Tag Archives: Tobacco Use

Truth, Truth Initiative, Vaping

Truth Initiative manipulates tobacco numbers

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TRUTH lies

Stunning claims of a rise in tobacco use among adults for 2017 as they are now alleged to have hit 17.1% nationally just two weeks after the Food and Drug Administration’s head clearly stated it was down to 13.9%.

On June 19th, 2018, Food and Drug Administration’s Commissioner Dr. Gottlieb decided to tweet the latest statistics about the national smoking rates among adults had dropped to 13.9% for 2017.

https://twitter.com/SGottliebFDA/status/1009077582246109184

Lies

Truth Initiative, established and relying on tobacco sales to stay in business, as part of the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement, decided to put out this tweet on July 3rd, 2018 claiming the “national adult smoking rate is 17.1%.”

The smoking rates went up 3.2% nationally in just two weeks? Huh.

I cannot stress this enough.

Truth Initiative claims the adult smoking rates ROSE 3.2 percent in just two weeks.

Math

Now, I’m no good in math so I recruited a mouse to do it for me… to no avail. He’s still a good rodent. Toss him some cheese for his effort!

I ask silly questions

When will they be made accountable for their accounting and other errors?

I asked Dr. Gottlieb about rectifying the issue. I predict government in action will be government inaction.

The truth is, Truth Initiative is lying.

Motivation

When a political front group disguised as an anti-tobacco group classified as a non-profit organization manipulates smoking rates because their very existence relies upon the sale of tobacco, why are they still in business…what else are they lying about?

This group, with other groups, are directly influencing and shaping laws and regulations. The Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids is no different.

Corruption and manipulation of public opinion is their business.

Classifying “nicotine” as tobacco is just one example.

You may think wrongly that organizations such as “Truth Initiative” and “Tobacco-Free Kids” is such a worthy and monumental cause to stand behind.

You could never be further from the “Truth”.

Money, by way of funding, is their ONLY motivation. They have no initiative to tell the truth.

I can let Paul explain it better here about the “Truth”:

The Truth Shall Set Ye Fret

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Kevin

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Can you quit smoking with patches and gums?

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Quit smoking patch gum

CAN you quit smoking with patches and gums?

Are attempts with these quit smoking products successful? Can you find success rates for them? Do they work? Can you quit smoking? I’m sure there are a few who will say yes. I say it is a deceptive practice to say you can.

In fact, the practice is on the smoker with an average of THIRTY tries.

That’s right.

“Understanding that for many smokers it may take 30 or more quit attempts before being successful may assist with clinical expectations.”

Estimating the number of quit attempts it takes to quit smoking successfully in a longitudinal cohort of smokers

To quit smoking with any approved method is a challenge. Why is that?  Can you quit with Nicorette® patches and gums? I asked, not so innocently, for success rates with Nicorette® product(s). I was given an 800 number to get personalized attention.  Has anyone ever thought to ask as they were purchasing their product? I’m always asking silly rhetorical questions. It’s a hobby.

Will quitting be successful for you?

If they were as successful as commercials and graphics are intended to make you “feel” by helping people quit smoking, wouldn’t they say so immediately? Give me something, like a 94% satisfaction rate. 85% of our customers are smoke-free. Repeat the successful rates of the product to potential customers, not the success of repeat customers trying again. Fine, I’m reaching for the perverbial stars, I suppose.

I’m guessing a 7% success rate.

What are success rates for Nicorette® patches and gums? I don’t know. Nicorette® evidently doesn’t either. It is that time of year, with New Years Eve coming up, ads will be convincing you that you can succeed. Keep trying. Do your best. Their subtle guilt trip illusions are coming.

I asked  “What are the success rates with your product” directly to Nicorette®,  made by Glaxo-Smith Kline on Twitter. I didn’t think it would be a hard question.

Not that Glaxo-Smith Kline would ever do anything to deter any other method of…..

Can you quit smoking?

People spend hours looking up the reviews on the latest appliance they’re thinking about purchasing, but spend 30 seconds deciding on an “approved” method, because you know, if it isn’t an approved method, it must be (bad, dangerous, unproven, deceitful, not taxable, pharma’s idea) just plain wrong.

There are times in some smokers lives where they either choose to quit smoking, or because of various reasons, want to quit. In my instance, I switched to vaping accidentally. I had, however, tried the patches and gums years before and they just didn’t work.

I didn’t even think to ask the doctor about success rates, I assumed they worked. So does the rest of the world. I’d like to see success rates after 6 months, 1 year, heck, call me crazy, 5 years – with relapse rates. (With all that data-driven stuff people like to blab about). Implying that it works isn’t enough any more. Proof by assertion isn’t enough.

How about real world stuff… still waiting.

I’ll direct you here:

Whistleblower sues GlaxoSmithKline over nicotine product

I am guiding you to this by Amy Renshaw from Vanderbilt University:

The Real Story Behind The Nicotine Patch and Smoking Cessation

DO they work? This article stated “the most rigorous long-term study” said no”.

Mine, where, ~dare I say~ patches and gums do not work because you are not addicted to nicotine itself. You are possibly addicted to the other chemicals or chemical reactions within smoking tbacco, but nicotine “addiction” without tobacco simply does not exist. Period.

There is no data or science showing nicotine “addiction” without tobacco and MAOI’s.

It’s like I’m a mind reader… really….

In fact, (added 12/21/17)

Why Is Smoking Addictive? It’s Probably Not Just Nicotine, Despite What We’ve Been Told For Years

Then this came up 12/22/17:

Nicotine patches and medications aren’t enough to quit smoking, a study finds

Nicotine is not addictive.

I rephrased my question, at the time of publishing this blog, there was no response.

My guess is a 93% failure rate.

Don’t take my word for it.

The patches and gums “may, could, might” work. I would say percentages of success are 7%, and I’m being very optimistic with that. For your own sanity, call the company and ask them about success rates. Ask your doctor. Let me know how they respond.

Here’s one (2009) with “effectiveness”… (Thanks, Jenny!)

Effectiveness and safety of nicotine replacement therapy assisted reduction to stop smoking: systematic review and meta-analysis

One with the Patch (1993)

Effectiveness of a nicotine patch in helping people stop smoking

What about Zyban or Chantix?

Pfizer’s quit-smoking Chantix fails study in adolescent smokers

From my survey:

https://atomic-temporary-76342073.wpcomstaging.com/2015/03/08/doctors-orders-take-your-medicine-vaping-over-chantix-zyban/

One with e-cigs (Thanks, Elaine!)

EffiCiency and Safety of an eLectronic cigAreTte (ECLAT) as Tobacco Cigarettes Substitute: A Prospective 12-Month Randomized Control Design Study

Another with e-cigs (Thanks, Jenny!)

Electronic Cigarettes As a Smoking-Cessation Tool

Effectiveness of Pharmaceutical Smoking Cessation Aids (Thanks, Skip!)

“pharmaceutical aids for smoking cessation, despite strong evidence for efficacy from randomized trials, have not been effective at increasing successful quitting”

Effectiveness of Pharmaceutical Smoking Cessation Aids in a Nationally Representative Cohort of American Smokers

I don’t want Nicorette feeling singled out, I also asked Pfizer quite a while ago:

 

Added 01/01/18

Smokers Willing to Try E-Cigarettes More Successful at Smoking Less, Study Says

Ask your government, they’d tell you, because they care, that every try counts.

Speaking of timing

Here’s Carl V. Phillips with his latest timely post over at The Daily Vaper:

Science Lesson: Smoking Cessation Is Not Medical Treatment

 

You can see here what the FDA charts with all “approved” methods here:

Table Data: FDA Approved Drug

Added 2/01/2018

Easiest Way to Quit Smoking

This is pretty awesome.

Not only does this wonderful company love you as a group, they are also ready to give you their “personalized attention”.

Easiest Way to Quit Smoking

Added 6/14/2018

I didn’t know there was “preloading” of…. never mind:

No clear evidence that nicotine ‘preloading’ helps smokers to quit

Advertise with YOUR text link or banner!

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Kevin

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Your comments are NEVER filtered, always encouraged and welcome on this blog.

 

 

 

Children, Teens Smoking, Tobacco 21, Tobacco Control, Tobacco Harm Reduction

Teen Smoking Drops, Gateway Closes, Unicorns Unemployed

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Teen Smoking Drops, Popular Gateway Closes, Unicorns Unemployed

Teen Smoking Drops, Gateway Closes

Teen smoking rates dropped again despite the ever-popular assessment that e-cigarettes “could be” a gateway to smoking. Even this year, stories continue to manipulate public perception with titles like “heavier teen tobacco use” and content to conjure images of a pack of 8-year-olds smoking like it’s going out of style. I’ll get to the unicorn sightings, I know that’s why you’re here.

Also noteworthy, and no surprise, e-cigarette use is going up. Well, hang on to your hats. If e-cigarettes are a gateway to smoking… where are the new smokers? You ponder that question, I’ll keep typing.

They’re wrong, No Gateway

With the confidence of a unicorn herder, always good for a laugh ever-so-credible Stanton Glantz just below boasts “even non-nicotine #ecigarettes are a strong gateway to cigarettes…” and he’s wrong. He uses the word “are”.  Not only is he wrong, he’s wrong at least twice.

glantz tweet

If he were correct in his hypothesis, this would be a different blog. I trust grandstanding filled with babbling and buffoonery is forthcoming from Stan about how wrong he isn’t.  (Blatantly obnoxious and wrong.) He’ll stroke his beard,  fidget in his chair, participate in some pesky deposition, but won’t admit wrong, he and others have been wrong, and will continue to be wrong. With reports of youth smoking rates dropping to all-time lows, thousands of gateway enthusiasts like Stanton “Puff-N-Stuff” Glantz, are… well, I am happy to report as I did in August here, and here, wrong.

Teen smoking drops again

Teen Nicotine and tobacco use (smoking rates) dropped again according to the latest report from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)  called “Monitoring The Future Survey”.

Use of traditional cigarettes has continued to decline to the lowest levels in the survey’s history.

Significant five-year declines-by more than half for daily use and for use of one-half pack or more per day-were reported by all grades.

Daily cigarette use was reported by 0.6 percent of 8th graders

2.2 percent of 10th graders

4.2 percent of 12th graders in 2017.

This was down from peaks of 10.4 percent and 18.3 percent among 8th and 10th graders in 1996 and a peak of 24.6 percent of 12th graders in 1997.

Unicorns

Expert Integrity In Question

Gateway Enthusiasts and Unicorns are out of work

Despite the valiant efforts of “experts”, despite an uncanny desire to invest in tactics like this to keep kids smoking, they’re smoking less. Now, due to cause and effect, the country has countless unicorns displaced and unemployed. Gateway enthusiasts and Unicorns are looking for work. Kids sure don’t smoke like they used to. Do what you can to save the unicorns, continue to question the integrity of experts.

Since the definition of nicotine is now tobacco, tobacco USE rates/funding are in jeopardy. (I predict next year the “tobacco use” will be put together with vaping in this survey, with or without nicotine). To my knowledge, not one city has made an effort to focus on the intended target: children. Instead of focusing on pre-teen and teen smoking (what I would consider 8-15 year-old juveniles), to educate that age group on tobacco use, so-called “experts” are insistent, despite the lowest smoking rates in history, on half-assed efforts and a lot of money aimed at raising the age of purchasing tobacco and e-cigs to 21.

Teens Are Smoking Less

While I was writing this blog, this came across my eye. (Thanks, Jenny!)

While all the “Tobacco 21” enthusiasts are running around feeling good about themselves, the teen smokers they should be spending energy on are already smoking. In this, it states the desire to raise the age to 21. Well. The paragraph above I stated 8-15 as the age range to educate, where (bold emphasis is mine) this study says:

“The mean age for the first puff on a cigarette was 11.7 years (n = 66). Youths who had stolen tobacco from a parent reported a mean age for the first puff (11.3 years), one year earlier than youths who had never stolen tobacco from a parent (12.3 years, n = 66, p = 0.05)”

Focus time on efforts, not control

11 year olds. 12 year olds. Why are they worrying about restricting 18-20-year-old adults again? Why are they not worried about pre-teen and teen tobacco use? Oh, that’s right, they’re experts. It’s pretty obvious a quick check with my untrained eye on the target age of when children first initiate smoking *in their own study* isn’t their expertise.  Maybe no one noticed.

You would think efforts focusing on pre-teen smoking education before a potential problem occurs would be more fruitful, and the obvious primary focus. Instead, restrict adults from doing something that “they might do” as adults has become the idiotic trend.

As far as my personal view, I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again:

On teens: “If “children” are *already smoking, they’re *smokers regardless of age. Think of the children™.”

If these people worked on the…. they might work themselves right out …. of… a …. job . . . wait a minute….

This was added 12/19/17.

https://atomic-temporary-76342073.wpcomstaging.com/2017/06/17/smoking-rates-among-youth-now-at-unimaginable-levels/

Added 01/18/17:

1.7 Million High Schoolers Vaped in 2016, As Both Vaping and Smoking Declined

Added 06/14/2018:

Still not smoking.

The elusive ‘epidemic’ of teen vaping

Added 8/18:

Interesting to note on 9/05/18:

Truth Initiative claims a gateway on August 6th claiming:

THEN:

a twenty-one % drop from 18-24….

From 2019:

“The percentage of adolescent daily smokers who smoked one or more packs of cigarettes per day was not reported for 2019 due to low
statistical precision.”

That’s here:

Key Substance Use and Mental Health Indicators in the United States

Added 7/16/2022

From the tweet above:

“Among adolescent never cigarette smokers, those who had ever used e-cigarettes at baseline, compared with never e-cigarette users, exhibited modest or non-significant increases in subsequent past 12-month or past 30-day smoking when adjusting for behavioral risk factors.”

Is Adolescent E-Cigarette Use Associated With Subsequent Smoking? A New Look 

Other related links of interest:

Electronic Cigarette Age Restrictions May Drive Teens to Traditional Cigarettes

US survey: Youth smoking rates reach historic lows despite e-cig popularity

Adolescent Smoking Rates Reach Historic Lows, Despite Vaping’s Popularity

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Research:

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There is definitely more to come.

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Kevin

think

Your comments are NEVER filtered, always encouraged and welcome on this blog.

Children, E-cigarettes, FDA, Smoking, Tobacco Free Kids, Vaping

Smoking and E-cig use among teens is down, again – (Don’t tell Stan)

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newsies

Smoking and e-cigarette use is down again. It’s a long standing whine from inefficient tobacco control “experts”, “those damn kids”.

Wait a minute…

Forgive me, I don’t know where my head was at by typing “those damn kids”.

It’s Think Of The Children ™ .

Future income for tobacco control.

There. Clear conscience. I hope we both feel better.

This graphic is just to make you laugh before we can move on.

I’ll wait.

glantz tweet

All set?

Moving on.

Smoking and E-cigarette use is dropping

The last chart I saw (from 2015) showing tobacco use among middle and high school students is below, and smoking rates at the bottom was going DOWN.

Substantially.

Seems in the chart on the bottom, the significant decrease in cigarettes use… was – well, ignored. Instead, it added in in the “overall useage”of tobacco.

Huh. Seems in the chart at the TOP, it increased. That made progress “No significant change”.

Well, after National Tobacco Day, that chart is accurate according to the arbitrary law.

I believe this grapic was made during the Surgeon General’s propaganda tour when I snipped this, so I apologize in advance on the source.

I’m sure they were made by someone much more important than I am before I put my remarks and drivel all over theirs.

I think the source is somewhere, if you can bear to go, in here.

lie kids rates.JPG

 

kids

I’d like to believe the children surveyed in the latest findings are telling the truth to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). I’d also like to believe those organizations were truthful in relaying that information to the public. Not sure. You?

Not sure. You? Haven’t seen Puff-N-Stuff metanalyze it yet… for all I know this is cause for children to pick their noses…I’ll move on.

Either way, smoking is down, e-cigarette use (now called tobacco) is down.

  • Down 20% for “any tobacco product”.
  • Down 20% for “any combustible tobacco product”.
  • Down 26% for any “two (dual use) tobacco products”.
  • Down 29% for “e-cigarette use”.
  • Down 33% for “hookah use”.

Imagine taking away e-cigarettes as a choice.

Would any of the other categories have gone down?

I think not.

Between 2013 and 2015, e-cigarette use rose substantially, and then it dropped in 2016…while “experts” were claiming, screaming, yelling and making a general ass of themselves that they are a gateway to smoking. Yeah. About that…  They’ll be making an ass of themselves and taking credit for the lower rates… any minute now.

kids youth smoking drops again low.jpg

Fool me once… keep babbling…. I’ll make it clearer.

Stop that – you’re starting to look silly.

Youth Tobacco Use in the U.S.

Meanwhile, the Tobacco 21 crowd gears up and wants to restrict tobacco from 18-20 year olds from having that choice. (E-cigarettes). From Adults.

Now look back up at that chart.

Now look without giggling at this graphic tweet from “well respected” our National Tobacco Control Professor, Stanton “Puff-N-Stuff” Glantz, again. It’s like he’s trying to be convincing and all…

You know you want to.

glantz tweet

Added 8/26/17

“The implications of the rapid rise in electronic cigarette (e-cigarette) use remain unknown.”

Huh. Unknown. Maybe knowing they’re much less dangerous than conventional cigarettes is a start?

Nicotine dependence is not a significant mechanism for e-cigarettes’ purported effect on heavier future conventional smoking among young adults.

Evaluating the Mutual Pathways among Electronic Cigarette Use, Conventional Smoking, and Nicotine Dependence.

“most e-cigarette experimentation does not turn into regular use, and levels of regular use in young people who have never smoked remain very low.”

 

Cumulatively these surveys collected data from over 60,000 young people.

Young People’s Use of E-Cigarettes across the United Kingdom: Findings from Five Surveys 2015–2017

“When tobacco use decreases, less smoking occurs.”

“If “children” are *already smoking, they’re *smokers regardless of age.

Legislators who say 18-year-olds are not adults are hypocrites

 

Related:

Clive Bates has been saying the same thing since 2013.

We need to talk about the children – the gateway effect examined

It’s also here from the Capital Research Center and Dr. Steve Allen:

Oh, and here:

Vaping Rates Are Falling For Teens Despite Alleged ‘Gateway’ Effect To Smoking

I’ve covered it, among other places, here:

The FDA can’t prove nicotine addiction or gateways exist.

And Dr. Cranfield, who did this

has covered the gatway theory in this video. Well worth the listen

Added 8/26/17

My Data Driven Meta-Analysis: E-cigarettes Cause Less Smoking

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Medical, Research, Science Professionals:

Research:

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Your comments are NEVER filtered, always encouraged and welcome on this blog.

 

There is definitely more to come.

Keep ON #Vaping On.

Kevin

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e-cig, E-Cigarette, Tobacco, Tobacco Control, Tobacco Harm Reduction, Vaping

E-Cigarettes: A Tobacco Harm Reduction Assessment

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tobacco-harm-reduction-graphic

Have you heard of a tobacco harm reduction assessment? Do you want to know if your “quit smoking” advice is sound? Do you believe you’re truly sincere about reducing tobacco use for Americans? Don’t you want to know you’re doing all you can? I certainly do.

I’ve devised this quick and easy interactive tool below for anyone in public health or tobacco control to assess the choices (and more) seen above for tobacco harm reduction, and your views.

Click on the link below, then click on your – or your association’s most likely “answer” you’d give to someone inquiring about switching to e-cigarettes in a phone call or in person.

Don’t be afraid.

E-cigarettes: A Tobacco Harm Reduction Assessment Tool

How’d you do?

Are you employing vigorous tobacco harm reduction methods to clients? I don’t believe you. Are you using a Strategy or Tragedy?

I wonder what those around you are thinking. Those people calling and asking questions? They’re going to figure this out eventually. There are millions of us. We’re getting louder and more pissed off with every single lie told. I’m tired of America settling for less.

If you’re a smoker, use this. Don’t be afraid of their answers.

“When tobacco use decreases, less smoking occurs.”

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Kevin