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2019
Chinese films given Dirty Ashtray Award
Xu Guihua, a senior adviser to the association and former deputy director of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said that, as in the past, no director or producer came to claim their awards on Friday. But she believes such publicity will remind the film and television industry to take responsibility and reduce tobacco footage in their works...The average number of tobacco-related scenes for a film last year was 12.3, a decline of nearly 50 percent compared with 2007, she said.
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Farah Khan: 'Won't glorify smoking in my films'
As a filmmaker, I have pledged that from now onwards any actor will not smoke in my films. In my films, actors don't smoke usually, but in 'Om Shanti Om', the character played by Arjun Rampal smoked a cigarette...and we all know what happened with him in the end of the film...I have made a promise that I will never glorify smoking.
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S. Korea adds tobacco warnings to films, TV
As part of efforts to curb smoking by young people, the ministry will ban tobacco producers from using cartoon characters in their ads, while mandating anti-smoking ads in the introduction of dramas and movies containing smoking scenes.
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A need for nicotine: Teenage nicotine addiction
In a Chronicle poll of 248 respondents, 80 students said they have used nicotine during their high school careers … “Smoking in movies always looks glamorous, but that’s just not what smoking is like in real life,” Amy Kronenberg [Harvard-Westlake School] ’20 said. “[Smoking] is gross and hardly ever looks cool. Just knowing what [smoking] does to your lungs removes all of the glamour.” [The Chronicle is the online student newspaper of Harvard-Westlake School, Los Angeles — Ed.]
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Health groups call on Disney to separate Vice Media and PMI
| Truth Initiative (25 Apr 2019)
A coalition of eight national and international health organizations today urged The Walt Disney Company (Disney) to require its partner network, Vice, to terminate its relationship with Philip Morris International, the world’s largest manufacturer and seller of cigarettes.
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Markey for the kids
Sen. Markey (D-Mass.), a longtime advocate for protections around children and technology, sent letters during the congressional recess to a dozen tech CEOs questioning them about promoting youth smoking … The letters, signed also by Sens. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), raise concern about the prevalence of tobacco imagery in on-demand digital content popular with young audiences, “especially on streaming services such as Netflix and Hulu.”
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Smoking scenes rampant in entertainment media
According to [Korea's] Ministry of Health and Welfare, 53.3 percent of dramas, 50.4 percent of films and 50 percent of webtoons depicted smoking … "Children and adolescents exposed to smoking scenes repeatedly are more likely to try smoking," a ministry official said. "We urge entertainment content creators and producers to refrain from showing smoking in content rated for minors."
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Senators query media companies on smoking
| Senator Markey (17 Apr 2019)
“Both film and television continue to expose children and adolescents to tobacco content conclusively proven to cause physical harm to young viewers,” write the Senators in their letters. “Indeed, the recent survey of tobacco content in the streaming series most popular among young viewers suggests that smoking levels in TV-MA rated shows are comparable to R-rated films and the levels in the TV-14 shows are comparable to PG-13 films.”
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Delhi protests smoking in Amazon shows
| Press Trust of India (8 Apr 2019)
A senior official of the Delhi government has asked the Union Health Ministry to stop promotion of smoking and 'hookah' in the three web series - 'Made in Heaven', 'Mirzapur' and 'Four More Shots Please' being aired on Amazon Prime Video.
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No tobacco promos at Mumbai film awards
A senior official of the Delhi government has written to the Union Health Ministry, the Maharashtra public health department and the organisers of the Filmfare Awards to "stop the advertisement, promotion and sponsorships" of tobacco brands in the 64th edition of the awards to be held [March 23] in Mumbai.
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