Globalisation:Democracy Institue:Tobacco

The Democracy Institute on Tobacco

Patrick Basham and John Luik

Patrick Basham is the founding director of the Democracy Institute and John Luik is a senior fellow of the Democracy Institute and a consultant and adviser to tobacco companies. Collectively, they have produced several documents and papers which challenge the accepted assertions about the effects of tobacco and smoking. These include the public smoking bans and the alleged health risks associated with passive smoking, tobacco pricing and advertising and the ineffectiveness of graphic warnings.

Public Smoking Bans

A ban on smoking in all public spaces was implemented in the UK in 2007. Dr Patrick Basham and Dr Juliet Roberts examine the rationale behind the public smoking ban in their paper 'Are Public Smoking Bans Necessary?' in attempt to argue that the ban is not necessary.

The claim that the health of all non-smokers is at risk through environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) or passive smoke is the most significant justification for the smoking ban and is criticized by Basham and Roberts on the grounds that the methodology of studies carried out to measure the effects of passive smoking is problematic. Fellow Tobacco Industry Consultant, Dr Gio Batta Gori identifies the ‘measurement problem’ which refers to how these studies are not based on actual measurements of exposure but on recall studies, which he claims to be unreliable.

Basham and Roberts also identify a second problem with this claim, stating: “these studies are plagued by sampling errors, confounders, biases and misclassification of smoking status” and also assert that there are numerous other possible causes for heart disease and lung cancer. The claim is also made that several governmental and public health agencies undermine the notion that passive smoke is a serious health risk to non-smokers as studies such as the 1992 Environmental Protection Agency report have been rejected and nullified by the US District Court and other reports have failed to find a statically significant link between ETS and lung cancer based on exposure during childhood.

Basham and Roberts identify that the number of cigarettes consumed by males amongst the lowest socio-economic groups - which account for some of the highest smoking rates - actually increased since the smoking ban and that 30% of smokers said the ban had only encouraged them to stay at home and smoke where they were free to do so . They cite that in the state of Ohio, smoking prevalence increased by 3% since similar legislation was introduced in 2006. In France, there was no change in tobacco consumption in spite of the implementation of a ban and, in Spain, tobacco consumption has apparently increased also since their public smoking ban . Yet the sources of these figures are unclear, citing only one reference from the 'Daily Mail' newspaper. Basham and Roberts argue that smoking bans are “built on a foundation of ignorance rather than knowledge” and also that these bans don’t necessarily motivate people to give up smoking. Basham and Luik, in their paper 'NYC: The City That Never Smokes' (2009), state that it has been confirmed that public smoking bans are not about damaging the health of passive smokers as claimed, but actually about stigmatizing smoking and also draw upon NHS evidence which indicates that the smoking ban has had no affect on smoking rates.

Cigarette Pricing and Advertising

The appearance of cigarette brands in advertising and in public entertainment media continues to be a topic of much concern based on the common belief that this contributes to the occurrence of youth smoking. Patrick Basham, in his paper 'An Absense of Tobacco Evidence' (2009), challenges the claims that tobacco advertising is a major reason why young people take up smoking and that tobacco pricing will discourage young people from buying cigarettes, claiming these arguments are not viable on the basis of a lack of evidence to support these claims. He proposes that the government should base smoking related policies on evidence rather than speculation and inaccurate views.

Tobacco policy has placed a ban on tobacco advertising and tobacco has been heavily taxed in attempt to reduce the number of under-age smokers. Basham contests this however, stating: "large independent studies have failed to find a statistically significant connection between tobacco advertising, consumption and youth smoking" . Basham notes that the lack of evidence is confirmed in the fact that tobacco advertising bans in countries for the past twenty five years has not resulted in a decline in the smoking patterns in young people. Also, based on the assertion that smoking is an addictive habit, the incline in tobacco prices, they argue, will have no effect. Conversely, John Luik, in the paper '"I Can't Help Myself": Addiction as Ideology' funded by the Niagara Institute, argues that the claim that smoking is addictive is ideological and is an "explicit attempt to change how it is that we both conceive and regulate smoking". However, public health advocates insist that advertising does influence young peoples' decision to take up smoking. It is argued by the democracy institute that most youths do not begin their smoking habits through the purchase of cigarettes, but through experimentation accessed by sampling those already purchased by friends of family.

Graphic Warnings

Luik argues that warnings on products are ineffective based on a number of problems. The first is that people often do not notice such warnings because they find them irrelevant or uninteresting. The second is that people generally tend to ignore information that has negative associations. Thirdly, he claims that people tend to exempt themselves from the possibility of the thing being warned about happening to them and finally, what Luik refers to as 'warning fatigue' where the over use of warnings diminishes its effectiveness. With regards to tobacco, Luik identifies the failings of graphic warnings on tobacco products - first introduced in Canada in 2001 in order to "increase smokers' awareness of the risks associated with smoking, discourage young people from starting to smoke, and reduce smoking prevalence and consumption by both young people and adults" . Showing stark images of smoking related health risks, the theory is that these images will solve the problem of warning fatigue and indifference by presenting the information in a fear-arousing way which cannot be overlooked. Images of diseased hearts, lungs and mouths are displayed on cigarette packaging based on the premise of the more shocking the better in attempt to change behavior. However, Luik argues, in the paper "A picture of Health? Why Graphic Warnings Don't Work" funded by Imperial Tobacco Group PLC, that these warnings do not work and are actually counterproductive as they can encourage mischief on the part of the smoker.

Philip Morris USA

Philip Morris is the largest tobacco company in the USA. In 1999, Phillip Morris led the "Project Whitecoat", which involved the recruitment of scientists or "whitecoats" to challenge the harmful effects passive smoking 'supposedly' causes to health One key player in this project was tobacco industry consultant John Luik. In the document “Proposal for the Organisation of the Whitecoat Project” they state they aim to attempt to "reverse scientific and popular misconception that ETS is harmful" and "restore social acceptability of smoking" . On their website, however, Phillip Morris provide a link for help to quit smoking as well as a section on health issues associated with smoking which states that they: "agree with the overwhelming consensus that cigarette smoking causes lung cancer, heart disease, emphysema and other serious diseases" . This highlights the contradictory nature of the tobacco industry, as on the one hand they want to promote their product and on the other hand they have to comply with government legislation. The way they get around such legislation is by recruiting scientists such as Gio Gori and consultants such as John Luik to write papers which dispute certain plicies and the effects of tobacco through their funding.

Documents produced by Tobacco Companies, such as "Project Whitecoat", have been made accessible via The Tobacco Archives, which were established to make information available to the public online and provide access to millions of tobacco company documents produced in US litigation concerning public smoking and health. The archives include links toPhilip Morris USA inc. Document Site, RJ Reynolds Tobacco Company Document Site and The Tobacco Institute Document Site.

Funding

Most of the documents produced by authors associated with the Democracy Institute are funded by tobacco companies themselves. Counter claims that the Democracy Institute make against certain tobacco policy have been contested on the basis of their biased position in relation to the tobacco industry itself. The underlying theme however, across the majority of their attacks on tobacco regulation, is that in a democratic society stigmatization and restrictions or exclusions on smoking - a legal activity - is not justifiable.