Category Archives: Uncategorized

Two new papers, The Effect of State and Local Flavored Cigar Sales Restrictions, on Retail Sales of Large Cigars, Cigarillos, and Little Cigars in Massachusetts, California, Illinois, and New York and The Association Between the License Fee Increase and The Density of Tobacco Retailers in California – A Segmented Interrupted Time Series Analysis by IncomeContinue reading “Cigar flavor bans and retailer license fees reduce health disparities”

Perchloroethylene, which is used in dry cleaning among other purposes, is toxic when inhaled. The US EPA previously determined that it poses unreasonable risk of injury to human health and is required under the Toxic Substances Control Act to ensure that “the chemical no longer presents [unreasonable] risk.” EPA has now proposed to ban allContinue reading “EPA needs to expand proposed perchloroethylene rule”

The National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine just published Sponsor Influences on the Quality and Independence of Health Research, which sums up a meeting where experts discussed how scientific studies funded by industry or conducted by an author with a conflict of interest consistently report results more favorable to industry or the sponsor thanContinue reading “National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine publishes informative report on how industry biases scientific research and some ways to deal with it”

I just came upon Real-world effectiveness of smoking cessation aids: A population survey in England with 12-month follow-up, 2015-2020 that uses the UK Smoking Toolkit Study to quantify the effectiveness of e-cigarettes and various medical therapies on smoking cessation among smokers were were trying to quit. In this longitudinal study Sarah Jackson and colleagues followedContinue reading “Real-world British study shows e-cigs don’t help motivated smokers quit”

I have published four earlier blog posts (1, 2, 3, 4) describing how RJR’s “non-menthol” cigarettes violate California’s law prohibiting the sale of flavored tobacco products. Now my colleague Lauren Lempert has submitted a complaint directly to the California Attorney General. Here is a copy of her submission. How long will it take AG RobContinue reading “Complaint about RJR flouting CA ban on sale of flavored tobacco products submitted to AG”

The Reagan-Udall Foundation report on FDA Center for Tobacco Products procedures is now available. It contains recommendations for improving FDA CTP operations, but recognizes that two of the serious impediments that the CTP faces are the huge number of applications for new products and aggressive litigation by the industry. Several recommendations deal with improving transparencyContinue reading “FDA should build on its menthol e-cig decision to implement Reagan-Udall recommendation to triage assessment of new tobacco products”

While I am best known for my work on tobacco, I also played an important role in budgetary matters at the University of California, including chairing the Systemwide Committee on Planning and Budget in 2005-6. At that time, we predicted the problems that would follow from UC President Bob Dynes’ accession to then-Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’sContinue reading “Problems that led to UC strike have their roots in Schwarzenegger’s pressure to privatize UC”

After the California legislature and the governor signed a state law ending the sale of almost all flavored tobacco products including menthol, in 2020, the tobacco companies spent $22 million to force a voter referendum. That suspended the law for two years until the voters could weigh in. Now they have, crushing Big Tobacco withContinue reading “Calif voters overwhelmingly confirm ban on flavored tobacco products”

E-cigarette advocates like to point out that because there is no combustion, e-cigarettes expose users to lower levels of many carcinogens (cancer-causing chemicals).  Even so, there are still some carcinogens in e-cigarette aerosol exposure to e-cigarette aerosol damages DNA and reduces repair in animal and human cells and causes cancer in animals.  Now there isContinue reading “First epidemiological evidence linking e-cigs to cancer in people”

Caleb Alexander, together with colleagues at Johns Hopkins, UCSF and I just published “The Opioid Industry Documents Archive: A Living Digital Repository” in American Journal of Public Health. This paper describes the growing Opioid Industry Documents Archive that is part of the UCSF Industry Documents Library and outlines opportunities for research and public education withContinue reading “Here’s an approachable introduction to the growing collection of industry insider documents on opioids, free to all”