Cigarette Toxin Update

US cigarette brands expose smokers to higher levels of cancer-causing agents.
CBS News (6/1) reported on its website that "'cigarettes from around the world vary in their ingredients and the way they are produced,' Dr. Jim Pirkle, deputy director for science at the CDC's National Center for Environmental Health, Division of Laboratory Sciences, said in a statement." But a newly-published paper appearing in Cancer Epidemiology Biomarkers and Prevention shows, "for the first time, the major carcinogens and cancer-causing agents in tobacco products, which researchers call tobacco-specific nitrosamines [TSNAs], were found in higher levels in US cigarettes than in cigarettes from" three other countries.
Before reaching that conclusion, the "CDC team enlisted 126 regular smokers in Australia, Canada, Britain and, in the US, in New York and Minnesota," the Los Angeles Times (6/1, Maugh) "Booster Shots" blog reported. "All smoked one brand routinely, typically the most popular brands in their country." Minnesotans "smoked Marlboro, Newport, Marlboro Light and Camel Light, while those in New York smoked Marlboro, Newport, Newport Light, Camel Light and Marlboro Menthol." The researchers "focused on the most lethal carcinogen in the tobacco smoke, 4-(methylnitrosoamino)-1-(3-pyridyl)-1-butanone (NNK), and its primary metabolite in urine, known informally as NNAL."