CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Rosa Lara remembers a doctor advising her not to quit smoking during her pregnancy because her baby was used to it. Lara had been living in California at the time. Most of her sisters had smoked and did not seem to have issues with it, and no one had told her about the health risks associated with smoking while pregnant. “My doctor never really explained to me what can be the consequences for my daughter,” L ... Jump to full article >>

Tony Marino has moved his business and cut his inventory and overhead by more than half. The smoking business isn’t what it used to be. “The government wants this business to basically be zero,” said Marino, who owns A.R.M Cigar Co. in Boardman. In the last several years, state and local government have led a charge to curb smoking. A voter-approved statewide smoking ban in 2007 has hurt business, and a national tax to fund children’s he ... Jump to full article >>

GEORGE TOWN: One out of every three cigarette packs sold in peninsular Malaysia is either contraband or fake. In Sabah and Sarawak, two out of three packs sold are illegal. These numbers were based on a quarterly survey and study conducted by the Customs De­­partment and the Confederation of Malaysian Tobacco Manuf­acturers (CMTM). Customs deputy director-general (enforcement) Datuk Mohamed Khalid Yusuf, in revealing the results, added that t ... Jump to full article >>

Cigarette sales have plunged, and smokers have been streaming across the border since Florida’s $1-a-pack tax went into effect July 1. The latest figures from the Department of Business and Professional Regulation show a 28-percent drop in the sale of cigarette packs from July 2008 to July 2009 — 76.8 million packs sold this year compared to 106.6 million packs a year ago. Sales are also down from June, the month before the buck-a-pack i ... Jump to full article >>

We’re all aware of the dangers of second-hand smoke; only recently, a leading doctor said smoking should be banned in cars carrying children. But could there be even greater worry? Could you suffer the effects of passive smoking from simply travelling in a smoker’s car – even if they haven’t lit up? Is that nasty ash-tray tang that lingers on car-seat fabric, curtains in homes and the clothes of the nicotine addict strong ... Jump to full article >>

Any company selling products that addict and eventually kill 400,000 customers annually might well be reluctant to point out the health dangers. So the federal courts should be mighty skeptical when Big Tobacco screams about its First Amendment rights to keep peddling cigarettes without the oversize health warning labels ordered by Congress this year. With a free-speech lawsuit filed last week, the nation’s largest tobacco companies challe ... Jump to full article >>

About 13 per cent of Canadian high-school students who are daily smokers regularly smoke illegal cigarettes A significant portion of young smokers regularly choose contraband cigarettes, a serious public-health problem that undermines efforts to curb young smoking rates, according to a study published today in the Canadian Medical Association Journal. Young people who smoke contraband cigarettes also smoke significantly more than their peers who ... Jump to full article >>

A year after it was implemented, the statewide smoking ban is receiving mixed reviews from bar and restaurant owners. At Theo’s Bar & Grille in Lower Allen Township, owner Ted Kalathas said he lost some of his regular bar clientele. “My bar crowd was tremendous. At the same time, what can I do? The people out for happy hour who want to light a cigarette are going to go somewhere else,” he said. On the flip side, food sales ... Jump to full article >>

Canadian politicians and tobacco producers are clamouring for action on the illegal tobacco trade after a U. S. grand jury in the state of Washington indicted two founding partners of a Six Nations cigarette maker accused of taking part in a conspiracy to supply contraband cigarettes. Haldimand-Norfolk MPP Toby Barrett said in weekend interview that he couldn’t speak to the specifics of the case, but he was quick to say enforcement eff ort ... Jump to full article >>

GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. — A river brought Anne Landman to Grand Junction. A job allowed her to stay. And a murder is why she left her hometown of Los Angeles. Landman came to the Grand Valley in 1982 for a river trip through Whitewater Canyon — it was a gift to herself after graduating from a respiratory therapist course. While in town she toured St. Mary’s Hospital, who she said offered her a job on the spot. “I didn’t know any ... Jump to full article >>