June 12th, 2009
"With House Vote, Tobacco Bill Goes to Obama"
Written by Duff Wilson
The House moved quickly Friday to pass the Senate’s tobacco bill and send it to the White Hosue, where President Obama promised to sign it.
Mr. Obama, who himself has struggled to quit smoking, said the measure would “protect our kids and improve our public health.” Appearing in the Rose Garden just moments after the House vote, he said the tobacco legislation was “a bill that truly defines changes in Washington” and one that “changes the way Washington works and who it works for.”
The law would for the first time give the Food and Drug Administration the authority to regulate tobacco products, which kill more than 400,000 people in this country each year.
The House vote Friday was 307-to-97, following Senate passage of the measure 79-to-17 on Thursday. A key to Senate passage was a vote earlier in the week to overcome a filibuster, by a two-vote margin.
Under the law, the F.D.A. will be able to set product standards and ban some chemicals in tobacco products, although not to totally ban addictive nicotine. The F.D.A. will set up a new tobacco regulatory office financed by industry fees, which are expected to be $85 million in the first year and as much as $700 million annually within in 10 years.
The F.D.A. would have the power not only to consider changing existing products, but could also ban new products unless the agency found they contribute to overall public health.
Within 15 months, the F.D.A. is charged with imposing a ban on tobacco advertising within 1,000 feet of schools and playgrounds, a measure that is likely to draw court challenges from the tobacco industry saying it violates the First Amendment.
Also, within one year, the industry will be banned from claiming products are “light,” “mild” or “low tar,” terms which have been found to mislead smokers into thinking they are safer when they are not.
By the year 2012, the law provides that new, graphic warning labels must be designed and approved by the F.D.A. and occupy 50 percent of the space on each package of cigarettes. According to David Adelman, tobacco industry for Morgan Stanley, the larger warning is the key to the new F.D.A. legislation in making it harder to lure customers to buy cigarettes.
“The newer warning label requirement in the Senate bill could compromise the graphics appearance of all U.S. cigarette brands,” Mr. Adelman wrote in a note to investors Friday.
The Senate required a larger warning than a bill the House had previously passed and required that the warning contain “color graphics depicting the negative health consequences of smoking.” That is likely to include photographs of cancerous and diseased tissue, similar those that run on cigarette packs in Canada.
Seeking to combat youth smoking — Mr. Obama noted that an additional 1,000 or so Americans under the age of 18 become regular smokers each day — the legislation will quickly ban most flavoring in tobacco and raise penalties selling tobacco to underaged buyers.
But in a political compromise it exempted one key flavoring, menthol, which masks the harshness of tobacco and accounts for about one-quarter of the market.
Some anti-smoking groups, particularly ones representing African-Americans, had wanted the law’s ban on tobacco flavorings to include menthol. Mentholated brands are preferred by three-quarters of black smokers, who also have a disproportionate share of lung cancer.
Menthol is to be studied by the F.D.A. by 2011, though, and the agency would have the power to ban it, if the evidence warrants.
The tobacco legislation was supported by Altria Group, parent company of Philip Morris with its dominant Marlboro brand, and was opposed by other major cigarette makers, who argued it would protect Philip Morris and stifle innovation.
Last year, the House passed similar legislation, but the Senate did not act in the closing weeks of Congress last fall. At the time, President Bush was threatening to veto it.
Anti-smoking advocacy groups like the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network were praising Congress on Friday."This bill is proof positive that the tobacco industry is no longer running the show on Capitol Hill and that the health of Americans is a top priority for our elected officials,” the group’s chief executive, John R. Seffrin, said in a released statement.
Sheryl Gay Stolberg contributed reporting.
LINK: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/13/business/13tobacco.html?ref=business
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New York Times (www.nytimes.com)
October 6th, 2008
"When Doctors, and Even Santa, Endorsed Tobacco"
Written by STUART ELLIOTT
[CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE!!]
PEOPLE who remember when tobacco advertising was a prominent part of the media landscape — and others who recall what they learned in Marketing 101 — probably recollect that actors like Barbara Stanwyck and athletes like Mickey Mantle routinely endorsed cigarettes.
But how about doctors and other medical professionals, proclaiming the merits of various cigarette brands? Or politicians? What about cartoon characters in cigarette ads? Or children? Babies? Even Santa Claus?
Those images — some flabbergasting, even disturbing — were also used by Madison Avenue to peddle tobacco products. An exhibit that opens on Tuesday in New York presents cigarette ads from the 1920s through the early 1950s in an effort to demonstrate what has changed since then — and what may not have.
An advertisement from 1930 asserts that 20,679 physicians say that Lucky Strike cigarettes are less irritating. The ad is part of an exhibit at the Science, Industry and Business Library, part of the New York Public Library. The exhibit aims to show how Madison Avenue sold America on cigarettes.
Mickey Mantle, the Yankee outfielder, appeared in many ads for cigarettes, including this one for Viceroy in the 1950s.
An ad from 1946 asserting that more doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette. The ads are part of a collection compiled by Dr. Robert K. Jackler of Stanford University's School of Medicine. "This era of over-the-top hucksterism went on for decades, and it was all blatantly false," Dr. Jackler said.
The exhibit, of hundreds of print ads and television commercials, is titled “Not a Cough in a Carload: Images Used by Tobacco Companies to Hide the Hazards of Smoking.” The first part of the title is borrowed from a slogan for Old Gold cigarettes, a brand that subsequently boasted in its ads of being “made by tobacco men, not medicine men.”
The exhibit will be on display through Dec. 26 at Healy Hall at the Science, Industry and Business Library of the New York Public Library, 188 Madison Avenue, at 34th Street. It can also be viewed online (tobacco.stanford.edu).
The exhibit is the brainchild of Dr. Robert K. Jackler of the Stanford School of Medicine, who described himself in an interview as “an accidental tourist in the world of advertising.”
“The very best artists and copywriters that money could buy” would work on cigarette accounts, said Dr. Jackler, who is also chairman of the department of otolaryngology, head and neck surgery.
“This era of over-the-top hucksterism went on for decades,” he added, “and it was all blatantly false.”
Even babies appeared as accessories in ads aimed at parents who smoked, as in this ad from 1951, before Marlboro was considered manly.
Another ad from 1946 asserting that more doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette.
An ad from 1951 asserts that Chesterfield cigarettes give off "no unpleasant after-taste."
The genesis of the exhibit was an ad from around 1930 for Lucky Strike cigarettes, which shows a doctor above a headline proclaiming that “20,679 physicians say ‘Luckies are less irritating.’ ”
“That captivated me,” Dr. Jackler said.
The Luckies doctor was joined in Dr. Jackler’s collection of about 5,000 ads by scores of scientists and medical professionals — doctors, dentists, nurses — making statements that are now known to be patently untrue. “Not one single case of throat irritation due to smoking Camels!” is a typical assertion.
“I was struck by the noble depiction of the medical profession, bemused and surprised, actually,” said Kristin McDonough, the Robert and Joyce Menschel director of the Science, Industry and Business Library.
“Some of the claims being made in the ads, you did not have to be a scientist in a laboratory to dispute,” Ms. McDonough said, citing ads that smoking certain brands “does not cause bad breath” or “can never stain your teeth.”
In 1953, Mickey Mantle appeared in an ad for Camels. Mantle was among many athletes and celebrities who endorsed multiple brands during their careers.
An ad from the 1950s asserting that a dentist recommends Viceroy cigarettes.
Santa Claus, apparently, was a smoker too, and enjoyed Pall Malls in this ad from 1951.
Other approaches that could cause double takes (if not whiplash) among contemporary consumers include ads featuring Santa Claus, for brands like Pall Mall; senators like Charles Curtis of Kansas, who endorsed Lucky Strike before he was elected vice president in 1928; cartoon characters like the Flintstones and penguins, for brands like Winston and Kool; children, who appear as accessories for their smoking parents; and babies, for brands like Marlboro.
The exhibit also includes copious examples of more traditional cigarette endorsements by athletes — occasionally in uniform — and entertainers. Some promoted multiple brands during their careers; for example, Mantle, the New York Yankees outfielder, pitched brands like Camel and Viceroy, while the actress Claudette Colbert endorsed at least five, Dr. Jackler found.
A primary purpose of the exhibit, Dr. Jackler said, is to connect the dots between now and then. He likened ads from decades ago intended to encourage women to smoke — “Blow some my way,” for Chesterfield, and “You’ve come a long way, baby,” for Virginia Slims — to the campaign last year from R. J. Reynolds Tobacco to introduce a version of Camels for women called Camel No. 9.
And there is a theme that runs from vintage tobacco ads to contemporary ones, Dr. Jackler said: “It’s all about youth marketing. The intent is to turn youth, ages 12 to 22, into youthful smokers.”
Documents from the George Arents Collection on Tobacco from the archives of the Science, Industry and Business Library will also be on display. The exhibit was seen in cities like Boston and San Francisco before arriving in New York.
LINK: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/07/business/media/07adco.html?_r=1
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