NOV/DEC 2006
Volume 12 - No. 4

SRNT Newsletter

November/December 2006, Volume 12, Number 4

In the Spotlight

Honors, Awards, & Achievements

• We are pleased to report that Harry Lando is the winner of the 2006 University of Minnesota Global Outreach Award for his impressive contributions to the field of tobacco control, many of which were done through his activities within SRNT. For the past several years, Professor Lando has waged what began as a one-man battle to focus attention on the need to build a tobacco control research infrastructure in low- and middle-income countries. He started this effort, most visibly, during his tenure as President of SRNT. Professor Lando directed SRNT resources to bringing developing country scientists to the annual meeting, a practice continued to the present. The year he served as President (2002-03), he also organized a day-long Global Initiatives in Tobacco Research Pre-Conference, held just prior to the SRNT annual meeting in New Orleans. The very first of its kind, the meeting attracted over 100 participants from all over the world. This past year he was involved in yet another such pre-conference. Judging from interest in the conference, and the participation of developing country scientists who had never worked on tobacco control issues, one can rank these meetings as highly productive. They are certainly visionary. Professor Lando has managed to enlist a number of colleagues in his quest to expand the global reach of tobacco control research. Currently he chairs the Global Network Committee of SRNT, a group now numbering 37 members from multiple countries. As well, he provides visionary leadership to the Global Tobacco Research Network, an organization based at Johns Hopkins whose advisory committee Professor Lando co-chairs. He enlisted a number of other scholars to develop a package of articles on the current state of affairs, and needs, in international tobacco control research, published in the American Journal of Public Health last year.

• On October 2^nd, Maher Karam-Hage, M.D., transitioned from his position at the University of Michigan to a new position at the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, TX, where he will be assisting Paul Cinciripini and Ellen Gritz to build a smoking cessation program. Maher's new email address is wjmaher@comcast.net. Congratulations, Maher!

• Noboru Hiroi, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Psychiatry & Associate Professor of Neuroscience, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, received a 2006 National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression (NARSAD) Independent Investigator Award.

• Brian Hitsman (Brown University) was the recipient of an American College of Neuropsychopharmacology 2006 Young Investigator Memorial Travel Award.

• On October 1st, Christian Chiamulera, Verona (Italy), was promoted to Professor of Pharmacology, Faculty of Exercise Sports Science Medicine, University of Verona. His affiliation remains at the Section of Pharmacology, Department of Medicine and Public Health, with the University of Verona, where his research laboratory is based.

Nicotine & Tobacco News in Brief

• In a recent SRNT Listserv exchange, many members took the time to tell others about various smoking cessation websites. E. D. Glover (Professor & Chair of the Department of Public & Community Health, Center for Health Behavior Research, Univeristy of Maryland) took some time to collate them all for the listserv, and they are repeated below in case you have a future need for this handy reference:

http://www.stopsmokingdoctors.com/
http://smokefree.gov/
http://www.smokersonly.org/
https://secure.tobaccofreekids.org/Cessation/
http://www.trytostop.org/
http://www.bronxbreathes.org/
http://www.committedquitters.com/
http://www.way2quit.com/
http://www.njchoices.org/
For smokeless tobacco cessation: http://www.chewfree.com/
http://www.smokeclinic.com
http://www.becomeanex.org
Spanish site, from our colleagues in Mexico:http://www.gmc.org.mx/contenido/programas/smoking%20cessation/ smoking%20cessation%20index.html
http://www.theactcenter.edu/
http://www.ctri.wisc.edu/
http://www.tobaccoprogram.org/
http://www.tobaccoclinic.org/
For Latino smokers: http://www.proyectovidanofume.org/
http://www.quitnet.com/
http://www.Nysmokefree.com
http://actcenter.umc.edu/
http://www.tobaccoweek.org/
http://www.healthauthority.com/
http://www.quitkey.com/
http://www.mquit.com/

• Michael Cummings announced that the Roswell Park group has recently updated its website: http://doingyoudamage.com/ . They have uploaded video clips of industry spokespeople's statements (i.e., click below "little Johnny" and you can view a 15 minute walk through the history of 50 years of tobacco industry lies and a "Happy Birthday Marlboro" song from our local "new voice club" singers"). Videos can be downloaded with either Quicktime or Windows Media Player. A DVD of this material is also available. Their "truth about your smokes" print ads are also available on this site also.

• Special Issue of Tobacco Control on Quitlines: Arrangements have been made for a special issue (Supplement) of the journal, Tobacco Control on Quitlines or telephone counseling for tobacco cessation. The Editors invite submissions on a variety of topics related to Quitlines, including work on effectiveness with new or challenging populations of smokers, integration with other treatment methods, marketing, cost analyses, variations in service delivery, and the integration of service delivery and research and evaluation. The issue is intended to be of interest to researchers, sponsors and the public health community. The deadline for submission is January 2, 2007. Papers should be submitted in the usual manner for Tobacco Control (i.e., electronically)with a cover letter noting that the manuscript is aimed at the Quitline special issue. All papers will be peer reviewed consistent with Tobacco Control's editorial policies. Inquiries about the suitability of papers or related matters can be directed to the issue's Guest Editor: Ed Lichtenstein, ed@ori.org

• Treatobacco.net is delighted to announce that Tom Houston has now taken over as head of the "Policy" section of www.treatobacco.net and that Jacques le Houezec has joined Ann McNeill as Deputy Manager. They are currently updating the main sections, hope to upload the new "Efficacy" section soon, and have just added a new Ask the Experts feature: "What is varenicline?"

• The DSM-V Research Taskforce on Substance Abuse has put together a series of papers proposing research to change to the DSM classification and this has just come out as a Sept 06 supplement to Addiction and is available online at http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/toc/add/101/s1.

• The Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health (http://jech.bmjjournals.com/content /vol60/suppl_2/) recently released a special issue entitled Tobacco Control Policies and Low Socioeconomic Status Women and Girls. The papers included in this issue examine the effectiveness of tobacco control policies in reducing the harm caused by tobacco use and exposure among low socioeconomic status (SES) women and girls. Tobacco control policies, such as increases in cigarette excise taxes, worksite smoking bans, and youth-focused media campaigns show promise in reducing smoking at the population level. However, few studies have examined the effects of policies in reducing smoking prevalence and secondhand smoke exposure among disadvantaged women and girls. Those of lower SES have higher-than-average rates of tobacco use and suffer disproportionately from the health consequences of tobacco. The Low Socioeconomic Status Women and Girls Project of the Tobacco Research Network on Disparities (TReND) held a meeting, Tobacco Control Policies: Do They Make a Difference for Low SES Women and Girls? September 22—23, 2005. Tobacco Control Policies and Low Socioeconomic Status Women and Girls is a product of that meeting, and the results from the papers clearly indicate that some policies have modest effects while others have no effect on smoking behavior or secondhand smoke exposure among low SES women and girls.