[C-U Smokefree] No Subject

[Theotskl at aol.com]

FYI.

T. Tsoukalas





J Drope1, S A Bialous2 and S A Glantz1

1 Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education, University of
California, San Francisco, San Francisco, California, USA
2 Tobacco Policy International, San Francisco, California, USA

Correspondence to:
Stanton A Glantz PhD
Box 1390, University of California, San Francisco, CA 94143-1390, USA;
<mailto:glantz at medicine.ucsf.edu>glantz at medicine.ucsf.edu

Read the full paper at
http://tc.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/abstract/13/suppl_1/i41

Objective: To describe how the tobacco industry developed a network of
consultants to promote ventilation as a "solution" to secondhand smoke
(SHS) in the USA.

Methods: Analysis of previously secret tobacco industry documents.

Results: As with its other strategies to undermine the passage of clean
indoor legislation and regulations, the tobacco industry used consultants
who represented themselves as independent but who were promoting the
industrys ventilation "solution" strategies under close, but generally
undisclosed, industry supervision. The nature of the industrys use of
ventilation consultants evolved over time. In the 1980s, the industry used
them in an effort to steer the concerns about indoor air quality away from
secondhand smoke, saying SHS was an insignificant component of a much
larger problem of indoor air quality and inadequate ventilation. By the
1990s, the industry and its consultants were maintaining that adequate
ventilation could easily accommodate "moderate smoking". The consultants
carried the ventilation message to businesses, particularly the hospitality
business, and to local and national and international regulatory and
legislative bodies.

Conclusion: While the tobacco industry and its consultants have gone to
considerable lengths to promote the tobacco industrys ventilation
"solution", this strategy has had limited success in the USA, probably
because, in the end, it is simpler, cheaper, and healthier to end smoking.
Tobacco control advocates need to continue to educate policymakers about
this fact, particularly in regions where this strategy has been more
effective.