SnusCentral Legislation Updates

Utah becomes the second US State after New York to propose legislation banning the Internet purchase of tobacco products in order to increase tobacco tax collection.

In 2008, Rep Weiner (D-NY) introduced the PACT Act in the US House of Representatives.  The PACT act would make it a felony, not to order tobacco over the Internet, but for all common carriers to deliver it to residential customers within the United States.  The Bill passed overwhelmingly in the House but did not have time to be considered by the US Senate before the end of the Congressional Session. 

The Pact Act is expected to be reintroduced and passed in 2009.

The Utah Internet Tobacco Ban - Click HERE to Read More

The PACT Act of 2008 and it's ramifications - Click HERE to Read More

"This is a wake-up call for the public health community," says Gregory Connolly of Harvard School of Public Health. "It's a total sea change."

For smokers who can't light up in the office or at a restaurant, a new aspirin-sized tablet, called "Camel Orb," will let tobacco melt in their mouth. The dissolvable product — arriving January in stores in Portland, Ore., Columbus, Ohio, and Indianapolis — is the first such product by a major tobacco company and is part of a booming market in smokeless alternatives to cigarettes as smoke-free laws sweep the nation.

"It's meeting the needs of smokers," says Rob Dunham, of R.J. Reynolds, maker of Orb and Camel cigarettes. With lozenge-like Orb, he says there's no smoke, no spit, no litter.

In the past two years, the nation's two largest cigarette companies, R.J. Reynolds and Philip Morris USA, have moved into the smokeless tobacco market as cigarette sales continue to fall. Each introduced smokeless pouches or "snus, " touted as spit-free products that sit inside the mouth. They also bought smokeless tobacco companies.

"We've been very pleased with the consumer response" to Marlboro Snus, says David Sutton, spokesman of Altria Group, which owns Philip Morris USA. He says smokeless is a "growing category" with sales rising 6%-8% annually. He says cigarette sales are falling 2%-3% each year.

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HELSINGIN SANOMAT
INTERNATIONAL EDITION

Finland, December 19, 2008

A committee on tobacco policy set up by the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health to review a potential reform of the Tobacco Act handed in its report to Minister of Health and Social Services Paula Risikko (National Coalition Party) on Thursday.

The report proposes a number of amendments, including a complete ban on passenger imports of smokeless tobacco or snus.

In order to reduce smoking among young people, the committee also proposed banning the display of tobacco on open shelves, selling tobacco products by vending machines, and criminalising the sale of tobacco to minors. Sponsorship by tobacco companies would also be outlawed.

The proposal for banning snus entirely is a response to Sweden’s failure to prevent the use of smokeless tobacco from spreading, reports Ilkka Oksala from the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health.
”The use of snus has become popular particularly among young people in Finland”, Oksala adds.

The sale of smokeless tobacco is prohibited in all other Union member states with the exception of Sweden and its territorial waters.

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Mr. UNZ and Everyone at SnusCENTRAL.org welcome this long over-due decision by the Swedish Government.  The EU's hasty and ill-conceived Swedish Snus Ban of 1992 made no logical sense at the time, made less sense as study after study continued to show the reduced harm value of Swedish Snus especially compared to Cigarettes, the import and export of which is not banned in the EU.

This should not be a drawn out process, as mentioned in the Swedish Match Press Release below, but especially in today's tough economic climate world-wide, but a quick and easy reversal.  We wish the Swedish Government the best of luck.

Your Friends and Supporters at SnusCENTRAL.org & SnusCENTRAL.com