Pain is something new for young people, Sussman said. "Adults are used to hurting. Kids don't like to hurt as much." Sussman thinks designers of smoking cessation programs should accommodate young smokers' lifestyles. "Kids don't keep appointment books," he said. "Have something they can go to right after school--at their school, not at another site." Some young smokers say they have no intention of quitting, but the new Proposition 10 tax, which raised the price of cigarettes by 50 cents a pack, may make them cut back on the amount they smoke. ...

The Clinton administration plans to propose a federal tax increase of 55 cents a pack on cigarettes to help pay for new domestic and military spending programs, White House and congressional officials said on Thursday. The new tax, if enacted, would raise $8 billion a year over the next five years and would be used to help pay for a host of new social initiatives the president has announced over the past two weeks, including expanded after- school programs, support for disabled workers, hiring of new police officers and a tax credit for people requiring long-term medical care. The money would also help offset $100 billion in proposed new Pentagon spending over the next six years. ...

The health care providers offers aerobics, body sculpting and stress management classes. Its also will provide classes to help employees stop smoking next month. "Where is the employer going to stop?" he said. "Once you start down that slippery slope, where does the employer end and the employee begin?" But employers have every right to take that route, argues John Banzhaf, executive director of a national anti-smoking lobby known as Action on Smoking and Health. ...

The question of what effect cigarette advertising has on children is an important one. In particular, this question is central to the current Congressional debate over tobacco legislation and a possible tobacco settlement. There are two major questions: (1)Does the tobacco industry specifically target youth in its cigarette marketing? (2)Does tobacco marketing actually cause children to start smoking? ...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Anti-smoking therapies and modified tobacco products have the potential to reduce the danger of smoking, but not enough is known about their use to be certain, a research panel said Thursday. A variety of products have come on the market in recent years, promoted to help people stop smoking or reduce tobacco usage. These range from nicotine replacement gum, patches, inhalers and nasal spray to cigarette-like products that produce less smoke and even modified tobacco with fewer toxic chemicals. ...

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. Attorney General Doyle. Attorney General Reno, thank you for joining us here today and for the work you have done with the states' attorneys general and local prosecutors on domestic violence and to reduce the crime rate and a whole host of other issues. I want to thank Fred Duval for the work he does on my behalf with you and this association. And I'd also like to thank the two former attorneys general that are working for me -- Bonnie Campbell, who heads the Attorney General's effort on violence against women; and Chuck Burson, who was formerly president of NAAG, now the Vice President Counsel. ...

The world has stepped up an anti-smoking campaign since the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) by the World Health Organization (WHO) took effect last month. Countries, especially those that have ratified the international treaty, have set out more aggressive anti-tobacco policies. Bhutan became the first nation to ban the sale of cigarettes. Ireland has started a total ban on smoking at bars and all public places, while the state of New York in the United States has declared all bars, restaurants and public venues as smoke-free zones. ...

Two inmates in the Supermax prison in Florence, Colorado, where some of the most dangerous criminals in the country are held, have filed a lawsuit contending their health is at risk. According to the lawsuit, the inmates -- Ahmad Mohammad Ajaj and Dandenis Munoz Mosquera -- don't fear violence from inside the prison as much as second-hand smoke. ...

The U.S. Justice Department has said it will argue for court-appointed monitors to oversee the tobacco industry as part of its racketeering case against the industry. Government lawyers said in a court pleading filed Monday that they will make the case for monitors as one of the remedies they may ask a federal court to impose if the government prevails in the five-year-old case. ...

In a move that could determine the future of tobacco lawsuits in California, a federal appeals court asked the state's high court Tuesday to resolve a conflict that has resulted in multimillion-dollar verdicts in state courts and dismissals of similar suits in federal courts. The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, considering two suits by former smokers, asked the California Supreme Court whether state law would allow a suit by someone diagnosed with a tobacco-related illness many years after becoming addicted to cigarettes. ...