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Excerpts from TOBACCO INDUSTRY WAGED FALSE BATTLE
AGAINST YOUTH SMOKING

Pioneer Planet [08/26/98]

While the tobacco industry launched high-profile efforts to keep kids from smoking, its youth programs were secretly aimed more at keeping lawmakers from passing laws restricting tobacco sales, according to industry documents. Facing a wave of anti-smoking legislation, the industry feared that if it didn't make it appear it was combating youth smoking, it would face even further restrictions -- even though some tobacco executives doubted smoking harmed children, according to the once-secret files.

``If we can frame proactive legislation or other kinds of actions on the Youth Access issue . . . we will be protecting our industry for decades to come,'' a Philip Morris executive wrote in a 1995 report to cigarette retailers.

The Tobacco Institute declined to comment on the documents. But Tom Lauria, spokesman for the tobacco companies' trade group, said the industry was sincere in its desire to keep minors from smoking, and has spent ``well into the seven figures'' on that effort.

Despite the industry's pricey campaigns, underage smoking is at an 18-year high. Some anti-smoking critics contend that the industry's efforts have been purposely ineffective. For example, the industry has long reinforced the point that smoking is an ``adults-only'' activity -- yet cigarette makers and their advertising agencies were keenly aware that one of the main reasons kids smoke is their belief that it makes them look adult, the records show.

And while the tobacco companies and the Tobacco Institute spent millions of dollars on their campaigns underscoring the ``adults-only'' aspect, they actively opposed numerous federal, state and local efforts to combat underage smoking.

``We never believed that they really were interested in stopping youth smoking,'' said Jean Forster, who studies smoking and policy issues in the University of Minnesota's School of Public Health. ``They had to get youth smokers. That's virtually their only source of new smokers. Their livelihood depended upon it. They had no choice but to attract youth.''

The long-secret memos, reports, letters and other documents reviewed by the Pioneer Press were made public as part of the $6.6 billion settlement reached in the state's recent lawsuit against cigarette makers. They provide the first evidence of what many anti-smoking activists long suspected: That the chief aim of the industry's youth programs was not to stop kids from smoking.

Despite its programs against underage smoking, the records show that some in the industry doubted that it hurt children to smoke.

``The industry does not . . . concede that cigarettes are unreasonably dangerous to anyone, young or old,'' a senior vice president for Brown & Williamson Tobacco Co. wrote in a 1979 letter.

A 1980 Brown & Williamson memo warned that campaigns to discourage underage smoking ``should be carefully thought out. Would such programming be a concession?''

Rise in youth smoking

Cigarette makers say they do not market to youth, a contention that critics dispute. For whatever reason, youth smoking is on the rise and is the highest its been since 1980, according to a report last year from the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

As the number of teen smokers grew, so did calls for legislative action to limit the access that youth had to tobacco. States and municipalities across the country -- Minnesota chief among them -- began enacting and enforcing laws to limit youth access.

It was amid this environment that the cigarette manufacturers undertook their youth anti-smoking campaigns. According to the documents, industry officials feared that laws restricting youth access to tobacco could eventually lead to laws restricting adult access.

With a flurry of publicity and nationwide media tours in the early 1980s, the Tobacco Institute launched its ``Tobacco: Helping Youth Decide'' campaign. It was aimed at helping parents and teens talk about a variety of ``adult'' activities, including smoking.

But some anti-smoking critics, including Dr. Greg Connolly, director of the tobacco control program at the Massachusetts Health Department, contended that the program only bolstered the belief among youth that smoking makes them look more mature.

``I think their basic strategy is to turn the rotten egg into forbidden fruit, and they're very good at that,'' said Connolly, who witnessed heavy tobacco industry opposition to a city-run campaign against underage smoking in Boston-area schools.

For public consumption, the Tobacco Institute's ``Helping Youth Decide'' program was meant to ``help parents reassert a positive influence on the lives of their young teenagers,'' according to a question-and-answer sheet prepared to help institute spokesmen handle inquiries.

``Whether the issue is smoking, drinking, or any of the others which can confuse and divide, we hope this project will provide assistance to parents and children in building trust and communicating ideas,'' the sheet said.

Privately, though, the program had a much different goal, as Tobacco Institute president Samuel D. Chilcote Jr. outlined in a 1990 memo to the group's executive committee.

``The issue of youth smoking is being used increasingly not only by anti-smokers, but also by legislators to support strengthened regulation of cigarettes and their sale,'' Chilcote wrote. ``The industry has in the past and must continue to defend its marketing practices. To ensure that the industry is putting forth maximum effort to meet these growing challenges, I have asked Institute staff to identify opportunities to politically and publicly reaffirm the industry's continued commitment to address the issue of youth smoking.''

Later in the memo, he said long-term spending was needed on the youth program.

``In order for this program to achieve its legislative goal, we believe a multi-year commitment of funds must be made up front,'' Chilcote wrote.

Industry records show cigarette companies have closely monitored youngsters' smoking habits and had an awareness that young teens represented their future customers. Eight of every 10 smokers pick up the habit before age 18, according to a 1994 Surgeon General's report.

A 1987 memo from the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. outlined a marketing strategy for a new cigarette targeted at ``primarily 13-24 year old male Marlboro smokers.'' A 1975 memo from the firm warned that Camel filter cigarettes ``must increase its share penetration among the 14-24 age group . . . which represent tomorrow's cigarette business.''

A 1978 report from the Lorillard Tobacco Co. reported on the ``fantastic'' success of Newport cigarettes among blacks and young adults, ``but the base of our business is the high school student.''

And a 1973 memo from the Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp. said Kool's stake in the 16- to 25-year-old age group ``is such that the value of this audience should be accurately weighted and reflected in current media programs.''

Documents from the tobacco files show that the manufacturers realized that if they didn't do something about underage smoking, lawmakers would do it for them. And that had dangerous implications for the entire tobacco industry, the executives expressed in several memos and reports.

In a January 1995 presentation for tobacco retailers and others involved in the business, Philip Morris warned that despite the new Republican majority in Congress brought about by the November 1994 elections, anti-smoking efforts would not subside.

``It's a big mistake to think that we can relax in the assumption that last fall's election, and a more pro-business attitude in Congress and Congressional oversight of regulatory agencies, means that our problems are taken care of,'' said the presentation, which was written in part by Ellen Merlo, a senior vice president for corporate affairs. ``The fact is, that in the near future, we could be facing increasingly severe local, state and federal legislation and regulations restricting the sale and use of tobacco products.''

Merlo and her co-authors warned that ``if we don't do something fast to project that sense of industry responsibility regarding the youth access issue, we are going to be looking at severe marketing restrictions in a very short time. Those restrictions will pave the way for equally severe legislation or regulation on where adults are allowed to smoke.''

Retailers were told that if the industry could ``get out in front on this issue now, if we can seize the moral high ground, we will not only be doing the right thing, we will be protecting our industry for decades to come.''

In 1995, Philip Morris launched Action Against Access, a retailer-education campaign aimed at keeping stores from selling tobacco to minors. After that, its support for the industry-wide programs waned, to the extent that Merlo recommended in a memo that the Tobacco Institute's youth programs could be cut when the budget got tight.

In a memo on a budget request from the Tobacco Institute that was $3.8 million too high, Merlo wrote, ``I have given them the opportunity to make whatever cuts they feel appropriate, but given the numbers I am being asked to live with in '96, we cannot go beyond that level. . . . I think youth is a good place to cut.''

In an interview, Merlo said she recommended the cut in the institute's youth program because she believed Philip Morris' campaign ``could do it more effectively and more efficiently.''

Countering coalitions

While some of the companies and the Tobacco Institute were undertaking their own programs, they were actively opposing and attacking the numerous federal, state and local underage-smoking initiatives that sprang up, including in Minnesota.

The industry saw Minnesota as a bellwether. In 1975, state legislators passed the Clean Indoor Air Act, the first law in the nation that brought about broad restrictions on smoking. And in 1984, the state Health Department's Plan for Nonsmoking and Health laid out a comprehensive series of recommendations for anti-smoking education and regulations. It became known as the Minnesota Plan.

In a 1985 memo, Susan Stuntz, then an executive with the Tobacco Institute's Washington office, advocated coming up with a ``blueprint of our own'' for dealing with the Minnesota Plan. Once they came up with ``a series of long-term public relations strategies'' to attack the health plan, ``we'd like to be able to plug this type of document into any state facing a coalition-type anti-smoking program,'' she wrote.

One of the Health Department's recommendations was for up to six hours of anti-smoking instruction in the state's schools. The Tobacco Institute didn't want that, and planned to ``persuade officials that the education portion of the program is unnecessary because it is based upon faulty research, and would be costly and difficult to implement.''

In addition, the institute official suggested they develop cost estimates for the state's plan, and then present the estimates ``to teachers and parents, asking if they want their tax money spent for unnecessary education programs or for textbooks, teacher salaries and other basics.''

Also, they wanted to ``promote to parents and teachers the concern that the `six or more hours of . . . nonsmoking education' cited in the plan might preclude six hours of education in another area (such as basic skills, driver and/or sex education.)''

The memo said taxpayers should be informed ``of the large number of national programs that already address this issue, so indicate that local efforts are duplicative, a waste of taxpayers' money and unnecessary.''

The cigarette industry, however, worked to oppose and discredit many of those other programs, the documents show. A Tobacco Institute official wrote in a 1991 memo that the ``anti-smoking lobby is actually doing harm to America's youth -- by ignoring the real problems young people face, and spending time and money on stopping youth smoking.''

The anti-smoking lobby was being assisted, she said, by ``do-gooder legislators (who) introduce youth smoking bills as window dressing to suggest they care about America's youth. We need to shift their focus by opening their eyes to the bigger pictures.''

As part of that, the institute official recommended the group produce a video on state programs for at-risk youth. The program, she wrote, ``would dovetail nicely with the industry's youth initiatives at Congressional hearings on youth access to cigarettes this year.''

A 1992 institute document found in the Lorillard files outlines a plan to ``re-affirm our youth program efforts and, where possible, to demonstrate where anti-smoking efforts designed with a similar stated objective have been unsuccessful.''

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