Friday and Saturday, September 16th and 17th, hundreds of vapers (e-cigarette users) and dozens of e-cigarette vendors from all over the world will meet at “Vegas Vapefest” at the Flamingo Hotel, Las Vegas. National Vapers Club, a consumer-based, volunteer organization formed to educate the public about e-cigarettes hosts the event. “Response to the event has been amazing.” said Spike Babaian, of National Vapers Club. “Vapers and health experts believe e-cigarettes are saving lives. These proponents are up against anti-smokers who criticize e-cigarettes and suggest, without any evidence, that they may be toxic and are being used to addict children to nicotine. Exponential growth of this population shows the product is widely accepted by smokers as a substitute.”

Xu Bing, one of China’s best-known contemporary artists, didn’t think it would be hard to get materials for an exhibit about tobacco in a city whose ties to the leaf run long and deep.His installation opened over the weekend at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. It explores the history, culture, and links between the tobacco industries in the U.S. and China. Mr. Xu was optimistic about finding 500,000 cigarettes for a 40-by-15 foot “Tiger Carpet”; a 40-foot-long uncut cigarette to be stretched—and burned—across the length of a reproduction of an ancient Chinese scroll; and 440 pounds of tobacco leaves compressed into a cube, with raised letters reading, “Light as Smoke.”

Last week the Boston Public Health Commission unanimously approved proposed rules that would regulate electronic cigarettes as a cigarette product.The Boston Globe reports that the commission’s proposal would require retailers to obtain a permit to sell e-cigarettes, as well as ban use of e-cigarettes in the workplace.“We don’t know what people are inhaling with these e-cigarettes,” said Nikysha Harding, director of tobacco control for the commission. “We see these as a gateway for youth to become addicted to nicotine.”

A hefty increase in sin taxes to simultaneously meet health and revenue objectives cannot be done at the same time. Right or wrong? Representative HermilandoMandanas, chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, thinks that a much higher tax on tobacco can reduce smoking consumption, thus good for health. But it will result in lower revenues for a cash-strapped government.

Prestigious American Medical Association Wants Tobacco and Alcohol Out of Any Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). The Executive Vice-President of the prestigious American Medical Association (AMA) James L. Madara has written to US Trade Representative Ron Kirk urging the exclusion of tobacco products and alcohol products from all provisions of TPP and any other free trade agreement, Jane Kelsey said today.Jane Kelsey has been in Chicago for the latest round of talks on the Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement.

The spread of smoke-free laws and anti-smoking sentiment has some smokers feeling like pariahs – and that feeling seems to have some basis in fact.A recent poll shows that 25 percent of Americans have less respect for people who smoke. That’s up from around 15 percent a generation ago and more than twice as high as the percentage of Americans who look down on fat people.Why the change? Non-smokers tend to have a lower opinion of smokers than smokers do – no surprise there – and the ranks of smokers in the U.S. have contracted sharply in recent years, according to a written statement released in conjunction with the poll.

A new edition of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Latest from The Business Journals CDC: Cigarette smoking is down; South still lighting upNew MIND Institute chief looks aheadTime to rethink the intersection of animal and human health Follow this company ’s Vital Signs reports adult smoking rates in the United States declined overall during 2005–2010, but nearly one in five U.S. adults – 45.3 million – are still smoking. The South and Midwest continue to have the highest rates of smokers.

More than five months after the ban on use of plastic pouches containing tobacco products by a Supreme Court verdict came into effect, which stated that manufacturers of gutkha, tobacco and pan masala are restrained from using plastic material in the sachets, the manufacturers of chewing tobacco and pan masala are now violating the rule as found by a recent survey conducted by Voluntary Health Association of India (VHAI) and its partner organisations in Assam, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Tamil Nadu.