Stanton Glantz blog

Commentary on tobacco, cannabis and public health

What the BAT chief scientist had to say about causality half a century ago

E-cigarette advocates, global warming deniers and social media companies continue to sidestep the implications of research showing dangers of their products by, among other things, retreating behind the high walls of claims that the evidence is not “causal.” To put these claims in context, it is worth re-reading the last couple paragraphs from our book…

Spinola et al support Brazil’s e-cigarette ban while defending implementation criticism

Shortly before the 11th WHO Framework Convention On Tobacco Control Conference of the Parties in November 2025, Vitoria Borges Spinola, Lucas Porto Santos, Hamilton Roschel, Bruno Gualano, and Megan E. Roberts published “Weak enforcement of Brazil’s E-cigarette ban and the expansion of a dangerous illicit market” in The Lancet Regional Health – Americas arguing that…

DOJ should have been able to easily release properly redacted Epstein files by December 19, 2025 based on our experience managing the UCSF Industry Documents Library

The issue of redactions – both redacting names of victims and not redacting participants in Jeffery Epstein’s “social circle” —  documents has been in the news.  There have also been questions about why it took so long for DOJ to release around 3.5 million pages of documents, plus about 2,000 videos and 180,000 images. Working…

Congress revives CDC Office on Smoking and Health

Last year the Trump Administration eliminated the CDC Office on Smoking and Health and fired the FDA Center for Tobacco Products leadership, paving the way for FDA to even more closely embrace the tobacco industry’s “harm reduction” marketing messages.  OSH ran the effective “Tips from Former Smokers” advertising campaign, supports state health department tobacco control…

RFK Jr strongly endorses tobacco industry harm reduction argument for ecigs and nicotine pouches

In a video interview circulated by Danny Gillis owner of SevierVapor and Executive Director Tennessee Smoke Free Association, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr strongly endorses e-cigarettes and nicotine pouches for “harm reduction.” He also cites industry arguments that nicotine helps people with Alzheimer’s disease and dimentia (at 50 seconds in the…

FDA should not authorize marketing flavored ZYN a modified risk claim because they will harm youth

My colleagues at UCSF and Stanford have submitted this public comment to FDA opposing its approval of Swedish Match (owned by Philip Morris International) claim that ZYN is less dangerous because of particular adverse effects on youth (PDF). The TPSAC tracking number is mk4-kp68-wmg2 and the general docket tracking number is mk5-q1p5-yauh on Regulations.gov. FDA…

The gateway has two doors in England, too

With some notable exceptions. e-cigarettes have been embraced by British tobacco control advocates and public health authorities more enthusiastically than anywhere else in the world, including authorities at Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) and University College London (UCL). Now, Emily Banks, Andrew Bush, Charlotta Pisinger, and Sam Egger have published Signs of increased smoking…

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