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Tobacco Control 2003;12:343–348 Tob Control: first published as 10.1136/tc.12.4.346 on 5 December 2003. Downloaded from News analysis....................................................................................... five years between the German Ministry UK: video nasty for of Health and the tobacco industry. Significantly, the contract specifies that BAT the money can only be spent on youth It is always reassuring when a tobacco prevention campaigns, and that ‘‘the company’s PR stunt goes wrong, espe- measures taken must not discriminate cially when it is panned by someone against the tobacco industry, their pro- who is supposed to be basking in the ducts, the cigarette business or the adult warmth of its corporate generosity. A smoker’’. recent case of biting the hand that feeds The Federal Centre for Health you was seen at the Old Warehouse Education, which developed the cam- gallery in London a couple of months paign, pleaded that the new ads had ago. The brown stained hand holding pre-tested well with a representative the money belonged to British American sample of the target audience, and had Tobacco (BAT), which despite new not been influenced in any way by the restrictions on tobacco sponsorship of tobacco industry, just funded by it. sports and cultural events apparently However, some of the world’s most sponsored an exhibition of new artists, experienced health educationalists, aptly named ‘‘We love to kill what we who saw the ads in Helsinki, added love’’. their derision to the gathering storm of The ungrateful beneficiary was a protest from an increasingly cohesive young artist called Simon Tyszko. He coalition of German health groups. They was so appalled at the apparently covert One of a series of health ministry saw the ads as crass beyond belief, involvement of the tobacco company advertisements appearing in youth publications refusing to believe that even if teenagers that he interspersed his video installa- in Germany, supposedly to discourage teens read the smaller copy, it would actually tion with some very down to earth anti- from smoking, which is being funded by the have any effect on their attitudes to tobacco messages, revealing BAT’s tobacco industry. smoking. Many groups feared it would involvement and what he thought about confuse teenagers and even encourage it to all who saw his work. BAT hastily them to smoke, as the prevailing mes- withdrew. It must be a nasty shock for a Germany: still sleeping sages were all in the images—of young http://tobaccocontrol.bmj.com/ company like BAT, when a gifted person people doing things they like to do, with talent that it wants to exploit for its with the enemy accompanied by cigarettes. The overall own cynical ends turns out also to have The determination of the German gov- impact of the ads was to glamorise a conscience and a brain. ernment to ignore growing anger about smoking, they claimed, and it was its close proximity to the tobacco indus- shameful for the German government try, and appeals for it to end the deal to be taken in by the tobacco industry’s whereby the industry funds a youth pretence that it does not want young education programme, reached new people to start smoking. heights in August. As more than two Professor Dr Friedrich Wiebel, chair- thousand tobacco control advocates man of the German medical action from all over the world convened in group on smoking and health, went Helsinki for the World Conference on further: ‘‘The seduction is perfect. The on September 27, 2021 by guest. Protected copyright. Tobacco or Health, a new advertising minor shot of health warnings makes campaign was launched in Germany, smoking even more attractive.’’ Groups consisting of a series of advertisements such as the cancer charity German in youth publications. Each ad showed Cancer Aid demanded that the health teenagers in some very modern, life-like ministry should immediately end the teen situations, under what appeared to campaign, while the world conference be an aggressively pro-tobacco message. delegates unanimously voted for a reso- Underneath the main message, in much lution urging civil society, academia, smaller type, was another item of copy and governments not to accept funding refuting the apparent message of the or participate in the tobacco industry’s BAT recently sponsored an aptly named first one. youth, social responsibility, voluntary exhibition of new artists in London. For example, one showing a young marketing, or other programmes. girl, cigarette in hand, mid-kiss with her At the end of the conference, one boyfriend, was entitled, ‘‘Raucher haben apologist for the advertisements was kontakt’’ (‘‘Smokers have contact’’); heard to plead that at least the health All articles written by David Simpson and below that, in the smaller type, education centre was in dialogue with unless otherwise attributed. Ideas and some more copy that translates as, the government about tobacco, whereas items for News Analysis should be sent ‘‘Correct: with carcinogens such as other health groups had abandoned to David Simpson at the address given arsenic, benzene, radon or tar’’. The their attempts to persuade it to change on the inside front cover ads are part of a contract valued at its policy. This left the tobacco industry J11.8 million (US$13.5 million) over as the only other body willing to talk to www.tobaccocontrol.com 344 News analysis Tob Control: first published as 10.1136/tc.12.4.346 on 5 December 2003. Downloaded from it, and thus able to influence govern- aspect of its total quality management government will also want to know ment policy. The logic of what sounded system. Not quite total enough, as the about the companies’ involvement with like a policy of appeasement was not ship was full of multiple display racks of discos, fashion shows, and multi-pro- well received by those who heard it. all varieties of tobacco, some just above duct ‘‘niche marketing’’ schemes to get Apart from its tobacco control policy, child’s eye height confectionery dis- prime peer leaders to parties, sometimes or lack of it, Germany is in many ways a plays, as well as large, back-illuminated clandestinely arranged only by tele- model European country that deserves tobacco ads that dominated the duty phone, with the lure of top musicians, to be celebrated for its contribution to free shop. and featuring cigarette handouts amid a the present, not the past. If only the Silja says it strives to earn the respect galaxy of talent and glamour. government could break its disastrous of its customers and the general public When tobacco executives make crass addiction to Big Tobacco (see also by making a pioneering contribution in arguments like that, especially in a Tobacco Control 2002;11:291–3). the sphere of environmental protection. country that has made it amply clear it In future, it may care to consider that means business, who do they think they the environment starts with its custo- are fooling? Do they really believe some Finland: floating mers, and especially with their children. of it? And as for the unique scale of the epidemic their product causes, at times loopholes it is hard to avoid the question: do these Delegates to the world conference on Australia: reviewing people really not get it? tobacco in Helsinki were reminded throughout the meeting what a strong the act, industry-style leadership role Finland has played in It has long been accepted that every Latvia: window of tobacco control. On the way to achieving decent health improvement plan, from one of the world’s fastest declines in the humblest local education campaign opportunity lung cancer mortality among middle right up to a comprehensive national For once, it seems that one of the new aged men, it was one of the first tobacco control act, should end with a democracies of the former Soviet Union section on the need for constant mon- countries to ban all forms of tobacco may be able to avoid the worst of the itoring and evaluation, followed up by enslavement to western tobacco compa- promotion. adjustments to the policy if necessary. nies that has happened to so many other But admiring visitors did not have to Few governments that survive the countries in the same situation. Latvia, go far to be reminded that wherever countless rounds in the heavyweight in fact, is actually quite an old democ- there is the slightest loophole, the slime ring of anti-tobacco legislation seem to racy, having tasted independence and of tobacco advertising will ooze out. One remember the bit about review, but not freedom in the early part of the 20th delegate took a post-conference trip surprisingly, Australia is once again a century, developing to have one of the across the Baltic Sea to Stockholm, model. highest standards of living anywhere in noting with satisfaction that Silja Line, After just 10 years, the federal gov- Europe in the 1930s. From 1940, it was the company operating the ferry, had ernment is reviewing its Tobacco occupied with extreme brutality first by received an award in the government Prohibition Act. It might have been the Soviet Union, then by Nazi http://tobaccocontrol.bmj.com/ backed ‘‘Golden Fork’’ scheme. thought that tobacco companies, which Germany, and then again by the This is described as promoting non- are known to have more or less given up Soviets, whose pretence of allowing smoking in hotels and restaurants, and any idea of increasing business in independence turned into forcible mem- is carried out ‘‘face to face’’ by the Australia, might have the grace to keep bership of the USSR. But eventually, in means of health education, and is a quiet.

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