The Indonesian government should discourage tobacco consumption in the country through its regulations on the cigarette trade, a WHO official said, “Indonesia is a permissive country that does not restrain the promotion of tobacco products. So, the government needs to raise its tax on cigarettes to reduce tobacco consumption in the country,” Dr Douglas Bettcher, director of WHO`s Tobacco Free Initiative (TFI), said here Wednesday.According to Bettcher, tobacco is a killer of people as in the 21st century it may take the lives of a trillion people.

American Blue Tip cigarettes and other electronic cigarettes have claimed to save consumers money on smoking cigarettes. But, recently after reviewing several studies regarding the loss of productivity and money due to smoking in the U.S., they have realized that electronic cigarettes could be the answer to a $92 Billion dollar loss annually.

A dispute between Armenia and Ukraine over taxes on Ukrainian tobacco products is already settled, Igor Kaletnik, head of Ukraine’s state customs agency, said in Yerevan on Wednesday after the 52nd meeting of CIS member countries’ customs services.Earlier, Ukraine accused Armenia of creation of adverse regime for Ukrainian tobacco and alcohol products in a clear breach of World Trade Organization’s general rules.

At a bar stand in Bucharest’s Obor area, men in black jackets sit on plastic stools drinking homemade whisky. They light up cigarettes while asking passers-by in a low voice: “Do you wanna a pack of cheap tobacco?” Even the bar owner sells unlabeled packs of cigarettes.Romania, one of the poorest countries in the European Union, remains a haven for bootleg cigarettes, with custom officers seizing millions of packs each year. Criminal gangs and impoverished communities near borders with countries where prices are lower – Serbia, Moldova and Ukraine – have taken to smuggling not only for big money but also as a means to earn a daily living.

The attacks on climate science that were made ahead of the Copenhagen climate change summit were “organised” to undermine efforts to tackle global warming and mirror the earlier tactics of the tobacco industry, according to the vice-chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

The FDA has ordered pharmaceutical companies Pfizer and GlaxoSmithKline to place warning labels on their anti-smoking drugs Chantix and Zyban, respectively, warning that the drugs may increase a patient’s risk of depression and suicidal thoughts.Both drugs have also been known to lead to other mental health disturbances, including hostility, agitation, nightmares and even loss of consciousness. Concern over seizures and loss of consciousness led the Federal Aviation Administration to ban the use of Chantix in on-duty pilots, and the U.S. military to ban its use by flight and missile crews.

Stanford University Medical School researchers recently conducted a survey in which they found that point-of-sale tobacco advertising greatly influences teenagers’ desire and willingness to smoke. According to the survey, teenagers who frequent establishments where this type of advertising exists are more than twice as likely to try smoking than those who do not visit them.

Two new studies were released with surprising information on the effects of cigarette smoking and a new discovery which may help treat nicotine addiction. One study found that five million people in the year 2000 suffered deaths related to smoking. This accounts for nearly 12% of all deaths. More than half of these deaths occurred in people aged 30-69. A second study found that nicotine may actually manipulate genes that control how nicotine is processed in the liver, making it impossible for some people to quit. Approximately six to eight percent of the population may be affected by this genetic mutation.