LOS ANGELES, Oct 30, (RTRS): A onetime leading US distributor of electronic cigarettes has agreed to strict limits on marketing practices in California, eight months after suspending operations under pressure from federal and state regulators.
Smoking Everywhere Inc settled a civil suit brought by California by agreeing not to target sales and advertising to minors or to claim that its products — battery-powered devices made to look and feel like conventional cigarettes — are safe alternatives to tobacco.
The settlement, announced on Friday by state Attorney General Jerry Brown, comes weeks after the US Food and Drug Administration said it intended to regulate e-cigarettes.
Rather than actual smoke, users inhale a vaporized liquid nicotine solution contained in cartridges that fit inside the device. Some cartridges come in flavors like strawberry, chocolate, cookies-and-cream or banana, a feature critics say is designed to appeal to youngsters.
Florida-based Smoking Everywhere and other e-cigarette companies have claimed their products are safe because they contain no carcinogens and no tar and do not produce second-hand smoke.
But the FDA has found that some brands contain a variety of dangerous chemicals, including nicotine and carcinogens such as nitrosamines, and that one brand also contained diethylene glycol, the main ingredient in antifreeze.
The FDA last month warned five makers of e-cigarettes that marketing the devices as quit-smoking aides violates federal laws against unsubstantiated health claims in advertising.
The agency also has sought to bar US imports of e-cigarettes, a move challenged in court by Smoking Everywhere, which gets its supplies from China. A federal judge in January 2010 overruled the import restrictions.
But a California-based lawyer for Smoking Everywhere said the company ceased operations the following month.
“They haven’t been doing business anywhere since February,” William Wright told Reuters on Friday. “They wanted to get this resolved, get reorganized and change some of their practices.”
A Brown spokeswoman, Christine Gasparac, said the company’s product was still on the market, its website was still active and it had not filed for bankruptcy. “So as far as we’re concerned they’re still in business.”
The consent decree bars the company from promoting its products as smoking-cessation devices or from claiming they are safer than conventional cigarettes. Claims that e-cigarettes lack second-hand smoke, tobacco or carcinogens are likewise banned under the agreement.
Moreover, the products must carry warning labels stating that nicotine causes birth defects or reproductive harm.
The restrictions on marketing claims, as well as prohibitions on advertisements aimed at young people, apply to all Smoking Everywhere promotional materials that appear in California, including over the Internet.
Sales of Smoking Everywhere products are banned outright to anyone under 18 years of age as part of the settlement.
Other provisions ban the company from selling its flavored cartridges in California and from selling any products in vending machines or in displays accessible to minors.
Smoking Everywhere customers will also be required to prove they are 18 or older by showing government-issued ID.
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Daylight: Putting the clocks back in winter is bad for health, wastes energy and increases pollution, scientists say, and putting an end to the practice in northern areas could bring major health and environmental benefits.
Countries across Europe, the United States, Canada and parts of the Middle East mark the start of winter by ending Daylight Saving Time (DST) and putting their clocks back by an hour — often in late October or early November — a move that means it is lighter by the time most people get up to start their day.
But this also robs afternoons of an hour of daylight, and some experts argue that in more northern regions, the energy needed to brighten this darkness, and the limits it puts on outdoor activities are harming our health and the environment.
Leaving clocks alone as winter approaches would allow an extra hour of daylight in the afternoon and could boost levels of vitamin D as well as encourage people to exercise more.
In some countries, such as Britain and Russia, politicians are being asked to consider parliamentary bills suggesting it’s time for a change.
“It must be rare to find a means of vastly improving the health and well-being of nearly everyone in the population — and at no cost,” said Mayer Hillman of the Policy Studies Institute in Britain, where a bill on DST is coming up for consideration in parliament soon. “And here we have it.”
Almost half of the world’s population has lower than optimal levels of vitamin D, often called the sunshine vitamin. Vitamin D deficiency is a well-known risk factor for rickets and evidence suggests it may increase susceptibility to autoimmune diseases.
Hillman conducted a study focused on Scotland, the northern-most part of Britain, which found that switching to Central European Time — to Greenwich Mean Time plus one hour (GMT+1) in the winter and GMT+2 in the summer — would give most adults 300 extra hours of daylight a year.
A “lighter later” campaign in Britain has gained support from many of the country’s major sporting bodies.
Writing in the British Medical Journal on Friday, Hillman said research shows people feel happier, more energetic and have lower sickness rates in the longer, brighter days of summer, whereas moods and health decline during duller days of winter.
Dr Robert Graham of Lenox Hill Hospital in New York said leaving clocks alone in winter should be considered to encourage people to get out more and get more exercise.
High rates of chronic illnesses such as diabetes, heart disease and obesity are caused in part by lack of exercise — adults are advised to do 30 minutes moderate or vigorous activity a day, and children at least an hour. “As a society we are always looking for accessible, low cost, little-to-no harm interventions,” he said by telephone. “By not putting the clocks back and increasing the number of accessible daylight hours, we may have found the perfect one.”
A study published earlier this year found that advancing clocks by an hour in the winter would lead to energy savings of at least 0.3 percent of daily demand in Britain.
Elizabeth Garnsey, one of the study’s authors and an expert in innovative studies at Cambridge University, said this was equivalent to saving 450,000 metric tons of CO2 during winter alone.