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Letter
to City Council regarding Smoking Ordinance
Dear
Mr./Mrs./Ms./Miss ......:
Thank you for the time and attention you have
spent on secondhand smoke (ETS). In drafting a
new ordinance please remember that you are
setting a precedence that could draw government
entities into more and more restrictive policies
where personal and private property rights are
concerned.
For example, Betty Bridges, director of the
Fragrance Products Information Network, says that
some 72 percent of asthmatics react adversely to
perfumes and at least 35 million Americans are
afflicted with allergies. Will you next be called
upon to pass an ordinance prohibiting people from
wearing perfume in public and at work that
requires businesses selling perfume and perfumed
products (the list of those is almost endless)
put in separate walls and a separate ventilation
system?
Anti-smoking/anti-secondhand smoking groups have
a reservoir of money to call upon for their
campaigns. The same funds don't currently exist
for those opposed to perfume products. Money
talks. As I pointed out during the public
meeting, trace the money.
Others have. The Columbia Daily Tribune on April
17, 2005, in a column with the headline: When
judging anti-smoking efforts, follow the money,
says, in part:
"The Boone County Coalition on Tobacco
Concerns would like you to think their movement
is of the grass-roots variety. When the group
convinces the Columbia Board of Health to present
a new anti-smoking ordinance to the city council
in coming weeks, it would like you to believe
they're no different than any other residents'
group trying to convince the government that its
cause is just. ...
"The Boone County Coalition on Tobacco
Concerns is the government. It is funded by
government. It was created by government. It
exists because of government.
"So when the council is asked to ban a legal
product from private property in Columbia
understand this: The same council that is voting
is already a partner with the side asking for a
vote. It's the kind of contradiction that on any
other issue would raise enough red flags to have
ethics complaints flying back and forth for
months."
The article, by columnist Tony Messenger, goes on
to say:
"Glenn Nielson started to realize how
insidious the government relationship with the
coalition was when he started following the
proposal to ban smoking in Columbia more closely.
Nielson is part of a new group of citizens
opposed to the ban that call themselves the Boone
Liberty Coalition. ...
"What he found bothered him. Many of the
cities passing anti-smoking ordinances, for
instance, are university towns. Key members of
the coalitions pushing for the new laws are
university employees who have access to grants to
fund anti-smoking efforts. Such is the case in
Boone County, where the MU Wellness Center is a
coalition partner. In fact, the coalition adopted
the university's ‘Breathe-Easy' logo when it
formed.
"‘I'm seeing a pattern. The cities
passing these ordinances have large universities.
The universities are getting the grants to do
this,' Nielson says. ‘It's crossed over the
line when you're using all these public resources
to influence public policy.'
" In Columbia the line has been crossed so
far it's hard to determine where it started. ...
The state of Missouri encourages such local
coalitions with grants that come from an
organization that was formed because of a legal
settlement with tobacco companies as a result of
lawsuits by the states that now depend on the
grants.
"If this were happening for any issue other
than smoking, we wouldn't stand for it. Would
we?" (End of Tony Messenger's column.)
My efforts to trace the money led to the
pharmaceutical industry and various national
non-profits. It is interesting to note that a
number of the same non-profits are listed as
links on Smoke-Free Midland's Web site. For
instance, The American Cancer Society: An
editorial in the New England Journal of Medicine
stated: "And why should the American Cancer
Society endorse only SmithKline Beecham's
antismoking products?" Jerome P. Kassirer
& Marcia Angell (9/4/97, p. 700) See also,
Los Angeles Time (8/13/97). The ACS, however,
denies that its actions are endorsements. Rather,
it characterizes such transactions as a license
for the "nonexclusive use of its logo on
Florida orange juice and SmithKline Beecham's
antismoking products" in "exchange for
monetary grants and other considerations used for
the fight against cancer." (e-mail to CSPI
from William J. Dalton, Chief Counsel, ACS,
5/30/01)
What is missing from the links listed on (the
local anti-smoking site) is one for the U.S.
Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
Instead, Smoke-Free Midland lists a link for the
Canadian Center for Occupational Health and
Safety. Are the Canadians now telling us what to
do in Texas? Is OSHA excluded because after 12
years of research on secondhand smoke (ETS) the
agency refused to rule according to the
anti-smokers demands? (I enclosed a copy of the
court action regarding OSHA in your last letter.)
(The local antin-smoking site) also includes the
EPA (Environmental Protection Agency ), whose
flawed report was taken to task by the courts
until it was ruled no court had jurisdiction and
by the Congressional Research Service's report to
Congress: Environmental Tobacco Smoke and
Lung Cancer Risk.
The report says, in its final comments: "It
is clear that misclassification and recall bias
plague ETS epidemiology studies. It is also clear
from the simulations that modest, possible
misclassification and recall bias rates can
change the measured relative risk results,
possibly in dramatic ways. Aside from smoking
misclassification, however, attempts to correct
for them have not taken place. ..." (I have
the entire report if you would like to read it.)
SmokeFree Midland's site has several links to the
World Health Organization and its cancer research
arm, the International Agency for Research on
Cancer (IARC), but NOT to the WHO-IARC 1998 study
that I cited: "Our results indicate NO
association between childhood exposure to ETS and
lung cancer risk. No clear dose-response
relationship could be demonstrated for
cummulative spousal ETS exposure. Vehicles and
public indoor settings did NOT represent an
important source of ETS exposure." (The
study was included in the evidence notebook that
came with my original report.)
As I said in my talk during the public meeting,
the close association between the pharmaceutical
industry, non-profits, medical institutions and
physicians is clearly outlined in The Truth
About the Drug Companies: How They Deceive Us and
What to do About It, by Marcia Angell, M.D.,
former editor-in-chief of the New England Journal
of Medicine.
A similar story is told in an article by Wanda
Hamilton on the 11th World Conference on Tobacco
and Health in Chicago in early August 2000. She
begins with several quotes, including the
following:
"The support provided by Pharmacia and other
committed [pharmaceutical] companies is
invaluable in helping us achieve our goals. Their
combined resources enable us to strengthen and
expand our global leadership to increase the
number of organizations and individuals engaged
in the fight against tobacco. Collectively, we
can promote the societal, political, and economic
changes necessary to reduce tobacco exposure and
use worldwide," said Thomas Houston, M.D.,
Director, Science and Public Health Advocacy,
American Medical Association; Co-director of The
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's SmokeLess States
Program; Co-chair, Executive Committee, World
Conference on Tobacco OR Health, Aug 6 - 10,
2000. Quoted in Pharmacia press release, Aug. 7,
2000.
Wanda Hamilton says, in part:
"The American Medical Association, the
American Cancer Society, and the Robert Wood
Johnson Foundation co-hosted the 11th World
Conference on Tobacco and Health, which was
billed as ‘the world's largest gathering of
tobacco-control experts.' Co-sponsors were the
American Heart Association, the American Lung
Association, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention, and the National Cancer
Institute. The World Health Organization (WHO)
and the United Nations Foundation served as
"honorary hosts." ....
"Chipping in for a good portion of the
funding for the conference as ‘primary
patrons' were four major pharmaceutical
multinationals: Glaxo Wellcome, Novartis,
Pharmacia and SmithKline Beecham, all of whom
make and/or market ‘nicotine replacement' or
other smoking cessation products. Johnson &
Johnson's McNeil Consumer Products, marketers of
Nicotrol, was well represented by the Robert Wood
Johnson Foundation, which receives almost all its
roughly $8 billion from shares of J&J stock.
"So strong was the presence of the
pharmaceuticals that the conference appears to
have been more a drug trade show than a
legitimate global public health meeting.
"In addition to putting out numerous
self-promoting press releases, the pharmaceutical
companies also sponsored symposia, paper
presentations, scholarships, a poster session,
presentation of a Public Service Announcement ad
campaign, sessions on research, and trade booths.
They also sponsored a session on a
"cessation treatment" database, funded
by the drug companies for the Society for
Research on Nicotine and Tobacco. The WHO, the
Centers for Disease Control, the World Bank, and
the Cochrane Tobacco Addiction Group provided
‘expert technical support' for the treatment
database. ...
"All in all, the 11th World Conference on
Tobacco and Health was a highly successful
marketing opportunity for the pharmaceutical
industry. It strengthened their already close
relationship with the global anti-tobacco
organizations, the medical establishment, the
WHO, and agencies of the U.S. federal government.
It also ensured that the global public health
community would enthusiastically continue
promoting the companies' cessation drugs. Even
more than that, it assured the drug companies
that their campaign to wrest control of nicotine
from the tobacco companies was right on track.
"In The Beginning
"The 11th World Conference was the
culmination of years of planning and work on the
part of the pharmaceutical companies. When
Pharmacia's scientists began trying to develop
"alternative" nicotine products back in
1962--two years before the first Surgeon
General's report on the health effects of
smoking--the company was no doubt aware of the
growing body of research linking lung cancer to
smoking. Presumably Pharmacia thought it could
capitalize on what it believed would be a growing
market for smoking cessation products. However,
if that was Pharmacia's intent, it means they
were already aware that nicotine was the
substance in tobacco that was
"habituating."
" Pharmacia was indeed the first
pharmaceutical company to manufacture a product
for nicotine replacement therapy [NRT]. It
developed nicotine gum in 1971, and in 1978
SmithKline Beecham began marketing the gum as
‘"Nicorette' in Switzerland.
" In the early 1980s Duke University
researcher Jed Rose invented and patented the
transdermal nicotine patch which became the basis
for SmithKline's Nicoderm and for Johnson &
Johnson subsidiary McNeil Consumer Products'
Nicotrol. The FDA first approved these products
for marketing as prescription smoking cessation
drugs in the U.S. in 1991. Both patches, as well
as Nicorette gum, are actually manufactured by
Pharmacia. ...
"Therapeutic Nicotine
"Meanwhile, researchers were discovering
that nicotine had possible therapeutic
applications for the treatment of certain
diseases. They already knew that nicotine
improved concentration and motor control, that it
increased the pain threshold in some individuals,
that it helped ward off hunger. For all these
reasons, cigarettes were readily and copiously
supplied to soldiers during World Wars I and II.
But research was also indicating that nicotine
could be used in the treatment of such
debilitating conditions as Alzheimer's and
Parkinson's diseases.
" Since then, many more therapeutic uses of
nicotine and tobacco have been discovered, but
the problem for the pharmaceutical companies was
that nicotine itself cannot be patented because
it occurs naturally in tobacco, tomatoes,
potatoes and other plants. What can be patented
are "nicotinic' compounds and nicotine
delivery devices. Thus the pharmaceutical
companies became increasingly interested in
developing new nicotine compounds and new
nicotine delivery devices that they could then
patent, not only for smoking cessation but
eventually for additional therapeutic uses.
"Co-opting Public Health
"Given that by the 1980s the public health
establishment was already ramping up for a full
assault on smoking as a public health issue, the
pharmaceutical companies saw a golden opportunity
for advancing their own nicotine products as
smoking cessation aides. What could be better
than having such revered entities as the Surgeon
General, the AMA, the American Cancer Society,
the American Lung Association, the American Heart
Association, the Centers for Disease Control, the
National Cancer Institute, other U.S. government
agencies (and, later, the WHO) actually help
market smoking cessation drugs as part of their
smoking eradication programs?
" And so, by the early 1990s the
pharmaceutical companies began building
partnerships with the public health
establishment. In 1991 the Robert Wood Johnson
Foundation, the largest single shareholder in
Johnson & Johnson, initiated its anti-tobacco
grant program, funding anti-tobacco programs and
nicotine addiction research. By 1995 a RWJF
representative sat on the U.S. Interagency
Committee on Smoking and Health, helping
coordinate the national tobacco control program.
By 1996 the CDC listed the RWJF as a
‘partner' in tobacco control. Also in 1996,
the RWJF funded the establishment of the
Tobacco-Free Kids Coalition along with its
‘partners,' the American Cancer Society, the
American Lung Association, and the American Heart
Association. In 1999 the RWJF, the National
Cancer Institute and the National Institute on
Drug Abuse announced a jointly funded and jointly
created "Transdisciplinary Tobacco Use
Research Centers" to be established at seven
academic institutions.
" In January 1999 Gro Harlem Brundtland
announced that Glaxo Wellcome, Novartis, and
Pharmacia had become ‘partners' with the WHO
in its anti-tobacco work.
" The global public health establishment
now dances to the tunes the pharmaceuticals play:
"1. Increase tobacco taxes to make
the price of the pharmaceutical products more
competitive with tobacco products.
"2. Demonize the tobacco industry
and prohibit the advertising of their products.
"3. Enact smoking bans to force
smokers either to attempt to give up smoking
using the pharmaceuticals' products or to use
"nicotine replacement" products as
substitutes for when they cannot smoke.
"4. Promote smoking cessation and
"treatment" for nicotine addiction.
"5. Promote full coverage for
treatment of nicotine addiction by public and
private health insurers."
(End of material from Wanda Hamilton's article.)
Since beginning my research on secondhand smoke,
I have read numerous claims by smoking ban
advocates that they could not substantiate. The
following is offered as an example. In response
to Mayor Bloomberg's claim that 1,000 lives would
be spared with the New York City's smoking ban,
Elizabeth M. Whelan, Sc.D., M.P.H., questioned
the mayor's statement in a Dec. 12, 2002, article
on the American Council on Science and Health Web
site, saying, "If, as we suspect, he is
referring to deaths caused by exposure to
secondhand smoke in restaurants and bars, the
estimate of 1,000 deaths prevented is patently
absurd. Our best estimate of the number of deaths
prevented is somewhere between ZERO and a
hypothetical 10 to 15. There is NO evidence that
any New Yorker – patron or employee –
has ever died as a result of exposure to smoke in
a bar or restaurant."
When I sent my first report to you, I included an
evidence notebook that contained all the
references cited. The notebook has between 300
and 400 pages. The mayor returned the evidence
notebook to me at the public hearing. If you did
not have the opportunity to check my sources and
read the actual studies and court actions, I will
bring the evidence notebook to you. I may be
reached at ................
You are taking action on a situation which could
have far reaching consequences. As Thomas
Jefferson said, "A wise and frugal
government, which shall leave men free to
regulate their own pursuits of industry and
improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of
labor and bread it has earned - this is the sum
of good government."
If I can be of service in providing you with
information, please let me know. I am deeply
concerned, as all Americans should be, about the
future we are creating for our children and
grandchildren.
I leave you with these words by John Dewey:
"Any doctrine that weakens personal
responsibility for judgment and for action helps
create the attitudes that welcome and support the
totalitarian state."
Sincerely,
.................
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