WASHINGTON — The Internet is not a safe haven for merchants selling illegal flavored cigarettes, the FDA warned in a letter to 14 companies still out of compliance with new laws.

The agency threatened to move against companies selling flavored cigarettes online and requested a written response within 15 days outlining a course of action to correct any failures to meet regulations.  More…

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — Smokers may soon find it difficult to buy cigarettes at their local convenience store, deli or drugstore. That’s because the state is increasing the annual licensing fee for retailers who sell tobacco by 900 percent — or a jump from the standard $100 application fee to $1,000 for stores making less than $1 million in gross annual sales.

Stores making at least $1 million but less than $10 million in gross sales are paying $2,500, up from the $100 fee, and retailers making more than $10 million in gross sales pay $5,000.

The deadline for renewing a license to sell tobacco in 2010 is Sept. 21.

State officials say the huge fee increase is an attempt to improve New Yorkers’ physical health and the state’s financial fitness, designed as it is to cut by 40 percent the number of retailers selling tobacco while raising money to help plug the remaining $2.1 billion deficit this year. More…

GALVESTON, Texas — City council members unexpectedly adopted one of the state’s strictest smoking bans July 23, effectively snuffing out a popular cigar bar still struggling to reopen after Hurricane Ike wiped it out almost a year ago. The proposed ordinance was comparable to similar laws in other Texas cities, prohibiting people from lighting up in restaurants and bars.  More…

Washington DC - District residents could soon face higher sales, gas and cigarette taxes after the D.C. Council approved a revised fiscal 2010 budget that might force Mayor Adrian M. Fenty to abandon earlier promises to not raise taxes and avoid cuts in public education.  More…

OZARK — Electronic cigarettes, all the rage overseas, have made it to the Wiregrass. Vaporized cigarettes from China are now distributed by a company in Ozark. Save A Smoker was founded four months ago by three smokers, two of whom have stopped smoking and completely converted to vaping.  More…

Food has to meet certain specifications to be labeled as “light,” but there are no such restrictions on cigarettes. Consumers can read the label to find out the ingredients in shampoo that goes on their hair, but not in the smoke that goes in their lungs. If matters proceed as expected today, the U.S. Senate will pass legislation allowing the Food and Drug Administration to regulate tobacco products in ways that it should have been doing for years.  More…

No ifs ands or butts — San Francisco considers cigarette cleanup fee

San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom thinks smokers should pay what it costs the city to clean up discarded cigarette butts. …

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Today’s Cigarettes May Pack More Punch

Professionally, he has also cared for hundreds of smokers injured by cigarettes and smoking, reports the San Diego Union Tribune. …

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Patrons debate probable effects of smoking ban

Smoker Jeff Porter smokes a cigarette at the Barbary Coast on Front Street. NC lawmakers approved a smoking ban for restaurants and bars across North …

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Sen. John Land: State should get the biggest bang for the …

 A vast majority of South Carolinians agree that the time has come to raise the nation’s lowest cigarette tax. …

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