CTRI wins patent for using tobacco as medicine
February 17, 2008
New Delhi (PTI): Tobacco will now be used for manufacturing cancer and cardiac drugs with the Central Tobacco Research Institute (CTRI) bagging the patent for 'solanesol' -- a medicinal substance extracted from tobacco.
Solanesol, a white crystalline powder derived from tobacco's green leaf, has curative effects against cardiac insufficiency, muscular dystrophy, anaemia, cancer, diabetes, high blood pressure, asthma and liver injury. "Many pharmaceutical companies have approached us for carrying out clinical trials for the usage of solanesol as anti-cancer and anti-diabetic drugs," CTRI Director V Krishna Murthy told PTI.
Solanesol is rich in Coenzyme Q10 -- a physiologically active substance with high pharmaceutical value. "Solanesol has excellent prospects in future as drug and CTRI would soon distribute the rights for production of drugs in the market," Murthy said. A letter granting the patent for solanesol was received by CTRI in October last year from Controller of Patents.
The project of deriving solanesol from tobacco was a collaborative programme between CTRI and Central Drug Research Institute (CDRI), Lucknow. CTRI used chewing tobacco variety Abirmani grown in Tamil Nadu and HDBRG tobacco cultivated in black soils of Guntur in Andhra Pradesh for extracting solanesol
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Study finds smoking wards off Parkinson's disease
July 9, 2007
 
There is more evidence to back up a long-standing theory that smokers are less likely to develop Parkinson's disease than people who do not use tobacco products, researchers reported on Monday.
 
The apparent protective effect of tobacco against the degenerative nerve disease has been observed for years but a University of California Los Angeles School of Public Health report said a new review of existing studies seems to confirm it, with long-term and current smokers at the lowest risk.
 
The review also found that the effect seems to extend beyond cigarettes to pipes and cigars, and possibly to chewing tobacco, and that it persisted among those who had stopped smoking years earlier.
 
What would cause such a preventive effect is not well understood, said the report in the Archives of Neurology, but studies on test animals suggested two possibilities.
 
One is that carbon monoxide or other agents in tobacco smoke exert a protective effect and promote survival of brain neurons that produce dopamine, which allows muscles to move properly and is lacking in Parkinson's cases.
 
Cigarettes may also somehow prevent the development of toxic substances that interfere with proper neurological functioning.
 
While there have been a number of previous studies, most were too small to be conclusive, the report said. So the UCLA researchers looked at 11 studies done between 1960 and 2004 covering more than 11,800 people, of whom 2,816 had Parkinson's disease.
 
"Our analyses confirmed prior reports of an inverse association between cigarette smoking and Parkinson's disease," the study said.
 
"Although we found that current smokers and those who had continued to smoke to within five years of Parkinson's disease diagnosis exhibited the lowest risk, a decrease in risk (13 percent to 32 percent) was also observed in those who had quit smoking up to 25 years prior to Parkinson's disease diagnosis," it said.
 
"Other tobacco products also appeared to be protective. Men who smoked pipes or cigars had a 54 percent lower risk. The number of chewing tobacco users was small, but there was a suggestion of reduced risk associated with this product," it added.
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Pooled Analysis of Tobacco Use and Risk of Parkinson Disease
Beate Ritz, MD, PhD; Alberto Ascherio, MD, DrPH; Harvey Checkoway, PhD; Karen S. Marder, MD, MPH; Lorene M. Nelson, PhD; Walter A. Rocca, MD, MPH; G. Webster Ross, MD; Daniel Strickland, PhD; Stephen K. Van Den Eeden, PhD; Jay Gorell, MD

Arch Neurol. 2007;64:990-997.

Context  Epidemiologic studies have reported that cigarette smoking is inversely associated with Parkinson disease (PD). However, questions remain regarding the effect of age at smoking onset, time since quitting, and race/ethnicity that have not been addressed due to sample size constraints. This comprehensive assessment of the apparent reduced risk of PD associated with smoking may provide important leads for treatment and prevention.

Objective  To determine whether race/ethnicity, sex, education, age at diagnosis, and type of tobacco modify the observed effects of smoking on PD.

Design, Setting, and Participants  We conducted the first ever pooled analysis of PD combining individual-level data from 8 US case-control and 3 cohort studies (Nurses' Health Study, Health Professionals Follow-Up Study, and Honolulu-Asia Aging Study) conducted between 1960 and 2004. Case-control studies provided data for 2328 PD cases and 4113 controls matched by age, sex, and ethnicity; cohort studies contributed 488 cases and 4880 controls selected from age- and sex-matched risk sets.

Main Outcome Measure  Incident PD.

Results  We confirmed inverse associations between PD and smoking and found these to be generally stronger in current compared with former smokers; the associations were stronger in cohort than in case-control studies. We observed inverse trends with pack-years smoked at every age at onset except the very elderly (>75 years of age), and the reduction of risk lessened with years since quitting smoking. The risk reductions we observed for white and Asian patients were not seen in Hispanic and African American patients. We also found an inverse association both for smoking cigars and/or pipes and for chewing tobacco in male subjects.

Conclusions  Our data support a dose-dependent reduction of PD risk associated with cigarette smoking and potentially with other types of tobacco use. Importantly, effects seemed not to be influenced by sex or education. Differences observed by race and age at diagnosis warrant further study.

Author Affiliations: Department of Epidemiology and Environmental Health Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles, School of Public Health, Los Angeles (Dr Ritz); Department of Neurology, University of California, Los Angeles, School of Medicine, Los Angeles (Dr Ritz); Departments of Nutrition and Epidemiology, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts (Dr Ascherio); Department of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle (Dr Checkoway); Gertrude H. Sergievsky Center, Taub Institute, and Departments of Neurology and Psychiatry, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York, New York (Dr Marder); Division of Epidemiology, Department of Health Research and Policy, Stanford University School of Medicine, Palo Alto, California (Dr Nelson); Division of Epidemiology, Department of Health Sciences Research, Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, Rochester, Minnesota (Dr Rocca); Veterans Affairs Pacific Islands Health Care System, Pacific Health Research Institute, Honolulu, Hawaii (Dr Ross); Research and Evaluation, Kaiser Permanente, Southern California, Pasadena (Dr Strickland); Division of Research, Kaiser Permanente, Oakland, California (Dr Van Den Eeden); and Department of Neurology, Henry Ford Hospital, Detroit, Michigan (Dr Gorell).
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Not so controversial anymore -- panel says moderate coffee drinking reduces many risks
April 30, 2007
Although the American Society for Nutrition’s popular “controversy session” at Experimental Biology 2007 focuses on the health effects of coffee drinking, panel chair Dr. James Coughlin, a toxicology/safety consultant at Coughlin & Associates, says that recent advances in epidemiologic and experimental knowledge have transformed many of the negative health myths about coffee drinking into validated health benefits.

Indeed, panel co-chair Dan Steffen, who follows coffee and health issues in the Scientific and Regulatory Affairs group of Kraft Foods, note that the “controversy” is often to educate a wider audience about this transformation in understanding.

Coffee is among the most widely consumed beverages in the world, and Dr. Coughlin says that the preponderance of scientific evidence - some by the panelists - suggests that moderate coffee consumption (3-5 cups per day) may be associated with reduced risk of certain disease conditions, such as Parkinson’s disease. Some research in neuropharamacology suggests that one cup of coffee can halve the risk of Parkinson’s disease. Other studies have found it reduces the risk of Alzheimer's disease, kidney stones, gallstones, depression and even suicide.

Dr. Coughlin and two distinguished researchers discussed some of the benefits - and a couple of the remaining increased risk factors (possible increase in blood pressure and plasma homocysteine) - on April 30 at the Experimental Biology meeting in Washington, DC.

Dr. Rob van Dam, an epidemiologist at the Harvard School of Public Health and the Harvard Medical School, studies the link between diet and the development of type 2 diabetes. Worldwide, an estimated 171 million persons have diabetes, mostly type 2 diabetes, and an alarming increase to 366 million persons is expected for the year 2030. While increased physical activity and restriction of energy intake can substantially reduce risk of type 2 diabetes, he believes insight into the role of other lifestyle factors may contribute to additional prevention strategies for type 2 diabetes.

In recent epidemiological studies in the U.S., Europe and Japan, persons who were heavy coffee consumers had a lower risk of type 2 diabetes than persons who consumed little coffee. Interestingly, he says, associations were similar for caffeinated and decaffeinated coffee, suggesting that coffee components other than caffeine may be beneficial for glucose metabolism.

Coffee contains hundreds of components including substantial amounts of chlorogenic acid, caffeine, magnesium, potassium, vitamin B3, trigonelline, and lignans. Limited evidence suggests that coffee may improve glucose metabolism by reducing the rate of intestinal glucose absorption and by stimulating the secretion of the gut hormone glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) that is beneficial for the secretion of insulin. However, most mechanistic research on coffee and glucose metabolism has been done in animals and in lab tubes and therefore metabolic studies in humans are currently being conducted. Further research may lead to the development or selection of coffee types with improved health effects.
Dr. Lenore Arab, a nutritional epidemiologist in the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, notes that the first coffee controversy dates back 430 years when in 1570 some monks petitioned the pope to condemn this drink, so popular among Muslims. Pope Clement VIII, liking how it kept the monks from falling sleep during mass, purportedly blessed it instead. The rest, including the United States’ wholesale conversion to coffee following the Boston Tea Party, is history.

In reviewing the latest epidemiologic literature on cancers and coffee, Dr. Arab has found there to be close to 400 studies of the associations between coffee consumption and cancers various at various sites. The earlier controversy with regard to colon cancer was based on flawed analyses, she says. More thorough analyses and the accumulation of evidence suggest no negative effect on the incidence of colon cancer, and possible protective effects for adenomas of the colon as well as for rectal cancer and liver cancer. Mechanisms which might contribute to a possible anticarcinogenic effect include reduction in cholesterol, bile acid and neutral sterol secretion in the colon, increased colonic motility and reduced exposure of epithelium to carcinogens, the ability of diterpenes to reduce genotoxicity of carcinogens, and lower DNA adduct formation, and the ability of caffeic acid and chlorogenic acid to decreased DNA methylation.

In other cancers - breast, ovarian, and prostate - the evidence is not suggestive of either risk or protection. There are two areas, says Dr. Arab, in which there is some evidence of increased risk: leukemia and stomach cancer. The evidence for the former is intriguing, for the latter insubstantial. She concludes that a systematic review of the newer data for liver, rectal, stomach cancer and for childhood leukemia is due.

Source: Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology 
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Coffee Lovers, Smokers at Lower Parkinson's Risk
Family study supports a link, although reasons behind it remain unclear

April 9, 2007

(HealthDay News) -- Could smoking cigarettes and drinking coffee protect you from Parkinson's disease?

That's the startling suggestion of a new U.S. study of families that also found NSAID use has no impact on the disease risk.

Previous studies have reported that consuming caffeine, smoking and taking nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) such as aspirin, ibuprofen and naproxen may help prevent Parkinson's disease, according to background information in the study. But there's been little family-based research done to examine these links.

The new study, led by researcher Dana B. Hancock of Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C., included 356 Parkinson's patients (averaging about 66 years of age) and 317 of their family members (averaging almost 64 years of age).

The people with Parkinson's disease were 44 percent less likely to report ever smoking and 70 percent less likely to report current smoking compared with unaffected relatives, the study authors found.

"Increasing intensity of coffee drinking was inversely associated with Parkinson's disease," they added. "Increasing dosage and intensity of total caffeine consumption were also inversely associated, with high dosage presenting a significant inverse association with Parkinson's disease."

The study found no link between NSAID use and Parkinson's disease.

The findings are published in the April issue of the journal Archives of Neurology.

It's not known how smoking or caffeine consumption may help reduce the risk of developing Parkinson's disease.

"Given the complexity of Parkinson's disease, these environmental factors likely do not exert their effects in isolation, thus highlighting the importance of gene-environment interactions in determining Parkinson's disease susceptibility," the study authors wrote. "Smoking and caffeine possibly modify genetic effects in families with Parkinson's disease and should be considered as effect modifiers in candidate gene studies for Parkinson's disease."
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Japan scientists find gene linked to heavy smoking

Dec 6, 2006

TOKYO - A team of Japanese scientists have found a gene closely linked to nicotine addiction, which could lead to more effective ways for smokers to kick the habit, a Japanese daily said on Wednesday.

The team at Osaka University found that among heavy smokers -- defined as those who light up as soon as they get up in the morning -- a gene responsible for producing an enzyme that breaks down nicotine is more active than others, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun reported.

After examining the gene CYP2A6 among 300 smokers and those who had smoked in the past, the scientists found that 70 percent of those with a highly active type of the gene were highly addicted to nicotine.

The percentage of heavy smokers among those with a less active CYP2A6 was lower at 40 percent, the finding showed.

If doctors can find out the type of the gene in patients who want to quit smoking, they can change treatment methods accordingly, such as adjusting the amount of nicotine patches prescribed to the smoker, the paper said.
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Genetically modified tobacco plants helped slash the cost of vital inflammation research.

October 25, 2006

John Miner, Health Reporter The London Free Press

Holy smokes, a good use for tobacco

London scientists have succeeded in using genetically engineered tobacco plants to treat inflammatory bowel disease, a breakthrough that holds out hope of a new treatment for the debilitating disease.

"It is a milestone," Anthony Jevnikar, chief scientific officer of London-based Plantigen Inc., said Oct. 24.

The London scientists, a team that combined medical and agricultural researchers, modified tobacco plants to produce the human protein interleukin-10, known to reduce inflammation in humans.

Fed to mice with an inflammatory disease, interleukin-10 reduced the severity of the inflammation and improved the health of the mice.

"I'd be very surprised if this did not have a similar effect in people," said Jevnikar, who is also director of kidney transplantation at London Health Sciences Centre.

Inflammatory bowel disease includes ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease which affect more than one million people in North America, including 100,000 Canadians.

The research results were published in Plant Biotechnology Journal by the research team which included scientists from Agriculture Canada, the Lawson Health Research Institute, and Plantigen, a discovery company spun off from Lawson.

Federal Agriculture Minister Chuck Strahl said the research was an exciting breakthrough that shows great promise.

By using tobacco plants engineered to produce the protein, the scientists were able to slash the production costs.

If usual pharmaceutical fermentation techniques had been used, the costs of the study on mice would have been hundreds of thousands of dollars a week, Jevnikar said. "It would have been simply unaffordable."

Researchers hope to use genetically engineered plants to produce other pharmaceuticals at much lower costs than currently possible.

"We are on the verge of this," said Jevnikar.

"London is most definitely a world leader in all of this."

Plantigen is also working on a preventive treatment produced in genetically engineered plants for Type 1 diabetes.

The tobacco plant was used in the research because there is almost no chance the genetically engineered variety could spread to other plants.

As an added precaution, all of the tobacco plants with interleukin-10 were grown indoors, and a mutant tobacco variety was used that doesn't produce any seeds.
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Disease indicators noted in studies of those stricken

Sep 16, 2006
By CARLA McCLAIN, The Associated Press

TUCSON, Ariz. - Are you shy? Do you avoid taking risks? Are you always on time and often anxious? Are you a teetotaler, a nonsmoker and don't drink much coffee?

Then, believe it or not, you may be at risk for one of the dreaded scourges of aging today - Parkinson's disease.

That's the conclusion of a series of studies of people with Parkinson's - a progressive brain disease that gradually destroys muscle movement, causing tremors, weakness, loss of facial expression and finally immobility and dementia.

Though most neurological diseases experts in Tucson say the science pointing to an at-risk "Parkinsonian personality" is valid, the issue remains controversial, especially among Parkinson's sufferers themselves. Many protest their portrayal as meek and mild.

"When I first heard of Parkinsonian personality, I remember thinking this did not describe Dad in my experience," said Anne Udall, daughter of Arizona's most famous Parkinson's patient, Morris K. Udall, the longtime U.S. congressman from southern Arizona who died in 1998 after a lengthy struggle with the disease.

Noting that running for president - as her father did in 1976 - is not exactly the behavior of the shy and timid, Anne Udall said: "But this does describe a number of folks I know with Parkinson's. There are so many different kinds, and so many different interactions and complexities of this damn disease."

At least 1 million Americans are battling the relentless degeneration of Parkinson's and about 50,000 new cases are diagnosed each year - a number that's steadily growing as the population ages.

Medical science long has searched for the cause of Parkinson's and many studies point to toxic chemical exposure - mainly pesticides, but also some herbicides - as a likely factor. Many experts believe Parkinson's can result from such exposures in those genetically vulnerable to the disease. And about 10 percent of all cases appear to be genetic.

But especially intriguing in this complex picture is the growing evidence that certain personality traits also signal a risk for the disease.

Shyness, aversion to risk, social withdrawal, anxiety, depression, subordination and rigidity - meaning a person who is inflexible, punctual, law-abiding and conscientious - are traits of the Parkinsonian personality that may emerge years, even decades, before the onset of the disease itself.

By the same token, people with opposite traits - risk-takers, sensation-seekers, extroverts, smokers and drinkers, even to the point of addiction - appear to be protected against Parkinson's, studies show.

The theory centers on a brain chemical - the neurotransmitter dopamine - that's destroyed as Parkinson's progresses. Dopamine affects muscle function as well as impulse control and reactions to stimulation.

Experts at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore analyzed the most recent study of Parkinsonian personality, which explored the history of personal characteristics, also smoking and drinking habits, in more than 100 people with Parkinson's disease.

When compared to 100 healthy people, the study found the Parkinson's patients had lower sensation-seeking and higher depression and anxiety scores.

The results likely explain why smoking and drinking coffee appeared in earlier studies to protect against Parkinson's. Instead, people who develop the disease simply have the risk-averse personalities that shun smoking, caffeine and alcohol, the study concluded.

"This is definitely a valid concept, no question about it," said Dr. Charles Adler, a neurologist who specializes in Parkinson's at the Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale.

"I do think there is evidence for a pre-symptomatic personality in people who go on to Parkinson's. But what we cannot say is if you don't smoke and you don't parasail, you're going to get Parkinson's. This personality does not actually predict Parkinson's. It only means you may have an increased risk."

Some of the earliest studies of Parkinsonian personality were done at the University of Arizona in the 1990s. One study found significantly higher rates of Parkinson's in the families of shy, elderly people than in families of those who were not shy.

"There probably is a Parkinson-prone personality," said Dr. Iris Bell, UA professor of family and community medicine, psychiatry, psychology and public health, who led these studies.

"But the take-home message for people is if you have this kind of personality, it means only a very small increased risk. The environmental risk factors, such as exposure to toxic chemicals, are likely much more important in the development of disease."

Parkinson's victims such as Udall, Billy Graham, Michael J. Fox and Pope John Paul II - who performed before millions - seem to defy the typical Parkinsonian type, Bell noted.

"When you see people out there who have done these huge public things, it's obviously not the whole story," she said. "We need to do much larger epidemiological studies to determine just how much of a role personality plays in this disease."

The whole subject of "Parkinsonian personality" is sensitive in the patient community.

"I could imagine if I were a Parkinson's patient, I would not really want to be described as dull and uninteresting," said Cynthia Holmes, a health psychologist and Parkinson's educator at the Arizona Chapter of the American Parkinson Disease Association.

It may surprise many to find out Pam Ronstadt - wife of former City Councilman Fred Ronstadt - has always battled painful shyness, despite the demands of political life and work dealing with the public. Hit with early-onset Parkinson's seven years ago, Ronstadt, now 40, only recently decided to stop working and spend her time with her children.

"I've jumped out of airplanes, and I plan to do that again, so I don't consider myself a non-risk-taker," she said. "But I am pretty introverted, really pretty shy. I have to force myself to approach large groups or go to large parties. That's always been true, but it has gotten worse with the Parkinson's.

"My friends know that my speech is slurred by the disease and not by knocking back five scotches, but other people don't," she added. "Maybe it's fear of exposure now."
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Parkinson's disease
Nicotine has some positive effect
September 6, 2006
by John Johnston

The Federal Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act was designed to make Americans more aware of the adverse health effects of smoking. As enacted in 1965, the law required health warnings only on cigarette packages. In 1984, the law was amended to require that one of the four warning labels listed below appear in a specific format on cigarette packages and in most related advertising:

Surgeon general's warning: smoking causes lung cancer, heart disease, emphysema, and may complicate pregnancy.
Surgeon general's warning: quitting smoking now greatly reduces serious risks to your health.
Surgeon general's warning: smoking by pregnant women may result in fetal injury, premature birth, and low birth weight.
Surgeon general's warning: Cigarette Smoke Contains Carbon Monoxide.
And of course, the warnings we've all heard from parents, public health officials and just about everyone else is: "if you don't smoke, don't' start, and if you do smoke, stop.
Sound advice a vast majority would agree.

New research suggests, however, that nicotine treatment protects against the same type of brain damage that occurs in Parkinson's disease. Experimental animals receiving chronic administration of nicotine over a period of six months had 25 percent less Parkinson's type damage than those not receiving nicotine.

This protective effect may explain the lower incidence of Parkinson's disease among smokers. Researchers say the results also suggest that nicotine may be useful as a potential therapy in the treatment of early-stage Parkinson's patients.

Researchers at The Parkinson's Institute, an independent, non-profit research institute located in Sunnyvale, California, conducted the five-year study.
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Why smoking may have a health benefit

August 10, 2006

Scientists have uncovered a gene that helps protect smokers from Parkinson's disease.

The medical world recently discovered that cigarette smoke decreases the risk of getting the degenerative neurological condition - but the genes responsible were a mystery.

US geneticist Professor Jeffrey Vance, from Duke University in North Carolina, has told the International Congress of Human Genetics in Brisbane he has found a gene that helps explain the link.

The gene - known as NOS2A - is found in every cell of the body and is responsible for the production of nitric oxide.

If too much is produced brain cells can die, leading to neuro-degenerative diseases like Parkinson's and Alzheimer's.

Prof Vance and his team realised that while everyone has this gene, in smokers it appeared to be "turned down", limiting cell death and ultimately disease.

"We think that something in smoke keeps the level of the NOS2A down so cells don't produce nitric oxide, which decreases cell damage," he told AAP.

The researcher was not sure why this was but said the team would look closer at this area of DNA to try to better understand the link.

"It really is ironic that something good might ultimately come out of smoking," Prof Vance said.

"It is definitely a window of opportunity that we are working on."

But the main focus on his project was on further understanding Parkinson's disease, which affects about 40,000 Australians, most aged over 60.

The cause is unknown and while there are treatments available including surgery and medication to replace the missing chemical dopamine, these have a limited effect.

"The other problem is that these things are not curing anything, only treating the symptoms while the process is still going on," Prof Vance said.

His team is now using this genetic information to try and find a way to slow down Parkinson's disease, or even prevent it.

"I'd like to be able to identify people that are at a high risk of Parkinson's disease so we can provide them information to change their lifestyle or give them a drug to stop them getting it," the scientist said.
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By GEOFFREY YORK
June 11, 2005

GUIYANG, CHINA -- Here's some exciting medical news from the Chinese government: Smoking is great for your health.

Cigarettes, according to China's tobacco authorities, are an excellent way to prevent ulcers.

They also reduce the risk of Parkinson's disease, relieve schizophrenia, boost your brain cells, speed up your thinking, improve your reactions and increase your working efficiency.

And all those warnings about lung cancer? Nonsense.

You're more likely to get cancer from cooking smoke than from your cigarette habit.

Welcome to the bizarre parallel universe of China's state-owned tobacco monopoly, the world's most successful cigarette-marketing agency.

With annual sales of 1.8 trillion cigarettes, the Chinese monopoly is responsible for almost one-third of all cigarettes smoked on the planet today.

If you believe the official website of the tobacco monopoly, cigarettes are a kind of miracle drug: solving your health problems, helping your lifestyle, strengthening the equality of women, and even eliminating loneliness and depression.

"Smoking removes your troubles and worries," says a 37-year-old female magazine editor, quoted approvingly on the website. "Holding a cigarette is like having a walking stick in your hand, giving you support.

"Quitting smoking would bring you misery, shortening your life."

Such statements are widely believed in China.

Two-thirds of Chinese men are smokers, and surveys show that as many as 90 per cent believe their habit has little effect on their health, or is good for them.

Even in China's medical community, 60 per cent of male doctors are smokers. Few are aware of the studies forecasting that cigarettes will soon be responsible for one-third of all premature deaths among Chinese men.

Little wonder that Western tobacco companies are hungrily circling the Chinese market, lobbying eagerly for entry into this lucrative market of 360 million smokers, the biggest market in the world.

So far, 99 per cent of the market is controlled by the Chinese monopoly, but Western tobacco companies are convinced they will soon crack it, especially now that China is a member of the World Trade Organization and is obliged to reduce its tariffs on foreign cigarettes.

For the anti-smoking movement, China is the ultimate challenge. Nonetheless, this week, a group of Canadian experts arrived in southwestern China in a bid to convince Chinese smokers that cigarettes might not be quite as beneficial as they believe.

They distributed anti-smoking posters, visited cancer patients, showed the graphic warnings on Canadian cigarette packs, and lectured on how the anti-smoking campaign has reduced Canada's lung-cancer rate. But they admitted that they face an uphill struggle in a country where the tobacco industry provides 60 million jobs and 10 per cent of national tax revenue.

"The magnitude of the problem is overwhelming," said Jean Couture, a Quebec surgeon who has been travelling to China since 1990 to work on cancer-education programs.

"In China today, the economy comes first and everything else is secondary, including health care," Dr. Couture said. "You wonder if anyone in the government is conscious of how great the smoking problem is. There's no public education program. The Chinese anti-smoking association is very weak and has almost no money. Within 20 years, China could have the majority of all smoking deaths in the world."

Chinese doctors have called Dr. Couture a "second Norman Bethune" -- a reference to the Canadian surgeon who became a Chinese hero after dying while giving care to Chinese Communist soldiers in 1939. The Quebec doctor, who has helped create an 80-bed cancer unit at a hospital in northeastern China, is now leading an anti-smoking campaign in four Chinese provinces.

When the Canadians arrived this week in Guizhou province in southwestern China, they were worried about the power of the local tobacco industry. The province is filled with tobacco farms and cigarette factories. As they distributed posters at a hospital in one of Guizhou's biggest cities yesterday, the Canadians saw a number of people smoking in the hospital. A hospital shop was openly selling cigarettes.

"The tobacco industry is so huge and the anti-tobacco movement is so weak," said Mark Rowswell, a Canadian television personality and Chinese celebrity (under the name Da Shan), who helps promote the anti-smoking campaign. "What we're doing is just a drop in the ocean."

While smoking rates have fallen sharply in Canada in the past two decades, the rate in China is still rising.

"Ten years ago, when we first came to China, it was unheard of for young women to smoke," said Nicole Magnan, executive director of the Quebec division of the Canadian Cancer Society, who was in the Canadian delegation this week. "Now there are more and more of them."

While China has proclaimed that the 2008 Beijing Olympics will be a smoke-free Olympics, it has done little to discourage smoking. The number of Chinese smokers is growing by three million a year, despite an estimated 1.3 million tobacco-related deaths annually.

Chinese cigarettes are cheap -- as little as 30 cents a pack -- and the health warnings are hidden in small print on the sides of the packages. Though cigarette advertising is technically illegal, tobacco companies are allowed to promote their corporate names. When sprinter Liu Xiang won a gold medal for China at the Athens Olympics last summer, he promptly went out and filmed a television commercial for China's biggest cigarette company.

Children can easily buy cigarettes at Chinese shops, despite an official ban on sales to those under the age of 18. "Shop owners never refuse to sell us cigarettes," said one 16-year-old boy who was smoking as he played pool near a Guizhou school this week.

"They only care about money."

Che Chuangao, a construction worker, started smoking when he was 20. "More than 90 per cent of my friends smoked, so I couldn't be different," he said. "And it's helpful for my work. Offering a cigarette is a social greeting, whenever you meet a friend or a stranger. I know that smoking isn't good. Once I stopped smoking for a month or two. But my friends persuaded me to smoke again."

While their task is daunting, the Canadians are scoring some small successes. After listening to a speech by the Canadians this week, 27-year-old medical student Li Dongbo said he was inspired to work on anti-smoking projects.

The student's uncle, who had smoked for 30 years, died of lung cancer in February. To spare his feelings, his family had never told him the truth about his illness.

"I was shocked," Mr. Li said. "The government should be doing more. We need promotion campaigns to tell people about it."
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Holy smoke! Chinese city turns cigarettes to medicine

Reuters March, 2006

BEIJING - A city in China, a country that's home to the world's most enthusiastic smokers, is crushing fake cigarettes to make medicine, Xinhua news agency said on Sunday.

The northwestern city of Xian is using the counterfeit cigarettes to extract solanesol, a compound found in tobacco which is used to treat cardiovascular disease, it said.

"We used to incinerate the fake cigarettes, which is wasteful and causes air pollution," Xinhua quoted Zhou Yaqing, vice director of the provincial tobacco monopoly, as saying.

A kilo of solanesol is worth about $200, and 30 tons of tobacco leaf can produce up to 120 kilos, Xinhua added.

China is the world's largest cigarette producer, with a growing market of about 320 million. Chinese cigarettes are also among the cheapest in the world -- a packet can cost as little as 8 U.S. cents -- and smoking kills 1.2 million people a year in China, according to the World Health Organization.

Fake cigarettes, made of poor quality tobacco and often topped up with wood chips, are commonly sold on Chinese streets.