Tobacco Center Faculty Blog

October 24, 2017

Stanton A. Glantz, PhD

Boris Reidel and his colleagues at the University of North Carolina just published E-Cigarette Use Causes a Unique Innate Immune Response in the Lung Involving Increased Neutrophilic Activation and Altered Mucin Secretion which adds to the growing case that e-cigarettes have a different risk profile that conventional cigarettes and, at least for some effects, may be more dangerous than conventional cigarettes. 
 
After noting that “e-cigarettes, have become popular … supported by a common assumption that e-cigarette use is harmless and a safe alternative to cigarette smoking. Despite a lack of sufficient health science evidence, e-cigarettes are promoted as cigarette smoking cessation aids in some health care practices.”  
 

October 12, 2017

Stanton A. Glantz, PhD

Press release / Published: 10 October 2017

 
Wellcome statement on the cancelled corporate event booking for the Foundation for a Smoke-Free World.
 
On 5 October 2017 Wellcome Trust took immediate steps to terminate a commercial hire contract for an event scheduled to take place in a Wellcome venue in late October.
 
At the time of booking, it was not made clear to Wellcome Trust Trading Ltd, or its parent Wellcome Trust Ltd, that the event was for a meeting of the Foundation for a Smoke-Free World, which is an organisation funded by a tobacco company.
 
We would not have accepted the booking had we known who it was for. A breach of contract occurred when Wellcome was named on the invitation without Wellcome’s permission. The hire contract was cancelled and the event organisers were informed.
 
Wellcome’s policy does not allow organisations to host events whose purposes conflict with our mission to improve health. We do not fund the activities of tobacco companies, or invest in tobacco companies.
 
We have no association with the Foundation for a Smoke-Free World.
 
The release is at https://wellcome.ac.uk/press-release/wellcome-statement-corporate-event-hire-cancellation
 

October 9, 2017

Stanton A. Glantz, PhD

Just published in American Journal of Preventive Medicine
 
Cigarette smokers with high levels of psychological distress are often heavy smokers, and thus identified as a “hard core” group who are less willing or able to quit than other smokers. However, a study by UC San Francisco researchers shows that over the course of 19 years, from 1997 to 2015, this hard core group smoked progressively fewer cigarettes per day and tried to quit in increasingly greater numbers, along with every other group of smokers in the United States.
 

October 9, 2017

Stanton A. Glantz, PhD

The paper, “Potential deaths averted in USA by replacing cigarettes with e-cigarettes” by David  Levy et al. published in Tobacco Control on October 2, 2017, attracted a moderate amount of attention with its conclusion that “Compared with the Status Quo, replacement of cigarette by e-cigarette use over a 10-year period yields 6.6 million fewer premature deaths with 86.7 million fewer life years lost in the Optimistic Scenario. …  Our projections show that a strategy of replacing cigarette smoking with vaping would yield substantial life year gains, …” 
 
This is a pretty impressive result until you consider that the Optimistic Scenario is based on a series of assumptions that are of which are inconsistent with empirical evidence to date:
 

October 7, 2017

Stanton A. Glantz, PhD

The Cancer Letter just published several related stories about the fact that former ACS CEO John Seffrin enforsed PMI's new "Foundation for a Smoke-Free World" run by Derek Yach that is a transparent attempt to help promote PMI's iQOS "heat not burn" product as well as split the health community.. 
 
I, like just about everyone else I know, am still in a state of shock that John did this and declined to talk with Cancer Letter about this situation because back in 1998 John, against some opposition inside ACS, took the lead in pushing back against an effort in Congress on behalf of the tobacco companies to block NIH funding of my research.  John is the only credible figure to have endorsed PMI's effort and I am still hoping that he will realize that this is a mistake that undermines a lifetime of good work.
 
You can read the Cancer Letter stories here:
Former American Cancer Society CEO John Seffrin endorses cancer research venture funded by Philip Morris

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