The 4th European Conference Tobacco or Health 2007 conference was held in Basel, Switzerland on 11-13 October 2007. The conference concluded with the ECToH 2007 Resolution.

The Towards a Smoke-free Society Conference was held in Edinburgh on 10-11 September 2007. The conference concluded with the Edinburgh Statement.

The presentations are available on the conference website.

These key recommendations to achieve comprehensive smoke-free legislation were endorsed at the European Strategy Meeting on the Implementation of Smoke-free Policies in Europe in Limassol, Cyprus on 13 April 2005.

Tobacco products themselves are dangerous to health. It is the exposure to the entity that determines its harmfulness, not only qualities or quantities of individual components. Tobacco smoke is a carcinogen and a toxic product per se, we are concerned that the Directive is concentrating on the toxicology data. The product is toxic and, while some additives may add to the overall toxicity, in some countries like Canada, where few, if any, additives are used, the toxicity of the product is high.

On 12.02.02 the Council of the European Union adopted Directive 2002/10/EC as regards the structure and rates of excise duty applied on manufactured tobacco setting i.a. the required incidence of excise duty on the retail selling price of cigarettes at 57% and establishing that the overall minimum excise duty shall not be less than € 64 per 1000 cigarettes of the price category most in demand from 01.07.06. In accordance with the 2002 Directive the European Commission is obliged to publish a review of the tobacco excise rules by the end of 2006. This position paper welcomes the review and supports higher taxes on all tobacco products in the EU.

Tobacco products themselves are dangerous to health. It is the exposure to the entity that determines its harmfulness, not only qualities or quantities of individual components. Evaluating safety of tobacco products based on their additives in the REACH regulation is not meaningful. The request to have a complete evaluation of additives creates confusion and covers over the evidence that tobacco smoke is a carcinogen and a toxic product in itself.