Tobacco Asia

64 tobaccoasia CLOSING NEWS 卷尾新闻 Liberal MP Angus Taylor, who introduced the bill, said, "Criminals who profit from the trade of illicit tobacco undermine the government's strategies to promote good public health out- comes. They threaten the viability of law-abiding local business operators." US Anti-Tobacco Trio Get US$20 mil from Bloomberg On August 14, former New York mayor and billionaire, Michael Bloomberg, gave a trio of anti-tobacco organizations US$20 million to up their game against the tobacco industry. In an interview with AFP, Bloomberg said the non- profit groups -- based in France, England, and Thailand -- jointly secured the three-year grant to spotlight "indus- try-led sabotage of policies designed to reduce tobacco use." The joint recipients of the grant are the Tobacco Control Research Group at the University of Bath in Britain, which, staffed by academics and journalists, has long tracked tobacco industry efforts to influence public policy, publishing its findings since 2011 on tobaccotactics. org.; The Global Centre for Good Governance in Tobacco Control (GGTC) in Thailand, which focuses on Southeast Asia and produces the Tobacco Industry Interference Index; and the Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease in Paris, which publishes the Tobacco Atlas, a national and global statistical database, and works with governments in 50 countries. 2018 Tobacco Regulatory Science Fellows Announced The National Academy of Medicine (NAM) along with the US Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) Center for Tobacco Products (CTP) have named the 2018-2019 class of FDA Tobacco Regula- tory Science Fellows. Six individuals were selected through a highly selective national competition based on their exceptional, diverse professional qualifi- cations to contribute to the work of CTP. The 12-month fellowship will begin in September at CTP headquarters in Maryland. The fellows will lead specific projects related to tobacco-product regu- lation, as well as actively participate in the development of CTP's science-based public health strategies. The fellows will also receive mentorship from senior staff at CTP who will guide them throughout the fellowship. The goal of the experience is to enrich the fellows' understanding about tobacco products, including their health consequences, and provide opportunities to learn about and contribute to the tobacco regulatory activities of a prominent public health regulatory agency. "This fellowship offers a unique opportunity for trainees to learn directly from the nation's top experts in tobacco product regulation and apply their diverse expertise to contribute to public health and regulatory activities," said NAM president, Victor J. Dzau. "The NAM is pleased to work alongside the FDA Center for Tobacco Products to offer this collaborative and productive program for these six emerging leaders in tobacco regulatory science." The 2018-2019 fellows are: • Frank Bandiera, Ph.D., assistant professor, School of Public Health, University of Texas, Dallas • Megan Hicks, M.P.H., executive director, South Carolina Tobacco-Free Collaborative, Columbia • Catherine Kemp, M.H.A., doctoral candidate, Tobacco Center of Regulatory Science, School of Public Health, Georgia State University, Atlanta • Mauricio Rangel-Gomez, Ph.D., postdoctoral fellow, Tobacco Center of Regulatory Science, School of Public Health, University of Maryland, College Park • Samantha Reilly, Ph.D., postdoc- toral scholar, Tobacco Center of Regulatory Science, department of public health sciences, Pennsylvania State University, Hershey • Jamie Tam, Ph.D., researcher, department of health management and policy, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor "We welcome the new class of fellows and are pleased to have the opportunity to work with these bright leaders," said Mitch Zeller, director of FDA's Center for Tobacco Products. "CTP offers an exciting public health experience to the fellows marked by cutting-edge research, policy and regulatory authority, and the opportunity to work with a truly dynamic staff." Big Tobacco Invests in Cannabis A subsidiary of tobacco giant Imperial Brands announced in late June that it had joined with seed investment firm Casa Verde, which is backed by rap musician Snoop Dogg, to invest in British medical marijuana research firm Oxford Cannabi- noid Technologies (OCT). Casa Verde's US$10 million invest- ment is one of Oxford Cannabinoid Technologies' largest to date. It is also one of Casa Verde's largest investments, given that the venture capital firm tends to offer US$1-3 million to seed companies in the ancillary cannabis space. Imperial Brands' stake has not been disclosed. OCT has also received backing from British actor Patrick Stewart, an advocate of medical marijuana research in the UK and who plans to serve on OCT's advisory board. OCT will be focused on developing and researching cannabinoids that can be used to treat specific ailments. Why Smokers Avoid Pack Warnings Researchers have conducted two clinical trials to study why smokers avoid warnings on cigarette packs, and whether said avoidance was associated with more forgoing or butting out of cigarettes. The first clinical trial randomly assigned 2,149 adult US smokers to receive either pictorial warnings (inter- vention) or text-only warnings (control) on their cigarette packs for four weeks in 2014 and 2015. Clinicla trial 2 randomly assigned 719 adult US smokers to receive either messages about toxic chemicals in cigarette smoke (interven- tion) or messages about not littering cigarette butts (control) for three weeks in 2016 and 2017. Researchers found that the interven- tion messages led to greater message avoidance in both trials and concluded that smokers may avoid cigarette pack risk messages because they evoke aversive types of emotion, such as fear, anxiety, disgust, sadness, and guilt. These studies add to a growing body of evidence that, in the context of cigarette pack messages, avoidance is not a form of defensive processing but instead a sign of deeper processing.

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