Anne Landman's Collection
Smoking Issues Claims & Responses Active Smoking
Abstract
Now worthy of a museum, this British American Tobacco (BAT) company primer for employees called "SMOKING ISSUES- Claims and Responses" is a compilation of the twisted arguments the industry long used with the public to deflect hard questions about the linkage between smoking, disease and death. The frightening thing is that the document is estimated to have been written fairly recently, in 1994. Note the ease with which the tobacco company uses its age-old technique of casting doubt on claims of death and disease, and blaming the smoker for his illness:
"CLAIM 1
Smoking has been proven to cause disease.
RESPONSE:
There is still a controversy about smoking and health. Although there is a 'statistical association' between smoking and certain diseases, which means that smokers are more likely to develop lung cancer than non-smokers, smoking has not be proven to actually cause the diseases. The cause could equally be one of the many other things that smokers do that makes them different from non-smokers. Smokers have been reported to have quite different lifestyles from non-smokers. For example, smokers have poorer, high-fat diets than non-smokers. It has also been suggested that this may explain the elevated risk of heart disease in smokers.
CLAIM 2
It is not credible simply to state that smoking does not cause these diseases.
RESPONSE
We are not saying that smoking does or does not cause these diseases; we are saying we do not know. (See also previous response.)
This manual represents the tobacco companies' longstanding, egregious stonewalling of public health efforts by denying the link between smoking and disease. One can barely begin to quantify the extraordinary damage such corporate actions have had on humanity.
Fields
- Notes
Thanks to Diane Jones of Americans for Nonsmokers Rights, www.no-smoke.org, for sending this document to Doc-Alert.
- Quotes
CLAIM 1
Smoking has been proven to cause disease.
RESPONSE
There is still a controversy about smoking and health.
Although there is a 'statistical association' between smoking and certain diseases, which means that smokers are more likely to develop lung cancer than non-smokers, smoking has not be proven to actually cause the diseases.
The cause could equally be one of the many other things that smokers do that makes them different from non-smokers.
Smokers have been reported to have quite different lifestyles from non-smokers. For example, smokers have poorer, high-fat diets than non-smokers. It has also been suggested that this may explain the elevated risk of heart disease in smokers.
Smoking might cause disease, or it might not.
CLAIM 2
It is not credible simply to state that smoking does not cause these diseases.
RESPONSE
We are not saying that smoking does or does not cause these diseases; we are saying we do not know. (See also previous response.)
CLAIM 3
Smoking causes lung cancer.
RESPONSE
There is still a controversy about smoking and health.
Although there is a 'statistical association' between smoking and lung cancer, which means that smokers are more likely to develop the disease than non- smokers, smoking has not been proven to actually cause !ung cancer.
CLAIM 4
90 % of all lung cancer patients are smokers; surely this indicates that smoking causes lung cancer.
RESPONSE
You have to ask yourself the converse question here: if smoking causes lung cancer, why do the vast majority of smokers not develop lung cancer, and why do non-smokers develop it? These are questions to which science has not provided answers. It has not been shown that the reason why smokers have a statistically higher risk of developing certain diseases is because they smoke. Smokers have been reported to differ from non-smokers in a variety of ways - in their diet, occupations, average weight, etc. A number of these smoker/non-smoker lifestyle differences, in addition to smoking itself, are statistically associated with lung cancer.
CLAIM 5
Smoking causes heart disease.
RESPONSE
There is still a controversy about smoking and health.
Although there is a small 'statistical association' between smoking and heart disease, which means that smokers are more likely to develop the disease than non-smokers, smoking has not been proven to actually cause heart disease.
CLAIM 6
Smoking causes emphysema and other chronic lung diseases.
RESPONSE
The origin and development of emphysema and other chronic lung diseases are poorly understood. Researchers have studied the possible role of many suspected factors in addition to smoking, including air pollution, occupational exposures, childhood diseases, adult infections and genetic disorders. But they have yet to find what actually causes these diseases.
CLAIM 7
Thousands of deaths every year are caused in this country by tobacco.
RESPONSE
The kind of numbers games that result in such numbers have no root in scientific or medical fact; they are merely statistical extrapolations, and indicate the extent to which the smoking and health issue has become politicised.
CLAIM 8
If smoking has not been proven to cause disease, why do doctors advise people to give up smoking?
RESPONSE
Doctors are in the business of giving advice, and that advice is usually conservative. The conventionai wisdom is to counsel patients against smoking, and this is certainly what doctors are taught in medical school. Doctors have to give advice to their patients, even when the available scientific evidence is not conclusive.
CLAIM 9
Smokers die younger.
RESPONSE
Smokers reportedly differ from non-smokers in many ways that may affect how long they live, quite regardless of whether or not they smoke. For example:
--Smokers are more energetic and restless than non-smokers --Smokers tend to marry and divorce more often than non-smokers --Smokers tend to change their jobs and move more often.
Scientists do not really know why smokers' mortality rates differ from those of non-smokers, but some have suggested that the prime determinant may be the behavioural and genetic nature of the smoker as opposed to smoking itself.
...CLAIM 20
You are working for a company that is selling a product that is claimed to kill people.
RESPONSE
Smoking has not been proven to kill people. We are providing a product that people want to buy in full knowledge of the controversy surrounding it.
There are few industries whose products or processes have not been criticised for public health reasons.
...CLAIM 23
If pregnant women smoke, will they harm the baby?
RESPONSE
The medical evidence on smoking during pregnancy is conflicting, and confused by the fact that women who smoke during pregnancy usually continue with other behaviours that have been considered to be 'risk factors' for complications during pregnancy e.g. drinking coffee and alcohol, having a less 'healthy' diet. In the case of pregnancy, however, it is recognised that many pregnant women choose to avoid certain publicised risk factors, even if those risk factors have not been proven to be harmful. For that reason, therefore, many women choose not to smoke during pregnancy.
CLAIM 25
Smokers should pay more for health services because they make more use of them.
RESPONSE
This claim is based on the belief that smoking has been proven to be a cause of disease. This is not the case and there is still a controversy about smoking and health. Ultimately, both smokers and non-smokers die, and many of both groups will require hospital treatment. For all the diseases that are claimed to be associated with smoking, there are many factors other than smoking that have been considered to be risk factors. It is simply not possible to apportion a specific percentage of these deaths to smoking or any other factor.
- Company
- Philip Morris (British American Tobacco document found in Philip Morris' files)
- Author
- Corporate author, British American Tobacco (BAT)
- Recipient
- Not specified
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