A new report from the American Lung Association lists the cities that have the worst air pollution in the U.S. In many places, such as Southern California and the Central Valley, including Los Angeles, Fresno, Visalia and Modesto, Las Vegas, and Salt Lake City, automobile and truck exhaust are primary contributors to the pollution and the health problems it causes.
New Report Documents E-Cigarette Advertising
E-cigarette makers spent $39 million on ads from June through November 2013, much of it on programming targeting youth, the anti-tobacco organization Legacy found.
Business Gears Up for Assault on Consumer-Protection Laws
That low rumbling you hear, writes Bloomberg Businessweek is the business lobby revving its engines for an assault on state consumer-protection laws. The corporate-funded American Tort Reform Association gave fair warning at an event in Washington last week, when it announced “a multiyear, multistate campaign to reform such laws.” By “reform,” ATRA means water down, roll back—choose your metaphor.
Origins of Personal Responsibility Rhetoric in News Coverage of the Tobacco Industry
By the mid 1980s, the personal responsibility frame dominated the tobacco industry’s public arguments. In a new article in the American Journal of Public Health, Pamela Mejia and colleagues analyze news coverage of the tobacco industry from 1966 to 1991. They conclude that the tobacco industry’s use of personal responsibility rhetoric in public preceded the ascension of personal responsibility rhetoric commonly associated with the Reagan Administration in the 1980s.
Court-Ordered Tobacco Ads Will Include Black Media
ABC News reports that the nation’s tobacco companies and the Justice Department are including media outlets that target more of the black community in court-ordered advertisements that say the cigarette makers lied about the dangers of smoking, according to a brief filed in U.S. District Court in Washington on Wednesday. The advertisements are part of a case the government brought in 1999 under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations.
General Mills Proposes, Then Withdraws Limits On Class Action Lawsuits
Huff Post writes that General Mills, the cereal company, last week revealed a new rule that prevented people from joining class action lawsuits if they “joined [its] online communities.” Such actions might include company contest, or liking the company on Facebook. Those who violated the rule would have been limited to arbitration or informal negotiations as a means of conflict resolution. But in a blogpost on its corporate website a few days later, General Mills said it was changing back to its old legal terms.
Jamira Burley Honored as White House Champion of Change for Gun Violence Prevention
“Since the murder of my brother Andre in 2005, I have worked to prevent my peers from experiencing the same adversities that I did. Whether that means training the next generation of city leaders through my job at the Philadelphia Youth Commission, or meeting with members of Congress regarding common-sense gun legislation. Nine years ago I did not choose this work, it chose me.”
Climate Change and Food Security
Food & Climate: Connecting the Dots, Choosing the Way Forward, a new report by the Center for Food Safety, warns that climate change “has the potential to damage irreversibly the natural resource base on which agriculture depends” and could create widespread scarcity, economic disruption, and social unrest, with grave consequences for global food security.
Underage Youth and Adults Differ in their Alcohol Brand Preferences
A new report published online by Substance Abuse finds that youth are not merely mimicking the alcohol brand choices of adults but choose to disproportionally consume brands such as Keystone Light beer, Bacardi malt beverages, Malibu rum, Captain Morgan rum and Smirnoff malt beverages. This suggests that other factors may influence youth drinking preferences.
Pharmaceutical Marketing Expenses in District of Columbia, 2012
According to a new report prepared by the George Washington School of Public Health and Health Services for the District of Columbia municipal government, 147 pharmaceutical manufacturers and labelers reported marketing expenditures of $97.5 million in 2012, which represents the first year‐on-year increase in such spending since 2007. The reported amount included expenses for local pharmaceutical sales representatives, speaking fees and gifts to physicians, and free samples.
Corporations and Health Watch 