Tobacco Money and Medical Research

EDITORIAL

VOLUME 5 • NUMBER 2 • FEBRUARY 1999

Tobacco money and medical research

The Cancer Research Campaign (CRC) has taken a bold stand against the tobacco Globally industry’s attempts to buy respectability • 1.1 billion smokers now; rising to 1.5 billion by 2020 (World Health Organization). by funding research (see page 129). • 3 million smoking-related deaths per year in 1990; rising to 8 million by 2020 (rep- Despite some public support for their resenting 12% of all deaths) (Harvard School of Public Health). stance, the CRC is one of just a few groups • 5 trillion cigarettes sold annually (Salomon Smith Barney). willing to take decisive action against the tobacco industry’s selective involvement the CRC, estimates that 20 British univer- would expect that individuals applying in funding medical research. They deserve sities receive tobacco money. for or holding research funds from the more support from the rest of the bio- With such widespread tobacco funding tobacco industry will not seek support medical research community. of research, it is sad but not surprising to from the Trust.” James Buchanan Duke (born 1856) note little concrete resistance to the prac- It is worrying, however, to learn that joined his family’s North Carolina tice. Surprising because there are at least the CRC’s publicized policy on tobacco tobacco business and transformed it from two reasons why it is wrong to allow funding is in fact a watered-down version

http://medicine.nature.com • a small farm into a multinational com- tobacco companies to support medical of their original proposal, and that it was pany concern of such stature and monop- research. The first is the most straightfor- Cambridge University and subsequently oly that in 1911 the US Supreme Court ward. Presumably, tobacco companies the UK’s Committee of Vice Chancellors ordered its dissolution. Duke prospered seek funding opportunities with presti- and Principals (CVCP) that pressured the nonetheless and, in 1925, established The gious and high-profile projects because of charity to adopt these weaker regulations. Duke Endowment. Although the endow- the renown it brings them. Association Although the CVCP offers guidelines ment funded many charitable and educa- with respectable research groups or popu- that urge universities not to accept fund- tional establishments, its main benefi- lar philanthropy-dependent institutions ing that gives favorable publicity to ciary was a new university–Duke can only have a positive and uplifting tobacco companies, such week-kneed 1999 Nature America Inc. University. Although this is a dramatic effect, and given the dangerous nature of advice is unlikely to have a substantial © and now historic demonstration of the products they sell, tobacco companies effect on the practice, particularly when tobacco funding for major institutions, it should be denied that benefit. high profile institutions, such as Cam- is by no means unique. Wake Forest Uni- The second reason to deny tobacco bridge University, make no secret of their versity’s prestigious School of Medicine companies the opportunity to support large tobacco grants. was until recently known as Bowman medical research is that it offends moral Declining such donations does not Gray School of Medicine–Bowman Gray law. Given the upward trends in smoking mean that the tobacco industry should was the first CEO of the tobacco giant R.J. and smoking-related deaths (see box), it is not be paying for research. The current Reynolds. And today, tobacco funding of disturbing that cigarette profits find their US arrangement between the Attorneys medical research is pervasive. way into hospitals and cancer research General and the tobacco companies Interestingly, when asked, most laboratories at the discretion of an ill- (Nature Med. 5, 10; 1999) has much tobacco company representatives are motivated donor. It simply is not ethical to recommend it. Two hundred billion quite cagey about their research dona- for this industry to have any direct role in dollars (which only represents tions and, as a result, it is almost impossi- a nation’s efforts to combat disease. $4,000–5,000 for each adult American ble to calculate the total amount of Thus, the CRC’s decision not to fund smoker), to be paid out over the next 25 money changing hands. Although the any group directly receiving or in close years and used at the discretion of state total funding is unlikely to be substantial proximity to others that are receiving governments, will go a long way towards enough to have a long-term effect on tobacco funding is a welcome step addressing the problems that tobacco has research, it is spread thinly across a great towards removing tobacco funding from created. The CRC’s action against the many recipients. In the UK, for example, a the academic environment. The Imperial more insidious and piecemeal tobacco recent Wellcome Trust investigation of Cancer Research Fund has announced its donations complements the more honor- medical schools revealed that all but one support of the move, as has the Wellcome able arrangement by which tobacco (Glasgow) had received tobacco money Trust, which offers grant applicants a money helps put to right some of the recently, and Gordon McVie, the head of softly worded warning: “…the Governors wrongs it is associated with.

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