Readers of this story recognise the holes in it. Researchers found a city where heart attack admissions have dropped following the introduction of a smoking ban, and quickly decided that it would help in building the case for a smoking ban, regardless of any other factors, such as the comprehensiveness of the ban and whether or not it did actually result in a reduction of so-called passive smoke exposure (rather than simply ensuring that people were exposed at home rather than in recreational venues).
The story says that the drop in heart attacks in Bremen was a 25 per cent drop and compares it to the drop of 2.4 per cent that the Department of Health found in England. A ten-fold disparity (as well as the huge disparities in population) in the figures must surely tell them something! but the figures of various heart attack drops are rattled off as if they proved, rather than cast a heavy shadow over the theory that smoking bans stop heart attack admissions.
A more accurate measure would have involved a larger population, across the whole of Germany. Why pick Bremen anyway – simply because the figures could be made to show a large drop? Small populations are more likely to produce startling variances for a wide variety of reasons.
An example of a study seeking to cover a wider population base is here. No statistically significant drops in heart attacks were found when studies were conducted over wider population bases using publicly available data on admissions, and employing appropriate controls.
Tuesday, 28 August 2012
Saturday, 18 August 2012
I like olive green
This piece from the Guardian speculates that plain packaging will backfire. Quite simply, some people like drab colours:
The olive industry in Australia wasn't happy with the characterisation of olive green as drab.
The problem is that tobacco control does not understand the allure of tobacco. It also tries to objectify what is really subjective, and trying to persuade us that everyone has the same taste in colour is absurd as trying to persuade us that everyone perceives tobacco as having the same risks, or that everyone has the same attitude to risk.
The Guardian puts it like this:
 |
| Source |
The problem is that tobacco control does not understand the allure of tobacco. It also tries to objectify what is really subjective, and trying to persuade us that everyone has the same taste in colour is absurd as trying to persuade us that everyone perceives tobacco as having the same risks, or that everyone has the same attitude to risk.
The Guardian puts it like this:
But you know that's going to backfire, right? In an age where companies use social media to make "friends" with everyone under the sun and consumer loyalty can no longer be bought through traditional top-down, shouty shouty means, de-branding is branding. This is an age where the 90s culture-jamming strategies of Adbusters and No Logo, originally designed to subvert the power of mainstream advertising, have now been gracelessly co-opted and absorbed by … mainstream advertising. Olive green packaging? It's minimal, man. Puss-filled cancer eyeballs? Terror is so in right now.The fact that people are not supposed to like drab olive green will be exploited to the full by marketing and advertising 'creatives'. They won't be able to resist it.
Friday, 17 August 2012
Unleaderlike
I won't say the editorial from the Scotsman (scroll down) on the Australian court decision was disappointing because these days it is hard to expect anything better from the media.
This is a poor excuse for a leader article. Not even the pretence of an attempt at even-handedness.
Does anyone really doubt that the way cigarettes are marketed – the packaging’s colour, texture, design and branding – are designed to add an attractive patina of glamour to the product? And does anyone really doubt that this glamour is part of smoking’s attraction, especially for the young and impressionable?That is the way any packaging is designed.
If so, what possible justification can there be for allowing cigarettes to benefit from this? Advertising and sponsorship by the tobacco industry has already been severely curtailed for precisely this reason.And tobacco has remained popular regardless, and the anti-smokers need to blame something beyond the fact that people have been smoking for millennia.
What rationale – beyond special pleading by vested interests or a woefully misplaced argument about freedom of expression – can there be for allowing this to continue?That we don't particularly want governments to exercise the authority to prevent people and businesses from using their branding because they perceive it to be unhelpful to their policy objectives. This is not 'woefully misplaced' concern. If government deprives anyone of assets, they should provide compensation. Brand packaging exists to protect both consumers and manufacturers from cheap imitations. Sometimes vested interests are good sources of insight.
You can just see the point here – anyone not agreeing with this programme can't love children and has probably got shares in tobacco companies.Smoking’s social acceptability has declined markedly over the past two decades. When the ban on smoking in public places was first introduced in Scotland, there were those who said it would never work. Does anyone now regret that historic step? Or the ban on cigarette vending machines (where many a young teenager obtained their first furtive pack)? Or any of the other curbs designed to protect public health?
This is a poor excuse for a leader article. Not even the pretence of an attempt at even-handedness.
Wednesday, 15 August 2012
Still more battles to fight on plain packaging
In spite of the Australian judgement in favour of plain packaging, there are more battles to be fought.
The UK campaign goes on, as do battles in the World Trade Organization.
Simon Chapman, prime supporter in Sydney comments here (admitting the first result will be a price war, to which the government's response will be to raise the tax). He outlines outstanding challenges to the display ban in Australia, and interestingly describes these greedy capitalist tobacco corporations as 'global minnows' in their fight against plain packaging.
A branding expert Stephen Cheliotis, comments here, from the other side of the argument.
Both sides have comments below, as does the BBC report.
Views vary depending where you read them. Sadly there are people who feel that the opposition of tobacco companies to plain packaging must mean that the policy is sound and will have its desired effect. The less mannerly accuse anyone who disagrees with this position of being in bed with tobacco. This is ad hominem argument (usually quite without foundation) and doesn't really help anyone to understand the issue.
The Australian government's attempts to confiscate the intellectual property of branding should be illegal: they have confiscated something of value without compensating the owners. Arguing that they are not actually using the branding doesn't cut it – especially now admitting that the Treasury expects to recoup extra tax revenue as a direct result of the change in law.
The UK campaign goes on, as do battles in the World Trade Organization.
Simon Chapman, prime supporter in Sydney comments here (admitting the first result will be a price war, to which the government's response will be to raise the tax). He outlines outstanding challenges to the display ban in Australia, and interestingly describes these greedy capitalist tobacco corporations as 'global minnows' in their fight against plain packaging.
A branding expert Stephen Cheliotis, comments here, from the other side of the argument.
Both sides have comments below, as does the BBC report.
Views vary depending where you read them. Sadly there are people who feel that the opposition of tobacco companies to plain packaging must mean that the policy is sound and will have its desired effect. The less mannerly accuse anyone who disagrees with this position of being in bed with tobacco. This is ad hominem argument (usually quite without foundation) and doesn't really help anyone to understand the issue.
The Australian government's attempts to confiscate the intellectual property of branding should be illegal: they have confiscated something of value without compensating the owners. Arguing that they are not actually using the branding doesn't cut it – especially now admitting that the Treasury expects to recoup extra tax revenue as a direct result of the change in law.
Saturday, 11 August 2012
Cancer Research supports plain packaging on your High Street
Cancer Research UK's campaign against plain packs continues here (this is from yesterday). The usual warnings – that colours mislead customers into the belief that some brands are safer than others – and the story of a mother's death from lung cancer prompting her daughter to stop smoking.
I enjoyed this piece, from Smoking Scot. An interesting view of Cancer Research's place on the High Street:
I find intriguing the idea that powerful charities might find it lucrative to lobby on legislation that will endanger small unfashionable shops, and small shops would support resistance to this juggernaut.
The fight goes on.
I enjoyed this piece, from Smoking Scot. An interesting view of Cancer Research's place on the High Street:
They love recessions because landlords have few choices and will sign up to predatory long term deals when they can't rent to the productive sector. The hidden value of 44,500 volunteers is worth tens of millions of Pounds to CRUK and the whole lot's tax free. Little wonder they couldn't care less if every pub, greasy spoon or betting shop in the country closed - far less competition and lots of opportunities for them to open another retail "presence" in another High Street.And even better:
Thankfully it's no longer necessary to go into a great long explanation about CRUK. All I need do is refer them to Tobacco Tactics (9), and point out that it's partly through their corporate donations that CRUK can help finance a site that slanders ordinary citizens, attempts to bully politicians and does its level best to ruin the careers of professionals who disagree with their view of the world. [link in original]
We may be met with a brick wall when it comes to most politicians, however very few corporations want to be associated with something as base as Tobacco Tactics. Once they see it for what it is, (and I highlight their "disclaimer") they quickly grasp how embarrassing it might be for their Chairman to have to answer searching questions at the next shareholders meeting! [link added]
Didn't need to go that far with one Tesco not a million miles from Edinburgh. Now their customers have a choice of charity cans and their alternate is excellent; the RNLI. The direct approach works, especially when the manager smokes!
One thing this has taught me is smokers need to get on to this charity bandwagon. It would be awesome if F2C, TCT or TICAP could set up a charity wing and start handing out donation cans. I've checked in on several small newsagents in my area that sell cigarettes and none accept cans from CRUK. To an owner, they've all indicated a willingness to accept a can from any outfit intent on fighting this monstrosity. [links added]The reference to Tobacco Tactics is particularly interesting. The site includes a directory of opponents to tobacco control (split into categories such as libertarians, bloggers, politicians, etc.). Cancer Research has provided donations to this effort.
I find intriguing the idea that powerful charities might find it lucrative to lobby on legislation that will endanger small unfashionable shops, and small shops would support resistance to this juggernaut.
The fight goes on.
Plain packaging: acquiring commercial assets without compensation
It was announced recently that next Wednesday we will learn whether the tobacco companies' challenge to the Australian government on plain packaging has succeeded. The Australian government has been taken to task for preventing the use of brand packaging, which they regard as a breach of international law. The Australian government denies that there is any breach, claiming that it does not directly acquire the intellectual property that is constituted in the branding.
The government has no direct use for the branding and design of tobacco packaging. However it does acquire selling and marketing space by depriving tobacco companies of the use of their intellectual property in the shape of branding, and of the actual boxes and packaging in which they sell their tobacco. The hope is to prevent young people from smoking 'by encouraging them to pay more attention to the health warnings'. (See this debate.) This is a key selling point of the policy: removing the clutter of branding from the pack face in order to make health warnings more prominent. Not only are they rendering worthless the branding assets of companies, on which billions have been invested over time, but they expect packaging to dissuade the purchaser from buying the product – and the prominence of the health warnings are central to this idea.
The government does not acquire the branding directly via a plain packaging policy but it does acquire powers to control what goes on the wrapper, in this case to stipulate that health warnings advertising smoking cessation services are prominent. Clearly the aim is to stop smokers spending money on tobacco and encourage them to become clients of stop smoking services and smoking cessation medication. It is entirely right that tobacco companies (and others) should object to this daylight robbery, which is no less robbery because tobacco branding is not employed directly by the government.
The government has no direct use for the branding and design of tobacco packaging. However it does acquire selling and marketing space by depriving tobacco companies of the use of their intellectual property in the shape of branding, and of the actual boxes and packaging in which they sell their tobacco. The hope is to prevent young people from smoking 'by encouraging them to pay more attention to the health warnings'. (See this debate.) This is a key selling point of the policy: removing the clutter of branding from the pack face in order to make health warnings more prominent. Not only are they rendering worthless the branding assets of companies, on which billions have been invested over time, but they expect packaging to dissuade the purchaser from buying the product – and the prominence of the health warnings are central to this idea.
The government does not acquire the branding directly via a plain packaging policy but it does acquire powers to control what goes on the wrapper, in this case to stipulate that health warnings advertising smoking cessation services are prominent. Clearly the aim is to stop smokers spending money on tobacco and encourage them to become clients of stop smoking services and smoking cessation medication. It is entirely right that tobacco companies (and others) should object to this daylight robbery, which is no less robbery because tobacco branding is not employed directly by the government.
Thursday, 9 August 2012
Confused campaigning group assists plain packaging campaign
In the final two days before the end of the consultation period, Avaaz has been persuaded that plain packaging is a cause worth the international attention of global internet activists.
From this to this in a little over a year.
The plain packaging campaign on Avaaz's page calls itself 'our lungs vs. lobbyists', as if lobbying were a dirty word, and yet their personnel operate at the highest levels. Of their campaign against the war on drugs, their page says:
The war on drugs of course has resulted in much more drug use in recent decades than we saw before it kicked off, and corresponding levels of crime. (I was told once by a senior civil servant in the Scottish Office that almost all crime was drug-related at some level.) How does one proceed from a campaign against a war on drugs to a campaign in favour of plain packaging – effectively an attack on legal sales of tobacco? It seems to me inevitable that when you get a powerful campaigning machine with access to the UN Secretary-General, everybody will want to use it for their own ends. It's a wonderful ... lobbying opportunity – even though, as someone has pointed out at Taking Liberties, one can't be sure that all the signatures are genuine as there is no thorough verification.
There are sound reasons for reconsidering the drugs war. It is hard to conceive how a better regulated drugs market is comparable to a market where retailers are penalised for selling tobacco and clear attempts made to make tobacco invisible in the retail environment – effectively to discourage sales. This is poor regulation. It puts the regulator and the purchaser at odds with one another, when they should be on the same side: at least to the extent of ensuring the customer has all relevant information about the product before making a purchase.
The campaign for plain packaging makes the unwarranted assumption that the mere presence of laws (and the absence of tobacco from view) will prevent youth take-up of smoking. The campaign against the drugs war simply recognises that illegal drugs make life more difficult for everybody by putting supply in the hands of the ruthless and the lawless. It also recognises that enormous profits are being made from drug trafficking.
Avaaz fails to make this connection. I am glad to see some of its Facebook supporters complaining about this campaign too!
From this to this in a little over a year.
The plain packaging campaign on Avaaz's page calls itself 'our lungs vs. lobbyists', as if lobbying were a dirty word, and yet their personnel operate at the highest levels. Of their campaign against the war on drugs, their page says:
Last week Avaaz Executive Director Ricken Patel hand-delivered our over half a million signatures to the UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, world leaders and the global media in New York.Friends in high places, indeed.
The war on drugs of course has resulted in much more drug use in recent decades than we saw before it kicked off, and corresponding levels of crime. (I was told once by a senior civil servant in the Scottish Office that almost all crime was drug-related at some level.) How does one proceed from a campaign against a war on drugs to a campaign in favour of plain packaging – effectively an attack on legal sales of tobacco? It seems to me inevitable that when you get a powerful campaigning machine with access to the UN Secretary-General, everybody will want to use it for their own ends. It's a wonderful ... lobbying opportunity – even though, as someone has pointed out at Taking Liberties, one can't be sure that all the signatures are genuine as there is no thorough verification.
There are sound reasons for reconsidering the drugs war. It is hard to conceive how a better regulated drugs market is comparable to a market where retailers are penalised for selling tobacco and clear attempts made to make tobacco invisible in the retail environment – effectively to discourage sales. This is poor regulation. It puts the regulator and the purchaser at odds with one another, when they should be on the same side: at least to the extent of ensuring the customer has all relevant information about the product before making a purchase.
The campaign for plain packaging makes the unwarranted assumption that the mere presence of laws (and the absence of tobacco from view) will prevent youth take-up of smoking. The campaign against the drugs war simply recognises that illegal drugs make life more difficult for everybody by putting supply in the hands of the ruthless and the lawless. It also recognises that enormous profits are being made from drug trafficking.
Avaaz fails to make this connection. I am glad to see some of its Facebook supporters complaining about this campaign too!
Plain packaging: ruling expected next week
Look for an announcement Wednesday, says the Sydney Morning Herald. A detailed judgement will not be available immediately but we will know in essence whether the legal challenge has won the day.
Sunday, 5 August 2012
Sunday Post reports dangers of counterfeit tobacco
To its credit the Sunday Post has published a story on the dangers of illicit cigarettes (the story is not published online). It reports the views of Roy Ramm, former Commander of Specialist Operations at New Scotland Yard, who 'has witnessed the illicit tobacco trade explode from a small-time cottage industry to a multi-billion pound trade of global proportions in his 30 year career'.
The content of these illegal products is, by definition, unregulated. Ramm speculates that 'fake fags can be 50 times more dangerous than normal cigarettes', as they may contain 'arsenic, asbestos or rat poison'. Unlike anti-smoking campaigners he is prepared to acknowledge a difference between a hazardous product that it regulated and a hazardous product that is not. To the anti-smoking zealot, there is no difference between regulating a product and condoning it. Ramm is able to make this distinction, but the anti-smoker cannot say that fake fags are particularly dangerous without worrying about the implication that 'normal' ones are less dangerous.
As per usual, Cancer Research UK is quoted in the article denying that plain packaging will have any impact on smuggling. To the extent that the plain packaging policy is not in place anywhere it may be hard to produce tangible evidence for an increase in tobacco smuggling.
But the logic of tobacco control is to denormalise smoking. I reported recently the story of a tobacconist forced by law to stop calling his shop 'tobacconist'. How are shops meant to convey what they have to offer the customer in the face of such laws? And if shoppers cannot find the legal product in their high street or local shop, where are they supposed to go? Anti-smoking campaigners cannot seem to see the hazard to the smoker in such a policy direction – or if they can see it they blame the smoker for wanting the product or the evil bastard who is prepared to supply it.
Nowhere do they blame themselves for failing to accommodate tastes that are more risky than their own. In their blindness they undo all the good work of regulators who have worked out what legal additives may be used in tobacco: first by insisting on extremely high tax levels, and then by hampering the operations of legal outlets, in the misguided hope that it will stop customers wanting the product at all.
Just as banning boxing would not stop people fighting (only ensure they did it without any recognised constraints, rules or etiquette), so this all-but-prohibitionist approach to tobacco will not stop people taking narcotics – especially in this age of economic austerity, where money is tight for so many. If a known risk is made inaccessible, life becomes more precarious and the quantity of unknown risks increases.
Cancer Research should note: it is not enough to say that plain packaging will not encourage smoking. They should absolutely lay off their policy of denormalising smokers and everybody involved in supplying legal and regulated tobacco. Smuggling of tobacco is already on an upward trajectory and plain packaging will do nothing to stop it.
A skeleton of this story appears online today in the Scotsman: perhaps the discussion will shed more light on it!
The content of these illegal products is, by definition, unregulated. Ramm speculates that 'fake fags can be 50 times more dangerous than normal cigarettes', as they may contain 'arsenic, asbestos or rat poison'. Unlike anti-smoking campaigners he is prepared to acknowledge a difference between a hazardous product that it regulated and a hazardous product that is not. To the anti-smoking zealot, there is no difference between regulating a product and condoning it. Ramm is able to make this distinction, but the anti-smoker cannot say that fake fags are particularly dangerous without worrying about the implication that 'normal' ones are less dangerous.
As per usual, Cancer Research UK is quoted in the article denying that plain packaging will have any impact on smuggling. To the extent that the plain packaging policy is not in place anywhere it may be hard to produce tangible evidence for an increase in tobacco smuggling.
But the logic of tobacco control is to denormalise smoking. I reported recently the story of a tobacconist forced by law to stop calling his shop 'tobacconist'. How are shops meant to convey what they have to offer the customer in the face of such laws? And if shoppers cannot find the legal product in their high street or local shop, where are they supposed to go? Anti-smoking campaigners cannot seem to see the hazard to the smoker in such a policy direction – or if they can see it they blame the smoker for wanting the product or the evil bastard who is prepared to supply it.
Nowhere do they blame themselves for failing to accommodate tastes that are more risky than their own. In their blindness they undo all the good work of regulators who have worked out what legal additives may be used in tobacco: first by insisting on extremely high tax levels, and then by hampering the operations of legal outlets, in the misguided hope that it will stop customers wanting the product at all.
Just as banning boxing would not stop people fighting (only ensure they did it without any recognised constraints, rules or etiquette), so this all-but-prohibitionist approach to tobacco will not stop people taking narcotics – especially in this age of economic austerity, where money is tight for so many. If a known risk is made inaccessible, life becomes more precarious and the quantity of unknown risks increases.
Cancer Research should note: it is not enough to say that plain packaging will not encourage smoking. They should absolutely lay off their policy of denormalising smokers and everybody involved in supplying legal and regulated tobacco. Smuggling of tobacco is already on an upward trajectory and plain packaging will do nothing to stop it.
A skeleton of this story appears online today in the Scotsman: perhaps the discussion will shed more light on it!
Friday, 3 August 2012
Scotsman: Bill Jamieson on unflattering research of NRT
The piece is here. The third paragraph is enticing:
ASH Scotland's daily bulletin doesn't get very deep into this analysis, but comments on the article thus:
Perhaps they didn't like the way Sheila was described in Jamieson's article. But it's always tough at the top.
Jamieson goes on: 'Well, there’s only one thing wrong with NRT. It doesn’t work,' and goes on to explain the research done by Patrick Basham and John C. Luik that sets out the position.Pass me my nicotine patches and the NiQuitin mint drops. I am on Day 23 of what Sheila Duffy, Reichsmarshall of that crack Panzer Division “Action on Smoking and Health” who has forced me to stand outside on countless rain-soaked pavements would doubtless call a Smoking Cessation Programme. I may be quitting fags after 50 years. But I sure ain’t quitting nicotine.
ASH Scotland's daily bulletin doesn't get very deep into this analysis, but comments on the article thus:
His stance against pharmaceutical products developed to help smokers quit is based on a review by Patrick Basham and John C Luik who are both noted for their links with the tobacco industry.(This quotation comes complete with links to Tobacco Tactics, which inspiration for Tobacco Control Tactics.) 'Links' with tobacco companies can cover a multitude of sins, but if you are opposed to people in the pharmaceutical camp there is no point whatever in going to them for funding. All research is paid for, to the extent now that it is very hard to believe any of it. I can only say that ASH Scotland's dismissal of Basham and Luik's contribution is easy. All they have to do is refer to the tobacco connection, and the job is done.
Perhaps they didn't like the way Sheila was described in Jamieson's article. But it's always tough at the top.
Only officials want to get at smokers? BBC interview
Had to like this clip: features Carol Cattell from Freedom2Choose being interviewed by Adrian Goldberg earlier this week.
And I hope the official anti-smokers will take note: smoker hatred comes from them, not from the general population (c. 7.11 minutes into the clip: the discussion starts around 2:33 into the clip). Not content pointing out that the war on smokers is more official than popular, Adrian Goldberg goes further and says that the war on smokers – being an official war that does not represent the view of most people in the street – can be compared with the Iraq War. 'It's a war being carried out in our name', he says, but when it comes to fining people more for litter than for theft, he is on the side of the smoker.
'Goldie' was laughing a bit over the Iraq War comparison – because no doubt it will seem an extreme comparison to many. But the point is the quality of the issue, rather than the scale. Since the system penalises the lesser offender more than the greater one, it can be seen to distort values. At the root of the Iraq war was lies about the military capacity of Saddam Hussein. At the root of the current war on smokers is a determination to denormalise smokers because of the perceived danger of secondary smoke. The evils of both Saddam and smoking are not the issue: the issue is that legislators have chosen to pursue a course a propaganda war in order to achieve their aims.
For this issue, we can see huge fines imposed on droppers of tobacco related litter, while other litter is ignored for propaganda purposes, and other petty or less petty crimes (such as the thefts that Goldie used as a comparison) are portrayed by officials as less heinous than the dropping of tobacco litter. This is the point where we are no longer equal under the law, which is being used by the powerful for their own ends.
And I hope the official anti-smokers will take note: smoker hatred comes from them, not from the general population (c. 7.11 minutes into the clip: the discussion starts around 2:33 into the clip). Not content pointing out that the war on smokers is more official than popular, Adrian Goldberg goes further and says that the war on smokers – being an official war that does not represent the view of most people in the street – can be compared with the Iraq War. 'It's a war being carried out in our name', he says, but when it comes to fining people more for litter than for theft, he is on the side of the smoker.
'Goldie' was laughing a bit over the Iraq War comparison – because no doubt it will seem an extreme comparison to many. But the point is the quality of the issue, rather than the scale. Since the system penalises the lesser offender more than the greater one, it can be seen to distort values. At the root of the Iraq war was lies about the military capacity of Saddam Hussein. At the root of the current war on smokers is a determination to denormalise smokers because of the perceived danger of secondary smoke. The evils of both Saddam and smoking are not the issue: the issue is that legislators have chosen to pursue a course a propaganda war in order to achieve their aims.
For this issue, we can see huge fines imposed on droppers of tobacco related litter, while other litter is ignored for propaganda purposes, and other petty or less petty crimes (such as the thefts that Goldie used as a comparison) are portrayed by officials as less heinous than the dropping of tobacco litter. This is the point where we are no longer equal under the law, which is being used by the powerful for their own ends.
Wednesday, 1 August 2012
From Linda Bauld: the case for plain packaging (UK Smoking Cessation Conference address)
Here's Linda Bauld's spiel.
She sticks fairly closely to the slide show, reproduced below the audio clip.
I thought I would present it here as we are near the end of the consultation period on this (12 August). To me (cynic that I am) it sounds as if she is saying the following:
1. There is no empirical evidence about plain packaging because it is not in place anywhere yet.
2. We have been asked by the government to compile evidence and we have done so using reports of varying quality that somehow combine to make a very strong case.
3. It is quite untrue that our academic report is biased. It is all peer reviewed. We chose all the studies and the government chose us to do the work because of our monopoly of wisdom and experience in this particular area.
4. Branded packs are more attractive than plain ones and this suggests that people will be less inclined to choose plain packs even when they can't choose branded ones. Plain packs are associated with older, less attractive and less popular people in society and the young won't want to be associated with that kind of person (this is what it says in the research!)
5. Young people that our colleagues gave plain cigarettes to were too embarrassed to get them out when out with their smoking friends, and more likely to think about quitting. This is ample evidence that they will actually go on to quit when the law is enacted and their friends are all carrying plain packs around.
6. There is no evidence that the policy will result in further extension of illicit tobacco sales (forgot about point 1, where it says there is no evidence about any aspect of the policy, because it has not been implemented anywhere yet).
For more about peer reviewing see here. It does not prove worth. This whole area of research is led by policy requirements, and peer review is alleged here to be part of this process.
She sticks fairly closely to the slide show, reproduced below the audio clip.
I thought I would present it here as we are near the end of the consultation period on this (12 August). To me (cynic that I am) it sounds as if she is saying the following:
1. There is no empirical evidence about plain packaging because it is not in place anywhere yet.
2. We have been asked by the government to compile evidence and we have done so using reports of varying quality that somehow combine to make a very strong case.
3. It is quite untrue that our academic report is biased. It is all peer reviewed. We chose all the studies and the government chose us to do the work because of our monopoly of wisdom and experience in this particular area.
4. Branded packs are more attractive than plain ones and this suggests that people will be less inclined to choose plain packs even when they can't choose branded ones. Plain packs are associated with older, less attractive and less popular people in society and the young won't want to be associated with that kind of person (this is what it says in the research!)
5. Young people that our colleagues gave plain cigarettes to were too embarrassed to get them out when out with their smoking friends, and more likely to think about quitting. This is ample evidence that they will actually go on to quit when the law is enacted and their friends are all carrying plain packs around.
6. There is no evidence that the policy will result in further extension of illicit tobacco sales (forgot about point 1, where it says there is no evidence about any aspect of the policy, because it has not been implemented anywhere yet).
For more about peer reviewing see here. It does not prove worth. This whole area of research is led by policy requirements, and peer review is alleged here to be part of this process.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)