Black Anti-Smoking Group Drops Support for Cigarette Regulation Bill
Black anti-smoking groups who previously backed a bill that would allow the Food And Drug Administration to regulate tobacco products, on Thursday dropped it support for the measure, according to The New York Times. The goupls say the bill fails to adequately protect the health of African-Americans because it would not ban menthol flavorings from cigarettes. The legislation, which has been cleared by crucial committees in both the Senate and the House of Representatives, would ban candy, fruit and spice flavorings in cigarettes, but specifically exempts menthol flavorings. That special protection for menthol has been considered crucial to getting the nation’s biggest cigarette maker, Philip Morris USA, to support the legislation. Menthol-flavored cigarettes account for more than 25 percent of the $70 billion domestic cigarette market. Philip Morris’s Marlboro Menthol is the second-largest menthol brand behind Newport, made by Lorillard. Many antismoking groups have seen the menthol exemption as a necessary compromise in getting a tobacco bill through Congress. They have noted that the bill would empower the Food and Drug Administration eventually to limit or ban menthol and other tobacco additives if it found those products to be unhealthful. Until Thursday, the groups going along with the menthol compromise had included the Black antismoking organization, the National African American Tobacco Prevention Network. But the group has withdrawn its support, saying that recent publicity about the menthol exemption had created a backlash among its members. Menthol brands are chosen by about 75 percent of African-American smokers, a group with a disproportionate share of smoking-related cancers. “Our constituents across the country are just livid,” said William S. Robinson, executive director of the African American network, a nonprofit group based in Durham, N.C.

Soldier Suicides On the Rise Again
Amid increasing violence in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, more U.S. Army soldiers are committing soldiers. Reflecting a 13 percent increase, the number of troops who committed suicide last year rose to 115 last year compared to 102 soldiers last year, according to an Army official who spoke to the Associated Press late Thursday on a condition of anonymity. About a quarter of the deaths occurred in Iraq. The 115 confirmed deaths among active duty soldiers and National Guard and Reserve troops that had been activated was a lower number than previously feared. However, documents released as part of a law suit filed against the Defense Department, that alleges that Blacks are not getting the same mental health care as other soldiers, indicates that the numbers could be even higher.“We are here because veterans are committing suicide at an alarming rate,” Atty. Arturo Gonzalez told U.S. District Court Judge Samuel Conti, citing government documents showing that 18 U.S. war veterans kill themselves every day, according to the Final Call. “More of these veterans are dying in the United States than in combat—that’s wrong.” Justice Department attorney Daniel Bensing countered that “the VA is providing world-class health care across the board” and dismissed as “immaterial” the fact that 18 veterans commit suicide every day. “We don’t dispute that suicide is a major issue among veterans,” he said. Preliminary Army figures released in January showed as many as 121 troops might have killed themselves, but a number of the deaths were still being investigated then and have since been attributed to other causes, the officials said. The 115 deaths last year and 102 in 2006 followed 85 in 2005 and 67 in 2004. Suicides have been rising during the five-year-old war in Iraq and nearly seven years of war in Afghanistan. The only Army records immediately available go back to 1990, and show no year with a higher number of suicides than 2007. The figure in 1990 was 102. More U.S. troops also died overall in hostilities in 2007 than in any of the previous years in Iraq and Afghanistan. Overall violence increased in Afghanistan with a Taliban resurgence and overall deaths increased in Iraq, even as violence there declined in the second half of the year.

There’s growing evidence that abstinence-only sex ed doesn’t work.
Vital Signs: Recently released studies that show nearly half of Black teen girls have a sexually transmitted disease is yet another indication that abstinence-only sex ed doesn’t work. So, what’s a parent to do? Vital Signs has some answers.

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