March 14, 2015
There are now 11 pubilshed studies that compare quitting smoking among smokers who use e-cigarettes compared to smokers who do not use e-cigarettes (counting the two analyses Lois Biener did, one for intense e-cigarette users and one for intermittent e-cigarette users, as separate estimates).
Using all these estimates in a random effects meta-analysis shows a significant drop in quitting with an odds ratio of 0.723 (with a 95% confidence interval ["margin of error"] of 0.531 to 0.983). Thus, smokers who use e-cigarettes are about 30% less likely to quit smoking than smokers who do not use-ecigarettes.
An interesting detail is that there is significant heterogeunity among the studies (p<.001 this="" heterogenuity="" is="" due="" to="" the="" brown="" study="" removing="" it="" from="" analysis="" makes="" test="" non-significant="" does="" not="" change="" overall="" conclusion="" pooled="" estimate="" of="" effect="" e-cigarettes="" on="" quitting="" just="" gets="" a="" little="" bigger="" ci="" p="" but="" raise="" question="" what="" different="" about="" study.="">
March 13, 2015
Lat week the FDA fired or forced the resignations of several highly qualified and respected scientists from its Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee because of an overly cautious reaction to a misguided court decision Like its decision to discount the health benefits of reduced smoking by the "lost pleasure" smokers experience when they stop or do not start smoking, this action sets a terrible precident not only for tobacco control but public health in general.
Here is the statement Tobacco Free Kids put out on March 5. I couldn't agree more..
FDA Errs in Removing Highly Qualified Scientists from Tobacco Advisory Committee – Decision Is Based on Misguided Court Ruling
Statement of Matthew L. Myers
President, Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids
March 13, 2015
Yesterday (March 12, 2015) Dr. Gina Intinarelli, a cardiothoracic nurse from UCSF and I attended the Walt Disney Corp. annual meeting. During the question and answer period, Gina told Disney CEO and Chairman of the Board Robert Iger of the thousands of patients with heart disease and cancer she had care for, that virtually all of these people started smoking as kids, and that the US Surgeon General had concluded that exposure to smoking onscreen caused kids to start smoking. She pointed out that nearly half of the Marvel movies (Disney owns Marvel) had contained smoking. She then asked Mr. Iger for if Disney would implement an “ironclad” policy of keeping smoking.
Iger responded definitively. Here is how it was reported in The Guardian:
March 11, 2015
Two papers were presented at the recent 2015 meeting of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco. Both followed smokers over time and compared quitting cigarettes among smokers who use e-cigarettes with smokers who did not use e-cigarettes. Both studies controlled for level of addiction among the smokers. The first, based on a large national study, the Tobacco Use Supplement of the Current population survey, found that e-cigarette users were less than half as likely to have quit smoking (odds ratio = 0.44) than smokers not using e-cigarettes. The other followed people in a smoking cessation program and found that e-cigarette users were about a third less likely to quit smoking (odd ratio = 0.68).
March 10, 2015
The UCSF Library has added over 30K new documents to the Industry Documents Digital Library, including thousands of Philip Morris documents that were previously unavailable due to their ‘confidential’ designation. Please access the LTDL blog for more info and links to document sets.
Rachel Taketa
Industry Documents Digital Libraries
UCSF Library
530 Parnassus Ave
San Francisco, CA 94143
415-514-1796