Re: Regulation as a barrier to reduced harm

General

Regulation as a barrier to reduced harm

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Anonymous 06-05-2006, 6:32 AM

It seems that despite the efforts of many manufacturers to reduce the potential harm of their products -smokeless or otherwise - there needs to be a regulatory framework in place (in every country where tobacco is used) to assess any claims about reduced harm made by a manufacturer about their product(s).

Without such a framework in place, how can tobacco manufacturers market these reduced harm products without the danger of litigation against them being preclusive to marketing them as such?

Will your research and findings be presented to any governmental bodies to offer insight into a possible framework or criteria for defining a reduced harm product?

Re: Regulation as a barrier to reduced harm

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Paul Bergen 06-05-2006, 2:19 PM
We already know that this is a reduced harm product through the epidemiology.  We know that users of smokeless tobacco live longer and healthier than smokers.  This is not in doubt.  This should be sufficient evidence in and of itself to justify manufacturers to not so much claim that their product is safer but to accurately describe their product as safer.

Though there is nothing necessarily wrong with the principle of a regulatory framework, to wait until it is in place before presenting smokers with this option of reducing their risk seems criminal.  Quite frankly, in regards to tobacco, government agencies have been poor guardians of the public health. Much of the misinformation about smokeless tobacco has come from these quarters. We do hope that government bodies looking into possible regulation take our research into account. 

Unfortunately, the intersection of scientific knowledge and inquiry, political objectives and corporate interests makes these sorts of issues difficult and time consuming.  And as far as smokers are concerned this is a time sensitive issue. 

Re: Regulation as a barrier to reduced harm

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Carl V. Phillips 06-05-2006, 3:32 PM

I understand the concern that manufacturers might not feel at liberty to make reduced-harm claims, even when they are clearly true.  Some people claim they can, but I understand why they are hesitant --I even had a brief debate about this when trying to get a paper published (http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2458/5/31/prepub, Author's comments for Resubmission Version 2).  It would be great if regulations explicitly said that truthful claims are allowed, and companies probably will fear saying anything without that (which I find unfortunate, but not at all surprising).  Unfortunately, new regulations could make things worse rather than better.  Several harm-reduction advocates (Bill Godshall in particular) lobbied against a recent bill in the U.S. legislature that ostensibly regulated tobacco in the public interest, because they felt that it did more to protect the market for big cigarette companies than anything else.  In particular, it would have actually prevented tobacco companies from making comparative risk claims.

Most of us involved with harm reduction have presented results to governmental bodies.  The European Union, where moist snuff is actually banned outside of Sweden (but cigarettes are allowed and quite popular), is currently considering changing their policy to allow the reduced-harm alternative onto the market, and many of us provided them with our work.

Carl V. Phillips, Associate Professor, University of Alberta School of Public Health