Free Republic

Researchers today announced in the journal Nature Plants the discovery of the first-ever fossil specimens of an "asterid" - a family of flowering plants that gave us everything from the potato to tomatoes, tobacco, petunias and our morning cup of coffee. But these two 20-30 million-year-old fossil flowers, found perfectly preserved in a piece of amber, came from the dark side of the asterid family - they belong to the genus Strychnos, which ultimately gave rise to some of the world's most famous poisons, including strychnine and curare. Poisons that would later find their way into blow-gun weapons, rat control,...

U.S. tobacco giant Altria Group Inc. MO, +2.48% on Thursday said it would cut roughly 5% of its workforce in an effort to reduce costs by $300 million annually as industry volumes decline. The Marlboro maker announced the layoffs on the same day it reported profit and revenue for the fourth quarter that missed Wall Street expectations as cigarette shipments slipped and earnings declined from its stake in SABMiller PLC's beer business. Altria's earnings rose slightly to $1.25 billion, or 64 cents a share, from $1.24 billion, or 63 cents a share, a year earlier. The results foreshadowed some of...

New York is reaping the whirlwind of sky-high cigarette taxes with a wave of smuggling decimating the state’s revenue. New York raised taxes on cigarettes to $4.35 in 2010 from $2.75. In total, cigarette taxes have increased by 190 percent since 2006. The sharp rise has resulted in a raft of unintended consequences which are dealing a significant blow to the state’s finances. New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli reports New York’s revenue from cigarette taxes has plunged by $400 million over the past five years.

SYRACUSE, N.Y. – The number of state-taxed cigarette packs sold in New York has plummeted by 54 percent in the past decade. That's far outpacing the 19 percent decline in New Yorkers who have quit smoking over the same time. Instead, more smokers are buying cigarettes in ways that avoid New York's $4.35 per pack tax, the highest in the nation. They cross state lines, shop from black market vendors and travel to Native American outlets to save $6 per pack or more, experts say. New York is losing big. In the past five years, the state's cigarette tax collections...

Archaeologists at Historic Jamestown have discovered the tenth Virginia-made pipe with a name inscribed on the stem. It’s the first new named pipe found at the site since 2009, and in contrast to most of the earlier discoveries, the name is complete: William Faldo. The stockholders of the Virginia Company were expecting to make a quick profit from their investment in the Jamestown settlement, but the struggling colonists could barely keep themselves alive, never mind send back the riches in minerals and trade goods the company had envisioned. They weren’t even self-sufficient, having clashed with the Powhatan tribes weeks after...

The World Health Organisation (WHO) will publish a report on Monday on the dangers of eating processed meats. It is expected to list processed meat as a cancer-causing substance, while fresh red meat is also expected to be regarded as bad for health, the Daily Mail said. The classifications, by the WHO's International Agency for Research on Cancer, are believed to regard processed meat as "carcinogenic to humans", the highest of five possible rankings, shared with alcohol, asbestos, arsenic and cigarettes.

Labour’s vegan farming spokesman believes meat should be treated like tobacco with a public health campaign to stop it being eaten. Kerry McCarthy MP was recently named the Labour Party’s Shadow Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Jeremy Corbyn’s appointment of a vegan farming spokesman was always going to be controversial. Not only is McCarthy’s 20 year-long vegan lifestyle choice in potential conflict with a large section of Britain’s agricultural economy, she is a Vice President of the League Against Cruel Sports which seeks to ban countryside pursuits favoured by many farming communities.

Despite evidence that electronic cigarettes are both safer for users than tobacco and also help smokers kick the habit, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has launched a campaign against them. According to FDA Commissioner Dr. Stephen Ostroff, the FDA is looking to enact a “deeming rule” that would expand the agency’s regulation of tobacco to include e-cigarettes, which do not use tobacco. Critics contend that such an illogical decision underscores that the FDA is at the behest of lobbyists that benefit financially from tobacco and nicotine addiction.The U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued its proposal earlier this year for...

Electronic cigarettes are around 95 percent less harmful than tobacco and should be promoted as a tool to help smokers quit, a study by an agency of Britain's Department of Health said on Wednesday. E-cigarettes, tobacco-free devices people use to inhale nicotine-laced vapor, have surged in popularity on both sides of the Atlantic but health organizations have so far been wary of advocating them as a safer alternative to tobacco and governments from California to India have tried to introduce bills to regulate their use more strictly. "E-cigarettes are not completely risk free but when compared to smoking, evidence shows...

Fenway Park is steeped in tradition, but one controversial piece may soon be history — the wads of smokeless tobacco stuffed into players’ bulging cheeks or tucked under their lips. Mayor Martin J. Walsh on Wednesday is expected to announce plans to prohibit use of the smokeless products at the city’s baseball parks and other professional and amateur sports venues.

For 15 years after Zimbabwe's agriculture sector collapsed in the face of President Robert Mugabe's seizure of white-owned farms to resettle landless blacks, the tobacco industry has been booming, with farmers funded by private firms to grow tobacco. But this switch, coupled with the worst regional drought in nearly a decade, has left Zimbabwe in a precarious food situation. Many farmers have complained of low prices as the season ends while buyers argue the quality of the crop was poor. "A number of farmers are crying foul over unsatisfactory (tobacco) prices," said Trevor Saruwaka, member of parliament for Mutasa Central...

<p>This was made known by the World Health Organisation (WHO) chief Margaret Chan during a visit to the former Soviet nation.</p> <p>Turkmenistan has emerged as the country with the world’s lowest proportion of smokers.</p> <p>This was made known by the World Health Organisation (WHO) chief Margaret Chan during a visit to the former Soviet nation.</p>

CVS Health is leaving the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, saying the trade group’s position on tobacco products is incompatible with CVS’ focus on health. The Chamber of Commerce said its position on tobacco products is being misinterpreted and it’s unfortunate that a company is leaving the organization over the issue. A New York Times article published June 30 said the Chamber of Commerce is fighting anti-smoking laws around the world at the behest of the tobacco industry, which is facing increased regulation aimed at reducing smoking. …

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse is not a fan of anyone who disagrees with him about man-made global warming. And at an event hosted by environmentalists, he made it clear just how much he doesn’t like skeptics. “But, this vast denial apparatus that propagates the false doubt, that props up the phony science, that gets these yahoos who can’t survive … peer-reviewed scrutiny onto Fox News, onto the cable shows, saying that their scientists, they create an artificial conflict about this and that’s why I think there’s doubt,” the Rhode Island Democrat told attendees at a League of Conservation Voters event in...

ARLINGTON (CBS) – Officials in one Massachusetts town will increase the minimum legal age to buy tobacco to 21 years old. Acting Director of Health and Human Services James Feeney announced on Tuesday that the change will be made as of July 1. “We know that the earlier people start smoking, the more likely it is to become a habit. We want to stop this trend,” Feeney said. “Communities throughout the Commonwealth are making this important change, and with Arlington coming on board, we hope to further prevent teenagers and young adults from traveling across city and town lines to...

With no debate and bipartisan support, the state Senate voted 26-8 on Tuesday to raise the legal age to buy tobacco in California from 18 to 21. --SNIP-- Even as tobacco companies are increasing their influence again at the Capitol, shedding a once-toxic reputation, SB 151 received unanimous support from Democrats, as well as yes votes from four Republican senators: Tom Berryhill of Twain Harte, Ted Gaines of Roseville, Janet Nguyen of Garden Grove and Jeff Stone of Temecula. If SB 151 is approved by the Assembly and Gov. Jerry Brown, California would be one of the first states in...

A new blog post written by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) may appear to be an attempt to align with Hillary Clinton, but it takes direct aim at multiple Clinton Foundation donors. Warren’s post, “I agree with Hillary Clinton,” details her concerns with a provision in the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement that she says “would let foreign companies challenge American laws outside of American courts.” “The Investor State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) provision isn’t a one-time, hypothetical problem—we’ve seen it in past trade agreements,” Warren wrote. Three of the five companies Warren uses as examples of companies that have abused similar...

Stepping up pressure on the California Legislature to raise the tobacco tax, a coalition of health groups said Monday it will begin circulating petitions to put an initiative on the November 2016 ballot to hike the levy on cigarettes. The initiatives would raise the tobacco tax by $2 per pack of cigarettes to raise $1.5 billion annually for smoking prevention and smoking-related medical costs now borne by taxpayers through Medi-Cal, the state's healthcare program for the poor. The filing is by the group Save Lives California Coalition, which includes the American Heart Assn., American Lung Assn. in California, American Cancer...

Regular readers of this column are aware that I am no fan of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Let’s examine the agency’s official mission… Here’s the first paragraph: “FDA is responsible for protecting the public health by assuring the safety, efficacy and security of human and veterinary drugs, biological products, medical devices, our nation’s food supply, cosmetics, and products that emit radiation.” Good stuff. But now, take a look at the second paragraph: “FDA is also responsible for advancing the public health by helping to speed innovations that make medicines more effective, safer, and more affordable and by helping...

The authors of the Lancet's centerpiece editorial said a so-called tobacco-free world -- in which fewer than 5% of adults smoke -- is "socially desirable, technically feasible and could become politically practical." .. Making tobacco use "out of sight, out of mind and out of fashion -- yet not prohibited" could be achieved only with a "turbo-charged approach," wrote a team of public health experts from Australia, Hong Kong and India. To achieve it, the United Nations, national leaders, and public- and private-sector institutions all would need to collaborate, they wrote. In addition to governments setting policies such as those...