Corporations and Health Watch

Norway rules in favor of tobacco display ban

Posted on September 19, 2012 by Corporations and Health Watch

Reuters reports that a Norwegian court has upheld a ban on displaying tobacco products in stores, in a closely-watched ruling as governments across the world look to crack down on smoking to improve public health and cut medical costs. The court on Friday rejected a complaint by Philip Morris, maker of Marlboro cigarettes, which argued the ban violates a free trade agreement linking non-EU member Norway to the European Union’s market rules.

McDonald’s to Post Calories

Posted on September 12, 2012 by Corporations and Health Watch

The world’s No 1 hamburger chain said it would start listing calorie information on menus in 14,000 US restaurants and drive-thrus. The change takes place ahead of a national rule that will require larger restaurant chains to make the disclosures and in conjunction with other corporate policy changes related to obesity and nutrition.

Good News: Tobacco Consumption Drops in Wake of Federal Tax Hike

Posted on September 12, 2012 by Corporations and Health Watch

More than three years after President Obama signed legislation increasing the federal cigarette tax from 39 cents a pack to $1.01 a pack, rates of smoking have dropped.

According to an analysis by USA Today, the decrease in smoking can be seen especially among teens, poor people and those dependent on government insurance. The dip in smokers came after the president signed the tax hike — which was intended to finance expanded healthcare for children — in early 2009 and it went into effect on April 1, 2009.

McDonald’s and Coca-Cola – An Unhealthy Alliance

Posted on September 12, 2012 by Corporations and Health Watch

Cross posted from Appetite for Profit

coke camera — McDonalds-Coca Cola Disposable Camera

This week, the New York City Board of Health is expected to approve Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s proposal to limit the size of sugary soft drinks. Motivated by rising diet-related chronic diseases (along with healthcare costs), the mayor’s attempt to rein in out of control portion sizes caused quite a media firestorm. Predictably, the soda lobby has come out swinging, complete with an industry front group called, “New Yorkers for Beverage Choices.”

A better name would be, “Soda Pushers for Continued Profits.”

According to Beverage Digest, fountain sales (versus packaged) make up about 24 percent of the 9.3 billion cases of soda sold each year, or $18 billion in a total market worth $75.7 billion.

Coca-Cola will be especially impacted by cup size limits, as that company controls 70 percent of U.S. fountain sales, followed by Pepsi with 19 percent and Dr Pepper Snapple with 11 percent.

While it’s obvious that the soda industry would be on the defense, largely missing from the debate so far has been the role of the fast food and restaurant industry as a significant driver of soft drink sales. (Due to legal constraints, the city’s soda proposal would only apply to food service establishments and not retailers.)

The fast food industry has gotten plenty of flak for pushing a diet of cheeseburgers, French fries, and other highly processed pseudo-foods, but they should also be recognized as a major purveyor of sugary beverages.

For example, McDonald’s should be held accountable for its role in allowing the creeping up of cup sizes from a reasonable 7 ounces in 1955, to the current large of 32 ounces (310 calories for Coke), a more than 4-fold increase. Even a child size at 12 ounces is almost twice as large as the original.

The fast food king has already expressed its displeasure with cup size limits, suggesting instead “a more collaborative and comprehensive approach.”

No wonder, since Edward Jones estimates that five percent of McDonald’s revenue comes from soft drinks. Last year, McDonald’s revenue reached a record $27 billion; therefore at least $1.35 billion came from beverages.

That figure may be an underestimate because according to the research firm Technomic, carbonated soft drinks account for about 10 percent of fast-food and fast-casual restaurants sales in the U.S.

Factor in the profit margins on such beverages—estimated to top 90 percent—and as Ad Age noted, “the potential impact on the bottom line becomes clear.”

Whatever the figures, the money at stake here is huge—for both the beverage industry and the fast food industry.

This explains why among those listed as alleged “New Yorkers for Beverage Choices” are not only the major soft drink companies but numerous restaurant chains, including: Carls’ Jr, Chick-Fil-A, Domino’s Pizza, Hardee’s, and of course, the National Restaurant Association, whose members include McDonald’s.

That trade group, along with its network of state restaurant associations, boasts more than 200 national, state, and local lobbyists. The restaurant industry has fought against every common sense nutrition policy over the decades, including menu labeling and regulating marketing to children.

Speaking of children, the downsizing of soft drinks will have an important impact on them as well. Children learn acceptable standards by what appears normal. McDonald’s has been teaching kids that supersized fries, Big Macs, and large sodas are A-OK. By bring cups down to size, children get a better message.

And that’s another reason McDonald’s and the rest of the fast food industry is teaming up with the soft drink lobby to stop this proposal. They don’t want kids to grow up thinking 16 ounces is normal, because that means setting kids up for a lifetime of saner (and healthier) drinking habits.

Industry also knows that if limits are enacted in New York City, it’s only a matter of time before other cities around the nation follow Mayor Bloomberg’s lead.

Get ready for the next front group to pop up in your area, but don’t fall for it. Instead, let’s tell McDonald’s and Coca-Cola that enough is enough.

This post originally appeared on the Corporate Accountability blog.

Bringing Corporations and Health into the Public Health Curriculum

Posted on September 5, 2012 by Corporations and Health Watch

As public health students and faculty head back to school this week, Corporations and Health Watch continues its tradition of starting the academic year with a commentary on teaching about corporations and health. Our argument for including teaching about the impact of corporations on health in public health and related academic programs is based on the following premises:

Corporations are the dominant economic and political institution of the 21^st century and thus have a profound influence on global well-being.
The business and political practices of corporations are a modifiable social determinant of health and thus a promising target for public health interventions.
To achieve local, national and global public health goals of reducing premature mortality, shrinking inequalities in health, and controlling non-communicable diseases and injuries will require making changing corporate behavior as important a public health priority as changing individual behavior.
Few public health academic programs adequately prepare their students to investigate, analyze or contribute to modifying the corporate policies and practices that harm health.

To be effective in fulfilling their responsibility to prevent illness, promote health and reduce health inequalities, public health professionals should be able to demonstrate the following competencies:

Identify corporate business and political practices that affect health.
Develop public health strategies to encourage health-promoting corporate practices and discourage or end health-damaging ones.
Analyze the public health advantages and disadvantages of various government/market relationships
Create alliances with consumer, environmental, labor and health organizations and movements that seek to change harmful corporate practices and policies
Describe the roles of public health professionals and researchers in modifying harmful corporate practices or policies.

These competencies can be developed in several ways. Core public health courses can includes sessions on these topics as they relate to, for example, epidemiology, health policy, environmental health, or health education. Some programs have developed specialized courses on the topic, allowing interested students to pursue this interest. (To see a syllabus for a doctoral course Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Corporations and Health 1900-2012 at City University of New York click here to request a copy.) Or a student-faculty interest group can bring together those who want to pursue research, advocacy or practice on the corporate impact on public health.

Front entrance to the Bloomberg School of Public Health
Photo credit

For the time being, you’re more likely to find a corporate name on the front of a school of public health than to have corporate practices discussed in the classroom. Fortunately, however, a growing number of resources are available to faculty who want to teach about this topic and students who want to learn more or write papers on corporations and health. I offer here a short list of such sources.

10 Sources on Corporations and Health for Use in Basic Public Health Classes

(with suggestions for use in Epidemiology (EPI), Health Policy & Management (HPM), Social and Behavioral Health (SBH), or Environmental & Occupational Health (EOH) Core Courses)

Biglan A. Corporate Externalities: A Challenge to the Further Success of Prevention Science. Prev Sci. 2011; 12(1): 1–11. (HPM, SBH)

Brandt AM. Inventing conflicts of interest: a history of tobacco industry tactics. Am J Public Health. 2012;102(1):63-71.(EPI, SBH, HPM)

Freudenberg N, Galea S. The impact of corporate practices on health: implications for health policy. J Public Health Policy. 2008;29(1):86-104 (SBH,HPM)

Hastings G. Why corporate power is a public health priority. BMJ. 2012;345:e5124.(EPI, HPM, SBH)

Huff, J. 2007. Industry influence on occupational and environmental public health. International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health 13.1: 107–117. (EPI, EOH)

Labonté R, Mohindra KS, Lencucha R. Framing international trade and chronic disease. Global Health. 2011 Jul 4;7(1):21.(EPI, SBH,HPM)

Ludwig DS, Nestle M. Can the food industry play a constructive role in the obesity epidemic? JAMA. 2008 Oct 15;300(15):1808-11.(SBH,HPM)

Stuckler D, McKee M, Ebrahim S, Basu S Manufacturing Epidemics: The Role of Global Producers in Increased Consumption of Unhealthy Commodities Including Processed Foods, Alcohol, and Tobacco. PLoS Med 2012; 9(6): e1001235. (EPI, SBH, HPM)

Wiist, W.H. (Ed). Bottom Line or Public Health. Tactics Corporations Use to Influence Health and Health Policy, and What We Can Do to Counter Them. NY: Oxford University Press, 2010. (relevant chapters for all 4 courses)

Woodcock J, Aldred R. Cars, Corporations, and Commodities: Consequences for the Social Determinants of Health. Emerging Themes in Epidemiology. 2008 Feb 21;5:4. (EPI, EOH, SBH)

In addition to these selected resources, a bibliographic essay on Business and Corporate Practices can be found in the Public Health section of Oxford Online Bibliographies.

Finally, several Corporations and Health Watch contributing writers have websites or blogs that include additional timely material. Check out these sites: David Jernigan, Michele Simon, Bill Wiist.

Previous CHW Posts on Teaching about Corporations and Health

10 Ways to Bring the Health Impact of Business Practices into the Classroom September 2011

Teaching about Corporations and Health June 2010

Teaching about Corporations and Health: Bringing Corporate Practices into Public Health Classrooms December 2007

Australian news coverage of alcohol advertising restrictions

Posted on September 5, 2012 by Corporations and Health Watch

In an article recently posted on BMC Public Health, Andrea Fogarty and Simon Chapman of the Sydney School of Public Health in Sydney, Australia, conclude that restrictions on alcohol advertising currently have low newsworthiness as a standalone issue. Future advocacy might better define the exact nature of required restrictions, anticipate vocal opposition and address forms of advertising beyond televised sport if exposure to advertising, especially among children, is to be reduced.

Britain’s Health Secretary has caved in to fast-food industry, says former adviser

Posted on September 5, 2012 by Corporations and Health Watch

British Secretary of Health Andrew Lansley is guilty of a “dereliction of duty” for failing to tackle Britain’s growing obesity epidemic, one of his former public health advisers warns. In an interview with The Independent, Professor Simon Capewell, who served on the Health Secretary’s Public Health Commission in opposition, accuses Mr. Lansley of conniving with the food industry and ignoring scientific evidence on obesity.

Historic Fuel Efficiency and Auto Pollution Standards Finalized

Posted on August 29, 2012 by Corporations and Health Watch

Cross-posted from the Union of Concerned Scientists News Center

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54.5 Mpg-Equivalent Standard a Big Step toward Halving U.S. Oil Use within 20 Years, Science Group Says

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WASHINGTON (Aug. 28, 2012) – The finalization of historic new federal automobile standards covering new passenger vehicles sold between 2017 and 2025 is one of the biggest actions ever taken to reduce U.S. oil use and a huge step on the path toward halving the country’s projected consumption within 20 years, the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) said today.

Under the new standards, which arose from a widely supported agreement between automakers, the White House, and California state officials, average fuel economy for new cars and light trucks would nearly double, and global warming pollution levels for the new vehicle fleet would be cut in half by model year 2025.

“This is truly a watershed moment. Twenty years from now we’ll be looking back on this as the day we chose innovation over stagnation,” said Michelle Robinson, director of UCS’s Clean Vehicles program. “These standards will protect consumers from high gas prices, curb global warming pollution, cut our oil use, and create new jobs in the American auto industry and around the nation.”

The new standards build on a similar set of regulations that are already saving consumers money at the pump and cutting oil use. The Environmental Protection Agency and Department of Transportation are implementing the standards for model years 2012 through 2016, which allow automakers to produce a fleet of vehicles that simultaneously complies with both the Clean Air Act and Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards.

According to UCS analysis, the combined standards will:

Cut oil use by as much as 3.1 million barrels per day by 2030 – roughly the amount we import from the Persian Gulf and Venezuela combined;
Save consumers $8,000 over the life of a model year 2025 vehicle, compared to the average vehicle on the road today, even after paying for fuel-saving technology; and
Reduce U.S. global warming pollution by as much as 570 million metric tons in 2030, the equivalent of taking a third, or 85 million, of today’s cars and trucks off the road for an entire year.

In addition to support from automakers, lawmakers, scientists, consumer advocates, environmental groups, and national security experts, a recent poll from the Consumer Federation of America found that 74 percent of Americans support the new standards. Most respondents also said they want higher fuel economy in their next vehicle purchase, but despite this deep popularity and the many benefits of the standards, a vocal minority continues to speak out against the rules.

“If you are against these common-sense standards, you are against saving consumers money, against consumer choice, and for leaving our economy open to being crippled yet again by our expensive oil use,” said Robinson.

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Automakers are already producing cleaner, more efficient vehicles that meet the standards.

“From advanced engines and transmissions to hybrid powertrains, automakers are already demonstrating what they can do with fuel-efficient technology,” said Jim Kliesch, research director for the Clean Vehicles program. “Thanks to these standards, this is just the beginning of the fuel-saving choices consumers will have on the showroom floor.”

The new standards are a critical step to turn around our nation’s growing rate of oil consumption, and just one of many. By tapping deeper into existing efficiency technology and promoting innovative solutions here in the United States, our nation can build on the groundwork these standards create and put the nation on a course to cut its projected oil use in half over a 20-year period.

UCS’s Half the Oil Plan lays out a practical and feasible path to reach that goal, and includes technologies and policies that make passenger vehicles and commercial trucks more efficient, hybrid and electric vehicles more practical, and vehicle fuels less polluting.

“Automakers are already showing us what they can do with a skilled and determined workforce,” Robinson said. “We need to build on that groundwork and take an even bigger bite out of our oil consumption.”

Click here to learn more about the new standards and the role they play in long-term oil savings.

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Survey Shows Small Arms Trade Has Doubled Since 2008

Posted on August 29, 2012 by Corporations and Health Watch

In its 2012 report released this week, Small Arms Survey found that legal global trade in small arms has grown to at least $8.5 billion a year. If the illicit trade were added, it would come to more than $10 billion, the weapons research group said Monday. The Small Arms Survey had estimated the global trade in small arms, munitions and spare parts at more than $4 billion four years ago. The countries that export more than $100 million of small arms were the United States, Italy, Germany, Brazil, Austria, Japan, Switzerland, Russia, France, South Korea, Belgium and Spain.

New York State Attorney General Investigates Energy Beverage Firms’ Marketing

Posted on August 29, 2012 by Corporations and Health Watch

The Wall Street Journal reports that New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is investigating whether the multi-billion dollar energy-drink industry is deceiving consumers with misstatements about the ingredients and health value of its products. Schneiderman issued subpoenas to PepsiCo Inc, the makers of AMP, Monster Beverage Corp, and Living Essentials LLC, maker of 5-hour energy drink. The subpoenas asked for information on the companies’ marketing and advertising practices.

Author: Corporations and Health Watch