Profits over people: tobacco industry activities to market cigarettes and undermine public health in Latin America and the Caribbean

This report, commissioned by the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) in the summer of 2001, summarizes previously secret tobacco industry documents from the two tobacco industry market leaders in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC): Philip Morris International (PMI) and British-American Tobacco Company (BAT). PMI documents were downloaded off a company web site and BAT documents were obtained from the Guildford Depository in the United Kingdom. Over one thousand documents were reviewed in preparing this report.

These documents reveal that the industry’s strategies forthe LAC region mirror worldwide tactics devised to promote the tobacco companies’ deadly products, increase corporate profits, and forestall any meaningful regulation of the industry’s practices or products. The principal PMI and BAT strategies include opposition both to tax increases and marketing restrictions, as well as maintenance of the social acceptability of smoking. In addition, the documents reveal the industry’s knowledge of and participation in the distribution of cigarettes through illegal channels, euphemistically referred to by the industry as the Duty Not Paid (DNP) market segment.

The report details tobacco company activities under four general themes: general plans and strategies; secondhand smoke; promotional campaigns; and tobacco smuggling. Within all of these themes, there is private confirmation of behavior and motives that the industry publicly denies. These include:

• company research into and deliberate targeting of the youth (“young adult”) market;
• acknowledgement that the primary goal of “youth smoking prevention” campaigns is to shore up the public image of tobacco companies;
• acknowledgement that the secondhand smoke issue and restrictions on smoking in public places constitute an enormous threat to tobacco company revenues;
• development of marketing campaigns, distribution channels, and levels of production aimed deliberately at supporting and encouraging the large market in smuggled cigarettes.

This report provides numerous industry quotes, often from current, highly-placed executives, and offers a regional overview of industry strategies and tactics. However, a detailed country-by-country analysis wasbeyond the scope of this report. For this reason tobacco control advocates and public health professionals in each of the region’s countries are encouraged to pursue more local, in-depth research. Knowledge of the industry’s activities and, more importantly, of its deceptions, will better equip advocates, health professionals and governments to promote effective tobacco control policies in their respective countries. [Adapted from author]