlines and Adam Smeltz's news story “Western Pa. cancer specialists call for electronic cigarette crackdown” , the scientific and empirical evidence indicates vaping is 99 percent less hazardous than smoking cigarettes, is more effective for quitting smoking than are FDA-   ... MORE

New Surgeon General Should Prescribe Honesty On E-Cigs

by Sally Satel, Forbes.        Early last week, the nation’s new Surgeon General, Dr. Vivek Murthy, said health officials are “in desperate need of clarity” on electronic cigarettes to help guide policies. The technology should be embraced, he said, if evidence shows e-cigarettes are able to help those who otherwise have trouble quitting smoking. Dr.    ... MORE

How Anti-Tobacco Activists Are Very Likely Killing People

by Ronald Bailey.  Last week, my colleague Jacob Sullum questioned a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine purporting to show that vaping is more dangerous than smoking actual cigarettes. The reason? Because vaping at high voltage produces high levels of the carcinogen formaldehyde. The New England Journal of Medicine even   ... MORE

Greg Gutfeld: New E-Cig Study Goes Up In Smoke

E-Cig attack vaporizes.    The New England Journal of Medicine ran a letter linking e-cigs to cancer and the panicky media gobbled it up like a pot brownie. But how sturdy is this research? What might happen if you tapped lightly on their findings? Yes, under closer scrutiny, this blockbuster collapsed faster than Michael Moore in a spin class. According to  ... MORE

Don't Blame Me - The Year's Highlights In Buck Passing

by Jacob Sullum.  For years New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof has insisted that people who pay for sex and the intermediaries who facilitate that exchange are responsible for violence against women. Hence his February 26 column celebrating the arrests of men who were guilty of nothing but negotiating terms with cops posing as   ... MORE

VIDEO: Control Freaks And The Damage They Do

Ebola, Smoking, and Mission Creep at the CDC

 by Jacob Sullum.     Before Tom Frieden became director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in 2009, his two nemeses were tuberculosis and smoking. Although both are commonly described as threats to "public health," they differ in ways that may help explain the CDC's stumbles in dealing with Ebola. Tuberculosis,  ... MORE

Jacob Sullum: Are E-Cigarettes Displacing the Real Thing?

Technology's healthier choice.  Survey results released last week indicate that use of electronic cigarettes by American teenagers continues to rise, even as their use of conventional cigarettes continues to fall. You might think these diverging trends would give pause to critics who worry that e-cigarettes are "reglamorizing" the old-      ... MORE

Excellent News As E-Cigarette, Or Vaping, Use Rises

by Tim Worstall.   We’ve news from the government that the use of e-cigarettes, or vaping, is on the rise among schoolchildren and teenagers. We might think that this is a health story and it is, but behind it is an interesting little economic point and a guide to public policy. The question really revolves around whether vaping is a substitute   ... MORE

John Stossel: Control Freaks Want To Run Your Life

They call themselves public servants.     But whether student council president, environmental bureaucrat or member of Congress, most believe they know how to run your life better than you do. I admit I was once guilty of this kind of thinking. As a young consumer reporter, I researched what doctors said was bad for us and what products  ... MORE

Children Suspended for Pretending to Smoke Candy

by Lenore Skenazy.  California school district considers candy a drug. At least three New Mexico middle school students have been suspended for 10 days for inappropriately consuming Smarties. No, that's not code for some hip new drug; we are talking about the sweet-and-sour candies sold in a roll and given out to unlucky kids on Halloween. The    ... MORE

FDA Regulatory Expansion Jeopardizes Public Health

Anti-cancer device in the crosshairs. In August, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has proposed expanding its regulatory authority over tobacco products to include cigars, pipe tobacco, hookah tobacco, electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes), and dissolvable products and gels. Currently, cigars are the most popular item in this group, but    ... MORE

Ebola and the CDC's Dangerous Mission Drift

by Jacob Sullum.    Before Tom Frieden became director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2009, his two main nemeses were tuberculosis and smoking. Although both are commonly described as threats to "public health," they differ in ways that may help explain the CDC's stumbling, alarmingly amateurish response to Ebola in the   ... MORE

Walter E Williams: Things I Don't Understand

There are things that really puzzle me.       Some life insurance companies charge lower premiums if you haven't made a life-shortening lifestyle choice. Being a nonsmoker is one of them. Actuarially, that makes sense because the life expectancy for smokers is at least 10 years shorter than for nonsmokers. Insurance company policies      ... MORE

Eliza Gray: E-Cigs Are Smokers’ Favorite Quitting Tool

No wonder big govt wants them regulated. Electronic cigarettes are a more popular tool for smokers trying to quit than nicotine gums and patches, according to a new study of consumer behavior from Kantar Media. As e-cigarettes have exploded from niche product to $2 billion-plus industry, big tobacco isn’t the only industry facing        ... MORE

Let The Free Market Kill The Combustible Cigarette

by Michael R. Hufford & Gilbert Ross.       Today approximately 14,000 people will die of tobacco-related diseases around the world. The same will happen tomorrow and day after that, leaving nearly 6 million dead in the coming year alone — more than 5 million from direct tobacco use. That does not include the lives lost from secondhand    ... MORE

Colorado's Cannabis Consumption Conundrum

by Jacob Sullum.        Buying pot is easy; smoking it is hard. For cannabis consumers who are accustomed to the black market's meager selection and iffy quality, Colorado's dispensaries are a revelation: dozens of strains, each with a distinctive bouquet, fresh enough that you can actually smell the difference. Denver-area budtenders, who say    ... MORE