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Adopting lessons from the Tobacco Playbook Why1 #351113 The tobacco industry had a playbook, a script, that emphasized personal responsibility, paying scientists who delivered research that instilled doubt, criticizing the “junk” science that found harms associated with smoking, making self-regulatory pledges, lobbying with massive resources to stifle government action, introducing “safer” products, and simultaneously manipulating and denying both the addictive nature of their products and their marketing to children. | From Dorfman et al: "Tobacco companies launched CSR campaigns to rehabilitate themselves with the public when their image had been tarnished [20]. Because the most comprehensive initiatives were introduced well after intense public outcry, however, their CSR efforts struggled to achieve their aims [42]. As soda denormalization is nascent, soda companies may enjoy benefits from CSR that Big Tobacco labored to accomplish. In addition to effectively preempting regulation and maintaining its favorable position with the public, the soda industry's CSR tactics may also entice today's young people to become brand-loyal lifetime consumers, an outcome that current social norms dictate Big Tobacco cannot explicitly seek. Without sustained denormalization of soda, it will be harder for public health advocates to see why partnering with industry may further the companies' goals more than their own. While tobacco denormalization was facilitated by litigation, which used the discovery process to procure internal documents revealing the industry's duplicitous intent, it is possible to respond to the soda industry without a “smoking gun.” For example, one instance of tobacco industry denormalization that did not rely on internal documents was the revelation that PM spent more on publicizing its charitable efforts than it spent on the charities itself, which exposed the cynical nature of Big Tobacco's CSR [114]. The Refresh Project's $20 million price tag, and the statements from company representatives, give public health advocates a similar opportunity to argue that this is marketing, not philanthropy [115]. Such criticism appeared in a Lancet editorial, which stated that the U.K.'s Change4Life should have avoided “ill-judged partnerships with companies that fuel obesity” [116]. Research on the health harms of sugary beverages can help advocates name these products as one of the “biggest culprits” [117] behind the obesity crisis. Emerging science on the addictiveness [118] and toxicity [119] of sugar, especially when combined with the known addictive properties of caffeine found in many sugary beverages, should further heighten awareness of the product's public health threat similar to the understanding about the addictiveness of tobacco products. Public health advocates must continue to monitor the CSR activities of soda companies, and remind the public and policymakers that, similar to Big Tobacco, soda industry CSR aims to position the companies, and their products, as socially acceptable rather than contributing to a social ill." |
+Citations (11) - CitationsAdd new citationList by: CiterankMapLink[1] The perils of ignoring history: Big Tobacco played dirty and millions died. How similar is Big Food?
Author: Kelly D. Brownell, Kenneth E. Warner Publication info: 2009 – Milbank Quarterly 87: 259–294 Cited by: David Price 9:07 AM 26 August 2014 GMT
Citerank: (7) 351042Strategies of some companies are fuelling the obesity crisisSome companies and industries are fuelling the obesity crisis, through a variety of strategies that prioritise profitability and corporate brand value over public health, and, in the process, externalise significant costs.555CD992, 351336Insufficient countervailing checks to oligopoly in food supply chainsThe majority of what most people eat is driven increasingly by the production and distribution decisions of a few multinational food companies, whose oligopolistic interest are not necessarily aligned with the public health interest. Successive governments have failed to establish sufficient countervailing public policy measures to ensure that, where these interests are not aligned, the oligopolistic interests of the companies don't impact negatively on public health.555CD992, 368179Production and marketing choices favour profit over diet optimisationDecisions made by many food and beverage companies tend to be shaped more by the immediate corporate financial interests of shareholders (and the associated interests of corporate officers) rather than the social goal of achieving optimal human diets; as reflected in, for example, the production and marketing a high volume of low-cost, highly processed foods that are rich in sugar, salt, and saturated fats.555CD992, 399888Strategies of some companies are fuelling the obesity crisisSome companies and industries are fuelling the obesity crisis, through a variety of strategies that prioritise profitability and corporate brand value over public health, and, in the process, externalise significant costs.555CD992, 399895Production and marketing choices favour profit over diet optimisationDecisions made by many food and beverage companies tend to be shaped more by the immediate corporate financial interests of shareholders (and the associated interests of corporate officers) rather than the social goal of achieving optimal human diets; as reflected in, for example, the production and marketing a high volume of low-cost, highly processed foods that are rich in sugar, salt, and saturated fats.555CD992, 399901Insufficient countervailing checks to oligopoly in food supply chainsThe majority of what most people eat is driven increasingly by the production and distribution decisions of a few multinational food companies, whose oligopolistic interest are not necessarily aligned with the public health interest. Successive governments have failed to establish sufficient countervailing public policy measures to ensure that, where these interests are not aligned, the oligopolistic interests of the companies don't impact negatively on public health.555CD992, 399915Adopting lessons from the Tobacco PlaybookThe tobacco industry had a playbook, a script, that emphasized personal responsibility, paying scientists who delivered research that instilled doubt, criticizing the “junk” science that found harms associated with smoking, making self-regulatory pledges, lobbying with massive resources to stifle government action, introducing “safer” products, and simultaneously manipulating and denying both the addictive nature of their products and their marketing to children.555CD992 URL:
| Excerpt / Summary Context: In 1954 the tobacco industry paid to publish the “Frank Statement to Cigarette Smokers” in hundreds of U.S. newspapers. It stated that the public's health was the industry's concern above all others and promised a variety of good-faith changes. What followed were decades of deceit and actions that cost millions of lives. In the hope that the food history will be written differently, this article both highlights important lessons that can be learned from the tobacco experience and recommends actions for the food industry.
Methods: A review and analysis of empirical and historical evidence pertaining to tobacco and food industry practices, messages, and strategies to influence public opinion, legislation and regulation, litigation, and the conduct of science.
Findings: The tobacco industry had a playbook, a script, that emphasized personal responsibility, paying scientists who delivered research that instilled doubt, criticizing the “junk” science that found harms associated with smoking, making self-regulatory pledges, lobbying with massive resources to stifle government action, introducing “safer” products, and simultaneously manipulating and denying both the addictive nature of their products and their marketing to children. The script of the food industry is both similar to and different from the tobacco industry script.
Conclusions: Food is obviously different from tobacco, and the food industry differs from tobacco companies in important ways, but there also are significant similarities in the actions that these industries have taken in response to concern that their products cause harm. Because obesity is now a major global problem, the world cannot afford a repeat of the tobacco history, in which industry talks about the moral high ground but does not occupy it. |
Link[2] Stalking the wily multinational: power and control in the US food system
Author: Thomas A. Lyson, Annalisa Lewis Raymer Publication info: 2000 – Agric Human Values 17: 199–208 Cited by: David Price 9:28 AM 26 August 2014 GMT
Citerank: (7) 351042Strategies of some companies are fuelling the obesity crisisSome companies and industries are fuelling the obesity crisis, through a variety of strategies that prioritise profitability and corporate brand value over public health, and, in the process, externalise significant costs.555CD992, 351336Insufficient countervailing checks to oligopoly in food supply chainsThe majority of what most people eat is driven increasingly by the production and distribution decisions of a few multinational food companies, whose oligopolistic interest are not necessarily aligned with the public health interest. Successive governments have failed to establish sufficient countervailing public policy measures to ensure that, where these interests are not aligned, the oligopolistic interests of the companies don't impact negatively on public health.555CD992, 368179Production and marketing choices favour profit over diet optimisationDecisions made by many food and beverage companies tend to be shaped more by the immediate corporate financial interests of shareholders (and the associated interests of corporate officers) rather than the social goal of achieving optimal human diets; as reflected in, for example, the production and marketing a high volume of low-cost, highly processed foods that are rich in sugar, salt, and saturated fats.555CD992, 399888Strategies of some companies are fuelling the obesity crisisSome companies and industries are fuelling the obesity crisis, through a variety of strategies that prioritise profitability and corporate brand value over public health, and, in the process, externalise significant costs.555CD992, 399895Production and marketing choices favour profit over diet optimisationDecisions made by many food and beverage companies tend to be shaped more by the immediate corporate financial interests of shareholders (and the associated interests of corporate officers) rather than the social goal of achieving optimal human diets; as reflected in, for example, the production and marketing a high volume of low-cost, highly processed foods that are rich in sugar, salt, and saturated fats.555CD992, 399901Insufficient countervailing checks to oligopoly in food supply chainsThe majority of what most people eat is driven increasingly by the production and distribution decisions of a few multinational food companies, whose oligopolistic interest are not necessarily aligned with the public health interest. Successive governments have failed to establish sufficient countervailing public policy measures to ensure that, where these interests are not aligned, the oligopolistic interests of the companies don't impact negatively on public health.555CD992, 399915Adopting lessons from the Tobacco PlaybookThe tobacco industry had a playbook, a script, that emphasized personal responsibility, paying scientists who delivered research that instilled doubt, criticizing the “junk” science that found harms associated with smoking, making self-regulatory pledges, lobbying with massive resources to stifle government action, introducing “safer” products, and simultaneously manipulating and denying both the addictive nature of their products and their marketing to children.555CD992 URL:
| Excerpt / Summary The ten largest food and beverage corporations control over half of the food sales in the United States and their share may be increasing.Using data from a range of secondary sources, we examine these corporations and their boards of directors. Social and demographic characteristics of board members gleaned from corporate reports, the business press, and elsewhere are presented.Information on interlocking corporate directorates and other common ties among members of the boards of directors show that US based food and beverage corporations are tied together through a web of indirect interlocks. |
Link[3] Tobacco and obesity epidemics: Not so different after all?
Author: M. Chopra, I. Damton-Hill Publication info: 2004, BMJ 328: 1558–1560 Cited by: David Price 10:56 AM 26 August 2014 GMT Citerank: (1) 399915Adopting lessons from the Tobacco PlaybookThe tobacco industry had a playbook, a script, that emphasized personal responsibility, paying scientists who delivered research that instilled doubt, criticizing the “junk” science that found harms associated with smoking, making self-regulatory pledges, lobbying with massive resources to stifle government action, introducing “safer” products, and simultaneously manipulating and denying both the addictive nature of their products and their marketing to children.555CD992 URL: | Excerpt / Summary Smoking and obesity are two of the most important global health risk factors. Extensive evidence is available on the broader global determinants of tobacco consumption such as trade liberalisation,1 the global marketing of tobacco,2 and smuggling.3 This has led to a comprehensive response from the global public health community, culminating in the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. At first glance the consumption of food is very different from that of tobacco. After all, food is not a deadly product and people need to eat every day to satisfy basic physiological requirements. Perhaps this is why the public health response to overnutrition has been largely based on the need for individuals to change their behaviour. But this approach is generally ineffective.4 We argue that an analysis of the broader global determinants of overnutrition will lead to a more comprehensive and effective global response. |
Link[4] Soda and Tobacco Industry Corporate Social Responsibility Campaigns: How Do They Compare?
Author: Lori Dorfman, Andrew Cheyne, Lissy C. Friedman, Asiya Wadud, Mark Gottlieb Publication info: 2012 June, 19 Cited by: David Price 2:42 PM 26 August 2014 GMT Citerank: (4) 351120The addictiveness of sugarSome companies are harnessing the addictiveness of sugar for commercial benefit and to the detriment of public health. Emerging science on the addictiveness and toxicity of sugar, especially when combined with the known addictive properties of caffeine found in many sugary beverages, points to a large-scale public health threat similar to addictiveness and harmful impacts of tobacco products.62C78C9A, 368181Exploiting the addictiveness of sugarSome companies are exploiting the addictiveness of sugar to boost profitability. Emerging science on the addictiveness and toxicity of sugar, especially when combined with the known addictive properties of caffeine found in many sugary beverages, should further heighten awareness of the product's public health threat similar to the understanding about the addictiveness of tobacco products.555CD992, 399915Adopting lessons from the Tobacco PlaybookThe tobacco industry had a playbook, a script, that emphasized personal responsibility, paying scientists who delivered research that instilled doubt, criticizing the “junk” science that found harms associated with smoking, making self-regulatory pledges, lobbying with massive resources to stifle government action, introducing “safer” products, and simultaneously manipulating and denying both the addictive nature of their products and their marketing to children.555CD992, 399946The addictiveness of sugarSome companies are harnessing the addictiveness of sugar for commercial benefit and to the detriment of public health. Emerging science on the addictiveness and toxicity of sugar, especially when combined with the known addictive properties of caffeine found in many sugary beverages, points to a large-scale public health threat similar to addictiveness and harmful impacts of tobacco products.62C78C9A URL:
| Excerpt / Summary Summary
> Because sugary beverages are implicated in the global obesity crisis, major soda manufacturers have recently employed elaborate, expensive, multinational corporate social responsibility (CSR) campaigns.
> These campaigns echo the tobacco industry's use of CSR as a means to focus responsibility on consumers rather than on the corporation, bolster the companies' and their products' popularity, and to prevent regulation.
> In response to health concerns about their products, soda companies appear to have launched comprehensive CSR initiatives sooner than did tobacco companies.
> Unlike tobacco CSR campaigns, soda company CSR campaigns explicitly aim to increase sales, including among young people.
> As they did with tobacco, public health advocates need to counter industry CSR with strong denormalization campaigns to educate the public and policymakers about the effects of soda CSR campaigns and the social ills caused by sugary beverages. |
Link[6] TobaccoTactics
Author: Tobacco Control Research Group, University of Bath Cited by: David Price 8:18 PM 26 August 2014 GMT Citerank: (1) 399915Adopting lessons from the Tobacco PlaybookThe tobacco industry had a playbook, a script, that emphasized personal responsibility, paying scientists who delivered research that instilled doubt, criticizing the “junk” science that found harms associated with smoking, making self-regulatory pledges, lobbying with massive resources to stifle government action, introducing “safer” products, and simultaneously manipulating and denying both the addictive nature of their products and their marketing to children.555CD992 URL: | Excerpt / Summary TobaccoTactics is a unique academic resource that explores how the tobacco industry influences policy and public health in the UK, the EU, and internationally.
The site details the tactics and techniques the tobacco industry and its allies employ to stall tobacco control measures, such as the introduction of plain packaging in the UK or Australia. It explores topical health issues too: the growing involvement of the industry in promoting e-cigarettes for instance, or its complicity in tobacco smuggling.
TobaccoTactics also contains profiles of people, organisations and allies of the tobacco industry, charting their involvement in the smoking and health debate. This is important as the industry often uses supposedly-independent third parties to lobby politicians or to push its message in the media. |
Link[7] Profits and pandemics: prevention of harmful effects of tobacco, alcohol, and ultra-processed food and drink industries
Author: Rob Moodie, David Stuckler, Carlos Monteiro, Nick Sheron, - Bruce Neal, Thaksaphon Thamarangsi, Paul Lincoln, Sally Casswell, on behalf of The Lancet NCD Action Group Publication info: 2013 February, 12 Cited by: David Price 0:49 AM 11 December 2014 GMT Citerank: (5) 351042Strategies of some companies are fuelling the obesity crisisSome companies and industries are fuelling the obesity crisis, through a variety of strategies that prioritise profitability and corporate brand value over public health, and, in the process, externalise significant costs.555CD992, 351043Public health interventions are often resistedEvidence suggests that, for example, some food and beverage companies are adopting similar tactics to those adopted earlier by the tobacco companies to avoid public health interventions (such as taxation and regulation) that might threaten their profits.555CD992, 399888Strategies of some companies are fuelling the obesity crisisSome companies and industries are fuelling the obesity crisis, through a variety of strategies that prioritise profitability and corporate brand value over public health, and, in the process, externalise significant costs.555CD992, 399894Public health interventions are often resistedEvidence suggests that, for example, some food and beverage companies are adopting similar tactics to those adopted earlier by the tobacco companies to avoid public health interventions (such as taxation and regulation) that might threaten their profits.555CD992, 399915Adopting lessons from the Tobacco PlaybookThe tobacco industry had a playbook, a script, that emphasized personal responsibility, paying scientists who delivered research that instilled doubt, criticizing the “junk” science that found harms associated with smoking, making self-regulatory pledges, lobbying with massive resources to stifle government action, introducing “safer” products, and simultaneously manipulating and denying both the addictive nature of their products and their marketing to children.555CD992 URL:
| Excerpt / Summary The 2011 UN high-level meeting on non-communicable diseases (NCDs) called for multisectoral action including with the private sector and industry. However, through the sale and promotion of tobacco, alcohol, and ultra-processed food and drink (unhealthy commodities), transnational corporations are major drivers of global epidemics of NCDs. What role then should these industries have in NCD prevention and control? We emphasise the rise in sales of these unhealthy commodities in low-income and middle-income countries, and consider the common strategies that the transnational corporations use to undermine NCD prevention and control. We assess the effectiveness of self-regulation, public–private partnerships, and public regulation models of interaction with these industries and conclude that unhealthy commodity industries should have no role in the formation of national or international NCD policy. Despite the common reliance on industry self-regulation and public–private partnerships, there is no evidence of their effectiveness or safety. Public regulation and market intervention are the only evidence-based mechanisms to prevent harm caused by the unhealthy commodity industries.
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Link[8] The Whitecoat Project
Author: Sourcewatch Cited by: David Price 1:16 AM 11 December 2014 GMT Citerank: (1) 399915Adopting lessons from the Tobacco PlaybookThe tobacco industry had a playbook, a script, that emphasized personal responsibility, paying scientists who delivered research that instilled doubt, criticizing the “junk” science that found harms associated with smoking, making self-regulatory pledges, lobbying with massive resources to stifle government action, introducing “safer” products, and simultaneously manipulating and denying both the addictive nature of their products and their marketing to children.555CD992 URL:
| Excerpt / Summary The Whitecoat Project was a Philip Morris-led global effort to create and maintain a controversy about the health effects of environmental tobacco smoke (ETS). The end goals of the project were to "resist and roll back smoking restrictions" and "restore smoker confidence." Prerequisites to achieve these goals included "reversing scientific and popular misconception that ETS is harmful" and "restoring social acceptability of smoking." The program consisted of proactive and reactive elements. The "proactive element" was generating a body of scientific literature supporting PM's views that ETS is not harmful and disseminating that information in target markets, and the "reactive element" was to "provide scientific and technical resources to challenge existing laws; to counter specific legislative and regulatory threats; and to respond to scientific mis-information and bias as it arises in these markets." The initial project leader was Helmut Gaisch of PM Science and Technology in Neuchatel, Switzerland. [1] "Scientific misinformation" and "bias" referred to any scientific viewpoints that did not support PM's marketing goals. |
Link[9] Manufacturing Uncertainty
Author: Britt E. Erickson Publication info: 2008 November, 17 Cited by: David Price 1:19 AM 11 December 2014 GMT Citerank: (1) 399915Adopting lessons from the Tobacco PlaybookThe tobacco industry had a playbook, a script, that emphasized personal responsibility, paying scientists who delivered research that instilled doubt, criticizing the “junk” science that found harms associated with smoking, making self-regulatory pledges, lobbying with massive resources to stifle government action, introducing “safer” products, and simultaneously manipulating and denying both the addictive nature of their products and their marketing to children.555CD992 URL:
| Excerpt / Summary With names like the Center for Consumer Freedom, Foundation for Clean Air Progress, International Society for Regulatory Toxicology & Pharmacology, and Council on Water Quality, you might think these groups are out to protect public health and the environment. Think again, says David Michaels, an epidemiologist at the George Washington University School of Public Health & Health Services and author of the book “Doubt is Their Product: How Industry's Assault on Science Threatens Your Health.
These organizations and many other front groups like them are paid for by industry and exist for the sole purpose of creating uncertainty in scientific debates, Michaels asserts. In his book, Michaels reveals the prevalence of such product defense groups. He also points out that several of the players behind them are the same ones who defended the tobacco industry beginning in the 1950s.
The book is a shocking portrayal of the tactics used by corporate America to delay public health and environmental regulation of their products for the sake of profit. Although a bit overwhelming at times, it is a must-read for anyone interested in public health and environmental protection. |
Link[10] Smoking and Health Proposal
Author: Brown & Williamson Publication info: 1969 Cited by: David Price 1:21 AM 11 December 2014 GMT Citerank: (1) 399915Adopting lessons from the Tobacco PlaybookThe tobacco industry had a playbook, a script, that emphasized personal responsibility, paying scientists who delivered research that instilled doubt, criticizing the “junk” science that found harms associated with smoking, making self-regulatory pledges, lobbying with massive resources to stifle government action, introducing “safer” products, and simultaneously manipulating and denying both the addictive nature of their products and their marketing to children.555CD992 URL: | Excerpt / Summary This 1969 Brown & Williamson (B&W) document discusses using cigarette advertising to "counter the anti-cigarette forces" by including defensive editorial text in the ads. The document states, "Doubt is our product, since it is the best means of competing with the 'body of fact' [linking smoking with disease] that exists in the mind of the general public. It is also the means of establishing a controversy...if we are successful in establishing a controversy at the public level, there is an opportunity to put across the real facts about smoking and health." |
Link[11] Using the tobacco fear to police our lives
Author: Rob Lyons Publication info: 2014 May, 26 Cited by: David Price 1:24 AM 3 January 2015 GMT Citerank: (1) 399915Adopting lessons from the Tobacco PlaybookThe tobacco industry had a playbook, a script, that emphasized personal responsibility, paying scientists who delivered research that instilled doubt, criticizing the “junk” science that found harms associated with smoking, making self-regulatory pledges, lobbying with massive resources to stifle government action, introducing “safer” products, and simultaneously manipulating and denying both the addictive nature of their products and their marketing to children.555CD992 URL:
| Excerpt / Summary Tobacco, the king of public-health scares, has spawned a cottage industry of copycat panics about just about everything under the sun (plus the sun itself). But we don’t live in a particularly deadly era – we live longer, healthier lives than ever. What these promiscuous comparisons with tobacco show is just how fearful we have become of even the most trivial health or environmental threat, with academics, campaigners and politicians all willing to play on that fear to further their own ends. |
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