The truth, the whole truth...?

Anti smoker advocacy relies heavily on the lack of knowledge in the general public and in many cases knowledge not existing in the public domain. Bill Gates once stated whom ever controls the information will control the world. It is quite easy to take a snippet of information not widely known in the public, to create half truths precipitating fears, which can be used advantageously in political campaigns.. This appears to be the case in many of the most popular battle cries of anti smokers in public tirades and feigned concerned citizens letters to the editor, attempting to illicit a public following while supplanting fictitious urban legends.

The RWJF tutelage of lobbies in the use of children to provoke maternal instincts and promote larger support. The further actions of RWJF in adjusting SAMMEC research to include child and baby mortalities statistically linked to smoking. This can be dissected in realizing the majority of the babies named are victims of SIDS which despite the promotions remains a syndrome or medical mystery of which smoking is only one of dozens of suspected causes. The public is not aware of the fact RWJF who receives the bulk of their funding from Johnson and Johnson and in fact RWJF is heavily invested in J&J stock. J&J are a competing interest nicotine delivery products charity begins at home has it’s limits. Consumers pay a disproportionate share of taxation because of the ability to avoid taxes, in charitable contributions.

I don’t see any feeding of children in Africa here, but a feeding of corporate profits. Half truths seen in the definition of the word charity foundation is a misconception of the public. In paying higher personal income taxes who would have guessed you could be increasing profits of the same suppliers of services, gouging us at the other end of the operation by charging for smoking patches perhaps 100s of times the cost of manufacture, while increasing our tax burden in cigarette taxation as the alternative.

When we hear about someone dying of lung cancer immediately the mind wanders to how that person was affected by tobacco was this a smoker or simply another victim of the smoke. The idea of socioeconomic linkages to smoking in knowing the lowest educated and lowest incomes are the groups more likely to start smoking has a lot of weight in who will eventually die of lung cancers which in all honesty can not be seen to be associated the effects of smoking to any degree close to the location where these people live. Lung Cancers are also more prevalent in urban areas than rural settings a fact which if the motivation were present could reveal a lot in assessing the true environment of a lung cancer patient.

In the year 2000 a breakdown of all cause mortality from the CDC showed Lung Cancers to derive less than 1% of total mortality in the same year SAMMEC research in Canada demonstrated a prevalence of 6% meaning either lung Cancer is six times more prevalent in the smaller Canadian population, or one of the sources of numbers can be seen to be highly flawed. Not to point fingers but, the CDC divestments are representative of death certificates and simply a relaying of the totals with no apparent gain. SAMMEC was designed to estimate the costs of smoking for financially advantageous use, in promotions of higher taxes and assessing damages in case it is ever needed in litigation.

The EPA defined the term Tobacco smoke as a single substance yet in reality many types of tobacco are harvested which are combined with a number of ingredients many of which the government is responsible themselves. In Canada new regulations regarding fire safe cigarette paper introduced a new array of chemical ingredients with no knowledge of what harm that may cause. Unknown to Canadian smokers potentially deadly human biological testing is being done as we speak, without their knowledge or consent.

Tobacco has always enjoyed a similar exclusion of international law evident in the array of ingredients which have been adjusted for decades without notice. Trade secrets rights have been stretched beyond the greater public good with the aid of incompetent governments and inadequacies in the courts.

In 1970 testing was done on 170 common cigarette brands the results should have evoked an immediate advocacy response, if, of course the end game were truly connected to the health and welfare of others, not simply serving self important needs. The research clearly showed in spectral analysis a variance of carcinogenic and potential chronic disease effects which could be reduced by more than 98% by simply regulating what is being smoked. If a product is unsafe why is the effort focuses on the users while ignoring the much more efficient method of reducing mortality, by reducing the potential harm in the product.

ASH revealed their cards when responding to Tobacco company claims to have produced a safer cigarette in loudly dismissing the possibility out of hand. A sign of ignorance beyond acceptable behavior, promoting the status quo and the higher levels of dangers to maintain a political prominence position which would be reduced if the product was safer. Read the report yourself of the carcinogens which could be reduced by eliminating stocks and roots and selecting lower TSNA tobacco types A 98% reduction is not something to be take lightly.

Arch Geschwulstforsch. 1990;60(3):169-77.

Tobacco-specific nitrosamines in European and USA cigarettes.

“Institute for Toxicology and Chemotherapy, German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg, FRG.

More than 170 types of commercial cigarettes from several European countries and the USA were analyzed for tobacco-specific nitrosamines (TSNA) in tobacco and mainstream smoke as well as for nitrate in tobacco. The cigarettes included filter and nonfilter cigarettes with different tar and nicotine yields. The observed range for N'-nitrosonornicotine (NNN) was from 4 to 1353 ng/cigarette in mainstream smoke and from 45 to 12454 ng/cigarette in tobacco. For 4-(methylnitrosamino)-1-(3-pyridyl)-1-butanone (NNK) the values were between not detected (less than 4 ng/cigarette) and 1749 ng/cigarette in mainstream smoke and between not detected (less than 50 ng/cigarette) and 10745 ng/cigarette in tobacco. Nitrate levels ranged from 0.6 to 19.4 mg/cigarette. The TSNA levels for the cigarettes from the different countries investigated were in a similar range with the exception of few individual brands. The results demonstrated that there is no correlation between TSNA and tar deliveries in mainstream smoke. The TSNA deliveries in mainstream smoke depend on the amount or preformed TSNA in the actual tobacco composition, which is influenced by the nitrate level of the tobacco and the tobacco type. According to these results the tar delivery, although crucial, is not a sufficient index for the biological activity and the carcinogenic potential of cigarette smoke. Reduction of TSNA exposure can be achieved by selecting tobaccos with low levels of preformed TSNA in tobacco, which means a low nitrate content and reduction of the amount of Burley tobaccos and stems in blended cigarettes.”

See all Related Articles... I like to call these “a growing body of evidence” where have we heard that before? In anti smoker technology; a term used In reference to repetitive and cherry picked statistical proof undermining the type of proof you can actually see and consistently reproduce.

The parrots will all scream the figures of annual mortality in “smoking kills x people every year”. “Smoking bans are aimed at reducing x preventable deaths every year” Smoking bans of course do not address the problem outside of making a smoker’s life more difficult in hopes of forcing a will upon them they would not accept of their own free will, we have descriptors for those actions as well. “Preventable death” which in reality is a reflection of actions of smoking habits in the past which were never preventable deaths unless something was done in the past to reduce them.

If you are interested in reduced mortality in the future a 98% reduction in harm would tend to suit those ends with simple regulations and not promote a need to attack your neighbors for their choice to use; so far a legal product.

The battle cry promotions of “4=5000 deadly chemicals” and “a chemical soup” If queried the parroting is not associated with any secretive knowledge of what those chemicals may be, none of the criers know the list of chemicals or where to find such a list. In most cases the origin of the list statement is unknown, to even the most well known lobbies and their hired help. This deprives the public of that list, to determine if the composition represents a risk; included in every ingredient, or if we are simply being made to believe every chemical is deadly. The chemical soup avoids the fact spectral analysis can remove all mystery from their presentations in analyzing the soup. This is a complicated process which continues today after decades of improvements to the equipment and the processes. In analysis every compound tested would also create a large number of blips on the screen simply counting them is no indication of harm. Most ingested products would have similar ingredients quantities in reality there are tens of thousands of toxic chemicals in use today which common sense would tell you and measurements have confirmed all end up in the larger chemical soup we call air. Would it be going beyond the low level of ethical concern of anti smoker technology to make a statement; “With every inhalation of tobacco smoke you inhale 10s of thousands of deadly chemicals” a tune I am sure would be used, if one of them thought of it. The claim would be accurate but only reveal half of the truth.

Investigations would reveal Tobacco smoke as deadly as it is described can not hold a candle to the toxic nature or abilities of the major chemical soup inhaled along with the tobacco smoke, with every breath extending to every breath you take regardless of tobacco smoke. It is a hypocritical approach as seen in the Aspen model in establishing safe levels of 168 air toxics, the same EPA can evaluate a much more ingredient rich soup known as air and tell us what is safe to inhale yet can evaluate tobacco smoke as a soup with 50 known, monitored and adjustable toxics as beyond the reach of analysis or regulation. Hypocritical and non scientific as demonstrated in the vast array of physical ingredients and horticultural varieties being wide brushed in a definition as tobacco. Reinforced with a “there is no safe cigarette” an announcement which undermines the fact “there are safer cigarettes” as demonstrated by evaluation of their physical contents. Politics as opposed to scientific integrity in a government agency the public believes to be representing the latter, this can be seen as more potentially toxic than any cigarette could ever be. In evaluation failing the test of autonomy and free will.

The cry “fat is the new tobacco” should wake a few intelligent minds to the reality; this never was about cause nearly as much as control. Control is not limited to the targeted population groups but demanded of participating stakeholders..

Perhaps the largess of misconceptions in the statement “ventilation can not protect the public from the toxins found in tobacco smoke” as a premises for implementation of smoking bans. In a half truth, this conceals as proven in a number of research studies including most anti smokers favorite quoted passages; neither can ventilation protect us from a long list of other just as deadly toxins prevalent in indoor air many times in tremendously higher volumes.

Here is another research paper which reveals exposure to indoor toxins does not define the total exposure which is assumed to be cumulative if the public spends a majority of their time indoors a much larger hazard exists in indoor toxins overlooked as acceptable risk by the EPA who sets the standards for testing.

If anyone should be banned from public spaces to maximize protections of those concerned with preserving their health it should be the concerned who should be banned because the banning of cigarette smoke may improve the situation the one in a million standard is far from achieved the other 168 toxins monitored by the EPA are not found to be within safe levels, but much higher than acceptable levels beyond the risk of tobacco smoke in the case of benzenes and other toxins in the indoor environments we seek to regulate with the no safe level standard. Of one in a million excess mortality.

Personal exposure meets risk assessment: a comparison of measured and modeled exposures and risks in an urban community.

Devon C Payne-Sturges, Thomas A Burke, Patrick Breysse, Marie Diener-West, and Timothy J Buckley

Department of Environmental Health Sciences, Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland, USA. payne-sturges.devon@epa.gov

http://www.pubmedcentral.gov/articlerender.fcgi?tool=pubmed&pubmedid=15064166

“Human exposure research has consistently shown that, for most volatile organic compounds (VOCs), personal exposures are vastly different from outdoor air concentrations. Therefore, risk estimates based on ambient measurements may over- or underestimate risk, leading to ineffective or inefficient management strategies”

The EPA can be shown the errors in their ways, in assessing and portraying to the public the ETS soup as a whole, devoid if measurements of the known ingredients or expressed as individual levels actually existing. The term “ETS causes 3000 deaths annually” in a 320 million population this would represent in a 1 excess death in a million standard 9.375 per million in comparison in evaluation of air toxics the air soup containing 10s of thousands of ingredients 168 were determined worthy of monitoring the results of measurements showed a number of ETS ingredients when measured alone in non smoking environments were proven to be much more toxic than the total of ETS assessments.

In direct comparison all units of excess cancer risk per 1 million. From personal monitoring

ETS 9.375 [Calculated above]

Benzene 133

Carbon 31.3

Tetrachloride Chloroform 801

Ethyl benzene 13.4

Methylene chloride 6.39

MTBE 41.4

Styrene 5.25

Perc 135

TC or at least the members dedicated to principled science and integrity, needs to start to realize anti smoker advocacy is not a part of Tobacco Control in supporting ethical value. Although they have raised the awareness of smoking hazards to an incredible degree, it was to serve self important interests enlisting the medical community proxy to say what ever it takes to arrive at that goal, profiting by the reputations of those enlisted. It may be a more useful position to encourage medical information depositories such as Pub Med or the BMJ to classify documents as political or scientific based primarily in evaluations of research conclusions, which often do not support the research presented more predominantly than the personal opinions being expressed in advocacy or personal political roles.

Big tobacco sponsored the tail end of research not fitting advocacy roles, a major research study the 35 year Kabat California report, this research can be dismissed as rhetoric due only to the credibility of the financiers with little scientific perusal of what was offered and appropriate critique, dismissed in a political argument alone. Alternately other less involved micro research with earth shaking conclusions in levels of heart disease decreases due to a smoking ban conclusions not seen historically or supported in physical science. Defined as questionable conclusions limited by duration and size yet the research can be given more prominence in the eyes of the Surgeon General in advising; smokers are now seen as a deviant subclass who should be avoided at all costs. Political opinion abounds as we saw in the Helena study, a war of personalities, totally unbecoming of medical professionals. Can we deem other industry sponsored research in a higher standard. Credibility awarded depending on the ability to purchase media spin. In self assessment of credibility and purchased perceptions as good corporate citizens; can the J&J corporation because they call themselves “the family company” be excused for advising parents to clean children’s toys or pollute indoor environments with toxic substances? Believed simply because of a corporate brand they purchased, which would portray them as less devious than tobacco company executives. and deserving of less scrutiny.