Western tobacco companies remain the worst
Plain cigarette packaging a hit with anti-smoking advocates, but debate about whether it works continues
Australia implemented plain packaging in 2012 - some say it reduced smoking rates, but others disagree
Rob Cunningham, senior policy advisor for the Canadian Cancer Society, holds up a proposed standardized cigarette package. The federal government is holding public consultations to develop new regulations on cigarette packaging. (Adrian Wyld/Canadian Press)
--------------------
Anti-smoking advocates who support the [Canadian] Liberal government's proposal to require plain packaging on tobacco products argue that Australia's implementation of similar regulations has had a significant effect on smoking rates in that country.
"Australia has seen the biggest decline in smoking prevalence that they've ever recorded after plain packing [was introduced]," said David Hammond, an associate professor of public health and health systems at the University of Waterloo. "All the data we have suggest that plain packing has reduced smoking in Australia."
Health Canada will hold public consultations on plain tobacco packages
Federal government moves ahead on plain packaging for cigarettes
Rob Cunningham, senior policy analyst for the Canadian Cancer Society, agrees and says research supports the effectiveness of plain packaging.
"If it wasn't effective, the tobacco companies wouldn't be so strongly opposed," he said. "And it's precisely because it's going to have an effect on sales that they are going to lobby hard against it, threaten legal cases."
But not everyone believes that Australia's policy of imposing bland tobacco branding has done much to deter smoking, which has been steadily declining for decades, according to Julian Morris, vice-president of research at the libertarian think tank the Reason Foundation.
"The decline in smoking seems to have been continuous and not dramatically effected, one way or the other, by the introduction of plain packaging," he said.
Three-month consultations
On Tuesday, the Canadian government announced it would hold three months of public consultations on the proposed plain-packaging requirements, which would regulate size and shape and require a uniform colour and font. The idea is that the removal of logos, colours and images from packaging makes tobacco products less appealing, in particular, to youth.
At right, Australian cigarette packages after plain packaging was introduced in that country. On the left are what the packages used to look like before the new law. The new packaging regulations also standardize the size and shape of the packages, eliminating 'superslim' and 'lipstick' packages meant to appeal to young women. (David Hammond/University of Waterloo)
----------------------------
It's a move that's being hailed by Canadian health groups like the Heart and Stroke Foundation and the Canadian Cancer Society, as well as by the World Health Organization.
Although other countries like the United Kingdom and France have begun the process of bringing in plain packaging rules, so far, only Australia has fully implemented them.
The country introduced the regulations in December 2012, and according to Australian health officials, they're working.
"[The] tobacco plain packaging measure is having an impact by reducing the appeal of tobacco products, increasing the effectiveness of health warnings and reducing the ability of the pack to mislead," the Australian health department claims on its website.
"The studies also provide early evidence of positive changes to actual smoking and quitting behaviours."
The website cites Tasneem Chipty, an econometric analyst who examined data from a series of surveys. Chipty found that the packaging changes accounted for a decline in smoking prevalence of 0.55 percentage points by September 2015 and 108,228 fewer smokers.
Tobacco company rejects analysis
But Eric Gagnon, a spokesman for Imperial Tobacco Canada, rejected that analysis, arguing that the rate of decline hasn't accelerated since the introduction of plain packaging.
There's no evidence that people start or stop smoking because of the packaging they see on a carton of cigarettes, but there is evidence that kids start smoking mostly because of peer pressure, he said.
Meanwhile, Morris pointed to reviews conducted by economic professors Sinclair Davidson and Ashton de Silva from RMIT University in Melbourne who said there was no evidence to support the notion that the plain packaging policy has resulted in lower household expenditure on tobacco.
Davidson and de Silva also claimed that the analysis conducted by the Australian government of the effectiveness of plain packaging "fails on a number of criteria, including independence, transparency, replication and rigour."
Morris said other factors could account for the decrease in Australian smoking rates, including the rise in the price of cigarettes, which were hit with a tax around the same time plain packaging was introduced.
"We do know that, historically, public information about the harms of smoking on health as well as significant increases in the price of cigarettes do reduce consumption," he said.
He said it's difficult to untangle the effects of historic restrictions on advertising, public information campaigns, cigarette taxes and graphic warning labels.
"That's not to say [packaging] had no effect on cigarette consumption. It's just that it's difficult to discern," Morris said.
There's also been an increase in the number of illegal cigarettes consumed in Australia, he said.
However, Chipty took many of those variables into consideration when analyzing the data.
It's difficult to say how much the decrease in smoking rates in Australia can be attributed to plain packaging, but Cunningham said that after the new rules came into force, calls to quit-smoking help lines increased, and surveys showed smokers were more likely to want to quit and try to quit and were less likely to buy cigarettes because of the packaging.
"It was certainly one of the main factors in those historic declines," he said.
SOURCE 1.
[There is a slideshow, which includes examples of the stomach churning images put on cigarette packaging around the world (i.e. just go to the page and scroll down, if you dare).]
--------------------------
OP wonders about the funding of the sources cited by the tobacco lobby. Sourcewatch.org has some very interesting things to say about the Reason Foundation's funding anyways (including an donations from Philip Morris).
The second article shows one way in which western tobacco comparnies have 'branched out', since youth smoking (i.e. the vast majority of people who become regular smokers begin smoking before the age of 25).
--------------------------
Big tobacco targets the young in poor countries - with deadly consequences
As smoking rates decline in the west, the tobacco industry is pouring marketing resources into developing countries, in particular trying to draw in young people
A young man smokes in the street in Beijing, China. Industry marketing deliberately targets young people, recognising that today’s teenager is tomorrow’s potential customer. Photograph: Kevin Frayer/Getty Images
------------------------------
Tobacco is the only consumer product that kills when used exactly as the manufacturer intends. It does so at an alarming rate - one in two long-term users will eventually be killed by their habit.
While the use of tobacco is declining in higher income countries, elsewhere it continues to increase. Nearly 80% of the world’s one billion smokers now live in low- and middle-income countries, a figure that continues to increase.
It is the tobacco industry’s insidious marketing of its product that fuels this increase in tobacco use. Growing numbers of deaths from tobacco will follow, stifling economic development, with the poorest countries hardest hit.
Evidence shows that tobacco marketing drives the uptake of smoking, especially among young people. While the tobacco industry continues to argue that it only markets to persuade adult smokers to switch brands, overwhelming evidence links the industry’s use of marketing to spiralling rates of tobacco use. Before the Soviet Union opened up to “big tobacco”, very few women smoked. Within 10 years of the major tobacco companies flooding the Russian market with marketing, female smoking rates in Russia had doubled and the age of smoking uptake had fallen.
If this epidemic is to be halted, comprehensive bans on tobacco marketing are essential. One hundred and eighty countries are now legally obliged to implement such bans. They are parties to the World Health Organisation’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC). This global treaty, which came into force 10 years ago, sets out evidence-based tobacco control measures which parties must implement.
Yet the latest evidence shows that tobacco industry marketing remains a significant global problem, particularly for people in the poorest countries who are the most exposed to it. Our study, published this week, examined tobacco marketing across 462 communities in 16 countries. It compared levels of marketing in high-, middle- and low-income countries while accounting for differences in access to television, radio and the internet and in the respondents’ gender, age, education, smoking status and whether they have close friends who smoke.
People living in poorer countries were exposed to significantly more tobacco marketing than those living in affluent countries. In communities in low-income countries, 81 times more tobacco adverts were observed than in high-income countries. People in lower-income countries also reported far higher exposure to tobacco adverts over the previous six months. For example, they were 46 times more likely to hear radio adverts, 11 times more likely to see poster adverts and nine times more likely to see television adverts than those living in high-income countries. Overall, those in low-income countries were almost 10 times more likely to report exposure to at least one form of traditional tobacco marketing.
Access to tobacco was also higher in poorer countries. In low-income countries, we observed two and a half times more stores selling tobacco in the communities in the low-income and lower-middle-income countries than in the high-income countries. Worryingly, 64% of stores visited sold single cigarettes compared with just 2.8% in high-income countries. The availability of single cigarettes is a key means of targeting young smokers who often cannot afford to buy a full pack. It is also outlawed in the WHO’s framework convention.
This high level of marketing in poorer countries is consistent with the tobacco industry’s targeting of these countries. They are key to the industry’s future. In the west, the tobacco industry’s profits continue to increase despite the decline in smoking rates , but it is unclear how long this pricing power will hold out in the face of growing regulations. The requirement for tobacco to be sold in plain packs, due to come into force in the UK next year, is a particular threat.
Of all the world regions, Africa is probably most critical to the long-term future of the tobacco industry. The tobacco epidemic is at its earliest stage in Africa, meaning the industry still has millions of potential customers to recruit. Marketing will drive this recruitment, and industry marketing deliberately targets children, recognising that today’s teenager is tomorrow’s potential regular customer.
It is depressing that 10 years after the framework convention came into force, tobacco marketing remains ubiquitous. Evidence shows that the FCTC has led to significant progress in other areas of tobacco control but that comprehensive bans on marketing are one of the treaty’s least adopted measures. A concerted effort is needed to implement and enforce marketing restrictions before millions more die needlessly. Holding the tobacco industry to account is an essential first step.
SOURCE 2.
----------------------------
Additional links:
-A Growing Gulf in the Terrain of Tobacco Control (i.e. editorial at the medical journal 'The Lancet'). Discusses the inequalities in the world with regards to tobacco and tobacco marketing.
-Implementation of the FCTC in Africa (link is to a free journal article).
-Tobacco increases the poverty of countries (the WHO on this issue).
-Another issue with respect to tobacco production is its effect(s) on the countries where it is produced: Malawi's Forests Going Up In Smoke As Tobacco Industry Takes Heavy Toll. Here is a link to a free journal article on this issue (discusses the negative health and environmental effects of tobacco farming in poor countries). The WHO on this issue.
OP: So... Tobacco companies (especially the western ones) remain the worst: targeting poor countries in this way is shameful.
OP is not here for stigmatizing smokers, though.
Australia implemented plain packaging in 2012 - some say it reduced smoking rates, but others disagree
Rob Cunningham, senior policy advisor for the Canadian Cancer Society, holds up a proposed standardized cigarette package. The federal government is holding public consultations to develop new regulations on cigarette packaging. (Adrian Wyld/Canadian Press)
--------------------
Anti-smoking advocates who support the [Canadian] Liberal government's proposal to require plain packaging on tobacco products argue that Australia's implementation of similar regulations has had a significant effect on smoking rates in that country.
"Australia has seen the biggest decline in smoking prevalence that they've ever recorded after plain packing [was introduced]," said David Hammond, an associate professor of public health and health systems at the University of Waterloo. "All the data we have suggest that plain packing has reduced smoking in Australia."
Health Canada will hold public consultations on plain tobacco packages
Federal government moves ahead on plain packaging for cigarettes
Rob Cunningham, senior policy analyst for the Canadian Cancer Society, agrees and says research supports the effectiveness of plain packaging.
"If it wasn't effective, the tobacco companies wouldn't be so strongly opposed," he said. "And it's precisely because it's going to have an effect on sales that they are going to lobby hard against it, threaten legal cases."
But not everyone believes that Australia's policy of imposing bland tobacco branding has done much to deter smoking, which has been steadily declining for decades, according to Julian Morris, vice-president of research at the libertarian think tank the Reason Foundation.
"The decline in smoking seems to have been continuous and not dramatically effected, one way or the other, by the introduction of plain packaging," he said.
Three-month consultations
On Tuesday, the Canadian government announced it would hold three months of public consultations on the proposed plain-packaging requirements, which would regulate size and shape and require a uniform colour and font. The idea is that the removal of logos, colours and images from packaging makes tobacco products less appealing, in particular, to youth.
At right, Australian cigarette packages after plain packaging was introduced in that country. On the left are what the packages used to look like before the new law. The new packaging regulations also standardize the size and shape of the packages, eliminating 'superslim' and 'lipstick' packages meant to appeal to young women. (David Hammond/University of Waterloo)
----------------------------
It's a move that's being hailed by Canadian health groups like the Heart and Stroke Foundation and the Canadian Cancer Society, as well as by the World Health Organization.
Although other countries like the United Kingdom and France have begun the process of bringing in plain packaging rules, so far, only Australia has fully implemented them.
The country introduced the regulations in December 2012, and according to Australian health officials, they're working.
"[The] tobacco plain packaging measure is having an impact by reducing the appeal of tobacco products, increasing the effectiveness of health warnings and reducing the ability of the pack to mislead," the Australian health department claims on its website.
"The studies also provide early evidence of positive changes to actual smoking and quitting behaviours."
The website cites Tasneem Chipty, an econometric analyst who examined data from a series of surveys. Chipty found that the packaging changes accounted for a decline in smoking prevalence of 0.55 percentage points by September 2015 and 108,228 fewer smokers.
Tobacco company rejects analysis
But Eric Gagnon, a spokesman for Imperial Tobacco Canada, rejected that analysis, arguing that the rate of decline hasn't accelerated since the introduction of plain packaging.
There's no evidence that people start or stop smoking because of the packaging they see on a carton of cigarettes, but there is evidence that kids start smoking mostly because of peer pressure, he said.
Meanwhile, Morris pointed to reviews conducted by economic professors Sinclair Davidson and Ashton de Silva from RMIT University in Melbourne who said there was no evidence to support the notion that the plain packaging policy has resulted in lower household expenditure on tobacco.
Davidson and de Silva also claimed that the analysis conducted by the Australian government of the effectiveness of plain packaging "fails on a number of criteria, including independence, transparency, replication and rigour."
Morris said other factors could account for the decrease in Australian smoking rates, including the rise in the price of cigarettes, which were hit with a tax around the same time plain packaging was introduced.
"We do know that, historically, public information about the harms of smoking on health as well as significant increases in the price of cigarettes do reduce consumption," he said.
He said it's difficult to untangle the effects of historic restrictions on advertising, public information campaigns, cigarette taxes and graphic warning labels.
"That's not to say [packaging] had no effect on cigarette consumption. It's just that it's difficult to discern," Morris said.
There's also been an increase in the number of illegal cigarettes consumed in Australia, he said.
However, Chipty took many of those variables into consideration when analyzing the data.
It's difficult to say how much the decrease in smoking rates in Australia can be attributed to plain packaging, but Cunningham said that after the new rules came into force, calls to quit-smoking help lines increased, and surveys showed smokers were more likely to want to quit and try to quit and were less likely to buy cigarettes because of the packaging.
"It was certainly one of the main factors in those historic declines," he said.
SOURCE 1.
[There is a slideshow, which includes examples of the stomach churning images put on cigarette packaging around the world (i.e. just go to the page and scroll down, if you dare).]
--------------------------
OP wonders about the funding of the sources cited by the tobacco lobby. Sourcewatch.org has some very interesting things to say about the Reason Foundation's funding anyways (including an donations from Philip Morris).
The second article shows one way in which western tobacco comparnies have 'branched out', since youth smoking (i.e. the vast majority of people who become regular smokers begin smoking before the age of 25).
--------------------------
Big tobacco targets the young in poor countries - with deadly consequences
As smoking rates decline in the west, the tobacco industry is pouring marketing resources into developing countries, in particular trying to draw in young people
A young man smokes in the street in Beijing, China. Industry marketing deliberately targets young people, recognising that today’s teenager is tomorrow’s potential customer. Photograph: Kevin Frayer/Getty Images
------------------------------
Tobacco is the only consumer product that kills when used exactly as the manufacturer intends. It does so at an alarming rate - one in two long-term users will eventually be killed by their habit.
While the use of tobacco is declining in higher income countries, elsewhere it continues to increase. Nearly 80% of the world’s one billion smokers now live in low- and middle-income countries, a figure that continues to increase.
It is the tobacco industry’s insidious marketing of its product that fuels this increase in tobacco use. Growing numbers of deaths from tobacco will follow, stifling economic development, with the poorest countries hardest hit.
Evidence shows that tobacco marketing drives the uptake of smoking, especially among young people. While the tobacco industry continues to argue that it only markets to persuade adult smokers to switch brands, overwhelming evidence links the industry’s use of marketing to spiralling rates of tobacco use. Before the Soviet Union opened up to “big tobacco”, very few women smoked. Within 10 years of the major tobacco companies flooding the Russian market with marketing, female smoking rates in Russia had doubled and the age of smoking uptake had fallen.
If this epidemic is to be halted, comprehensive bans on tobacco marketing are essential. One hundred and eighty countries are now legally obliged to implement such bans. They are parties to the World Health Organisation’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC). This global treaty, which came into force 10 years ago, sets out evidence-based tobacco control measures which parties must implement.
Yet the latest evidence shows that tobacco industry marketing remains a significant global problem, particularly for people in the poorest countries who are the most exposed to it. Our study, published this week, examined tobacco marketing across 462 communities in 16 countries. It compared levels of marketing in high-, middle- and low-income countries while accounting for differences in access to television, radio and the internet and in the respondents’ gender, age, education, smoking status and whether they have close friends who smoke.
People living in poorer countries were exposed to significantly more tobacco marketing than those living in affluent countries. In communities in low-income countries, 81 times more tobacco adverts were observed than in high-income countries. People in lower-income countries also reported far higher exposure to tobacco adverts over the previous six months. For example, they were 46 times more likely to hear radio adverts, 11 times more likely to see poster adverts and nine times more likely to see television adverts than those living in high-income countries. Overall, those in low-income countries were almost 10 times more likely to report exposure to at least one form of traditional tobacco marketing.
Access to tobacco was also higher in poorer countries. In low-income countries, we observed two and a half times more stores selling tobacco in the communities in the low-income and lower-middle-income countries than in the high-income countries. Worryingly, 64% of stores visited sold single cigarettes compared with just 2.8% in high-income countries. The availability of single cigarettes is a key means of targeting young smokers who often cannot afford to buy a full pack. It is also outlawed in the WHO’s framework convention.
This high level of marketing in poorer countries is consistent with the tobacco industry’s targeting of these countries. They are key to the industry’s future. In the west, the tobacco industry’s profits continue to increase despite the decline in smoking rates , but it is unclear how long this pricing power will hold out in the face of growing regulations. The requirement for tobacco to be sold in plain packs, due to come into force in the UK next year, is a particular threat.
Of all the world regions, Africa is probably most critical to the long-term future of the tobacco industry. The tobacco epidemic is at its earliest stage in Africa, meaning the industry still has millions of potential customers to recruit. Marketing will drive this recruitment, and industry marketing deliberately targets children, recognising that today’s teenager is tomorrow’s potential regular customer.
It is depressing that 10 years after the framework convention came into force, tobacco marketing remains ubiquitous. Evidence shows that the FCTC has led to significant progress in other areas of tobacco control but that comprehensive bans on marketing are one of the treaty’s least adopted measures. A concerted effort is needed to implement and enforce marketing restrictions before millions more die needlessly. Holding the tobacco industry to account is an essential first step.
SOURCE 2.
----------------------------
Additional links:
-A Growing Gulf in the Terrain of Tobacco Control (i.e. editorial at the medical journal 'The Lancet'). Discusses the inequalities in the world with regards to tobacco and tobacco marketing.
-Implementation of the FCTC in Africa (link is to a free journal article).
-Tobacco increases the poverty of countries (the WHO on this issue).
-Another issue with respect to tobacco production is its effect(s) on the countries where it is produced: Malawi's Forests Going Up In Smoke As Tobacco Industry Takes Heavy Toll. Here is a link to a free journal article on this issue (discusses the negative health and environmental effects of tobacco farming in poor countries). The WHO on this issue.
OP: So... Tobacco companies (especially the western ones) remain the worst: targeting poor countries in this way is shameful.
OP is not here for stigmatizing smokers, though.