Tobacco Documents Online

nstitute Newsletter PREPARED:FOR YOUR INFORMATION SYTHE..INSTfTUTE STAFF 'i77781 R:STREET,.N.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20008: •~ 2SS-St7r. SPECIAL REPORT June 9, 197'5'. 3RD WORLDCONFER'ENCE0N SMOKING AND HEAL'.TH: "THE CIGARETTE," said new Assistant Secretary of HEW'Cooper, "kiZls Zots~ of'peopZe but doesn't seem to frighten anyone." That was perhaps the key among many keynotes struck by openingispeakers at New York's Waldorf Astaria- Hotel where the 3rd World Conference'oniSmokiingiand Health:convened'for four days. Speakers and'.d:elegates alike were hard put to identify "gains" in their (in some cases) lifelong battles against tobacco. There was ai cliear consensus that activity on behalf of "nonsmokers''rights" might ac- complish what Sir Geor e:Godber, the former English equivalent of the Ui.S. Surgeon General, called "our target' in, the Z'ong term, the' ebimination of cigarette smoking." ~ FIRST'SESSION SPEAKERS tri~ed1to whip enthusiasm into the:500i delegates from 47 nations and to provide pithy quotes for news media. AmeriicaniCancer Society staff ran aibusy andd well-organized press room as part of ACS' quarter-milllion- d'ollar contract from National Cancer Institute to runithee conference',. CONFERENCE CHAIRMAN, Sir George, foresaw the end of this century as a time when "relativeZy fem'addict's use cigarett'es,, but onZy, in private and in the company of consenting adul'ts. " He called tobacco mfrs."the enemy" and "mer- chants of death." He called' their advertising a "false message" which must be "suppressed. "' He, regarded smoking as a, "dirt'y; antisocial practice. "' He twice invoked the memory of Robert Kennedy, who indicted cigarette ad- vertising in a speech to the:first Wor1d Conference on Smoking and Health in New York eight years ago. TO STEINFELD, ex-U.,S'. Surgeon General', fell the task of re- viewing the health evidence ag instr tobacco. He called its use "public health enemy, number one iM,the iixdustrtiabized nations."' °FFh'ere,, for instance,," he cried, "is there a disease in the Jnited'. .St'ates,, which has a two hundred million dollar advertising budget? ...OnZy aZcohoZ;, our other'great, accepted societal aberration,, shares ~ ~

-2- with tabacco great economic gains for it's purveyors and great medical and'social disasters for its users.," (Alcohol indeed made great economic gains for its purveyors at the day's end, when delegates--Steinfeld among them--jammed iinto:the Waldorf's Empire Room for cocktails at $2.25 a throw and free hors d' oeuvres.): COUPLE OF DAMP NOTES came out in the opening session. Asst. Sec., Cooper,, despite his professed smoking-health belliefs, put down attacks against tobacco as of "l'zmited value" in a: "cacophony of threats to our very survival'." He saidlhe objects to regimentations and prohibitions, and prefers ef- forts to:motivate people to take care of themselves. American M'ediical,Association,House of Delegates Speaker Nesbitt, a Tenn. physician, was applaudied out of politeness after telling the conference there's little if any evidence of tobacco smoke:danger for nonsmokers; that everybody bet- ter: watch, out for "quacks and charlatans" in the quit-smoking clinic field; and! that a "more pragmatic;, as opposed ta an emotion- al approach"'might be preferable in the anti-smoking fiel'd., SAID' NE SBITT: "We must all be aware that reports in both the scientific and popu- Zar medtia regarding other suspected causes ((af'Zung cancer)) have become more fre- quent rather than Zess frequent...It is incumbent upon all of us concerned with,this subject to exercise totaZ objectivity and in so doing, avoid being, trapped'by an over- simplificati••on of issues beyond which the audience will hear but not heed." (Empha- ses his.)i "PLENARY SESS'IiONS" were conductedion the first and fourth days, with numerous sections,, panels andinews conferences in between. From here &,there: • Banzhaf of ASH helpedlhimself to the newsroom to denounce AC!~ and other voluntary healthiorganizations for not prohibiting smoking among their own,staffs., ACS issued a statement in re- sponse,, calling itselfl "not authorit'arian;" and pointing out that "smokers are not our enemies." •iHammond of ACS and Sterling, of Simon Fraser Univ. argued about the meaniinq, if any, of comparisons between llung,cancer ra:tess anditobacco consumption. Hammond said he's "given up in disgust" trying to figure them out. • Miller, the USDA tobacco economist, gave a paper indicating high prices could lower tobacco consumption, but declined to indicate whether he favored such a move. • Gori, who directs NCI's smoking research, describedihimself as, "a Li:ttZe 9t. George fighting, a lot of dragons,,"'this in reference to:other delegates who want to move too radically against to- bacco. • Banzhaf disclosed he's filledla six-poiint petition for rule- making at Federal,Trade Commission:, l.,Prohibit attractive people in cigarette ads; 2.Require relative "tar'"-nicotine disclosure in brand ads; 3.Prohibit cigarette coupons & pre- miums; 4.Ban cigarette billboards; 5.Require ads to state the "difficulties of smoking cessation;" and,, 6:. Require ads to state a warning about danger to nonsmokers.

-3- • Horn, former director of the Clearinghouse for Smokingland Hea1tY1 and now with the World Health,Organization, wondered! if there"s a conflict between providing,"safer" cigarettes and getting people to stop smoking., • SmokEnders attended prominently, especially to influence dis- cussions of quit-smoking clinics,, methodis:and their relative successes. One speaker, who had surveyed most of them~, said SmokEnders operates in,17 centers in 12 states and has:had some 50,000,clients, at $1201to $175 apiece. • Norwegian and Swedish governments won plaudits for their tight regulatory grips.Swedenienvisions reduction of per capita cigarette consumption to the 1920's level, and making children, born afte:r, 1974 "the first'' nonsrnoking generation. "' Nor- way has banned advertising of all tobacco products (eveni pi'pes:), required a healthiwarning on them and has given its Ministry of Social Affairs sweeping regulatory power to limit "detrimental" ingredilents. • Federal Communications:Commission Asst. Gen. Cbunsel Roberts said "the legislative route is st'iZZ'open" and "whatever other direc- tion:or avenue is chosen to combat smoking; that' choice be made quickZy,.," r NCI statisticianiSchneiderman had an assi.stant deliver his speech, whichiwas supposed to be about epidemiology. Between playing tapes of a 1605 madrigal andia: 1951 Carl Sandburg song about tobacco, he recommended putting tobacco acreage into a kind of soil bank to reduce leaf supplies and cause higher prices, and'a new cigarette tax,at the rate of'a halif- cent per pack per thousandlannual deaths attributed to smok- ing. • Federal Trade Commission attorney who"s:been leading an in- ve:stigati~on of cigarette advertising said from the floor (without identifying himseTf) that he favored' banning a11~ cigarette ads, and in,the meantime requiring mfrs. in every country to disclose all marketing and planning information relevant to what he called their efforts to get people to start andl keep oni smokingi. SIR GEORGE surrounded himself with,an all-NorthiAmerican group of sec- tion ehaiirmen who huddled with hian until the wee hours of adjournment morning to prepare conference recommendations. Something went awry,, however, because the "'recommendations" turned out to be "concZusions." Some, Sir George said, were "not quite compatibZe with others," and some did' not turn up in written form but were merely recited at the final sessi~on. Nblone, it turned'out, knew how many:conclius:ions there were:.Sir George guessed,between 1510iand 2001. He declared them acceptable with- out debate,, and forecast their appearance i~n the proceedings he thought might become available "ZikeZ'y sometime early next' year, ° FMONG! THECON~CLUSIONS: • Research to find out if smoke harms:nonsmokers. •,'BZiminati!on of smoking cigarettes."

-4',- • Include quit-smoki'ng assistance in health insurance. • CYeate "a soeial environment in which smoking is unacceptabZ,e. " • Ban all smoking imall schools. • Classify tobacco as ad'dictive and smokers as drug-dependent. • Preempt 5% of tobacco sales revenues for antismoking"educati.an." • Raise tobacco prices enough to discourage sales. • Ban all forms of tobacco advertising andipromotion. • Set up committees of soph,isticated politicians and economists in every country to kielp pursue stated goal's. QVERALL, observers saw heightened ded:ication and,clearly visible anti~- tobacco progress throughout the world. Though publicity levels were clearly so low as:to disappoint the conference organizers, the world"s anti-smoking,activists went home with~sharply focused notes on both the useful and useless ways to progress toward Sir George Godber's stated goal. I