In recent decades, the alcohol, tobacco and food and beverage industries have become the leading global providers of public information about their products and their health impact, spending far more than governments or public health agencies to disseminate messages to consumers.
At the American Public Health Association meeting in Boston last week, Corporations and Health Watch sponsored a session that examined the implications of this corporate takeover for the discipline and profession of health education and for the prevention of chronic diseases, now the world’s leading killers.
First, Cheryl G. Healton, Dean of the New York University Global Institute of Public Health and former CEO of the American Legacy Foundation described the role of the tobacco industry in promoting its products and compared its strategies to those used by the food and beverage and alcohol industries.
Next, Michele Simon from Eat Drink Politics and the author of Appetite for Profit examined the food and beverage industry. In her report And Now a Word From Our Sponsors,she described the ways the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics collaborates with the food industry, jeopardizing the credibility of nutritionists and nutrition educators.
David H. Jernigan, the Director of the Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth at the Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University analyzed the role of the alcohol industry in educating consumers and policy makers about alcohol and described some of the ways the industry sought to influence alcohol policy.
Finally, Nicholas Freudenberg from City University of New York School of Public Health and Hunter College, who served as moderator, discussed the roles that health educators and other public health professionals can play in mobilizing various constituencies to oppose the takeover of health education by the alcohol, food and beverage and tobacco industries.
Eurocare, the European Alcohol Policy Alliance, announced that last month, several of its members left the European Alcohol and Health Forum (EAHF), a European Commission body formed to address and reduce alcohol-related harm. The NGOs have been disillusioned with the ability of EAHF to provide effective and efficient changes to reduce alcohol-related harm across the EU. A call for stronger regulations, abandoning of the self-regulation policy and exclusion of industrial interests follows the announcement.
On October 7-9, the city of Seoul, Korea served as host for the third Global Alcohol Policy Conference. At the conference, more than 850 participants from 45 countries discussed the current state of science-based alcohol policies, recent successes in the alcohol policy field, the prospects for improvement, and the challenges facing alcohol policy advocates.
One important theme running through the conference was the role of the global alcohol industry in maintaining and intensifying alcohol-related harm through its tactics and practices.
Dr. Thomas Babor of the University of Connecticut, for example, stressed reasons to doubt the sincerity of the global alcohol industry in its insistence to be part of the solution to alcohol problems. This is particularly true, given that the strategy of the multi-national alcohol producers and their industry associations and social aspects organizations is clearly to increase overall consumption – a strategy which is inimical to public health and public safety. Additionally, the industry clings to “self-regulation” – a strategy Babor described as “spectacularly ineffective” in actually preventing industry misconduct or associated alcohol-related harms.
Other plenary speakers and workshop presenters illustrated specific cases of alcohol industry efforts either to prevent evidence-based policies from taking effect or to render such policies ineffective. Dr. Ronald Laranjeira (Professor of the Federal University of São Paulo [UNIFESP], Brazil; Director of Alcohol and Drug Research Unit of UNIAD) described the almost total lack of functional alcohol policies in much of Latin America. He called attention to the suspension of a national ban on the sales of alcohol beverages in soccer stadia during the forthcoming 2014 World Soccer Cup in Brazil. The removal of the ban was forced by the Fédération Internacionale de Football Association (FIFA), linked to that organization’s multimillion-dollar contract with Anheuser-Busch InBev’s Budweiser brand.
Similarly, Dr. Evelyn Gillan, Chief Executive of Alcohol Focus Scotland (AFS), Scotland’s national alcohol charity, addressed the tactics of the Scotch Whiskey Association to work to prevent or delay implementation of the Scottish Government’s Minimum Unit Pricing policy.
In South Africa – and the rest of that continent – multinational brewer SABMiller has made clear its intention to “grow per capita beer consumption.” Dr. Charles Parry, Director of the South African Medical Research Council’s Alcohol & Drug Abuse Research Unit (ADARU), described the efforts of SABMiller and other alcohol operators to resist a proposed total ban on alcohol advertising. Specifically, he listed the various arguments marshaled by industry groups and related associations and media outlets – all of which should be familiar to public health advocates vying with health-harming industries:
Casting doubt on the underlying science (the “scientific evidence is not uniform”)
Warning of the “unintended consequences” of regulating industries, including dire economic consequences
Claiming that the measures would be disproportionately burdensome to small businesses (“hurt the little guy”). (Dr. Parry noted that this claim begs the question: if this measure is so beneficial to big business, why would SABMiller raise such vigorous opposition?)
Finally, one of the workshops at GAPC 2013 specifically addressed alcohol industry influences in the alcohol policy process.
During that session, Professor Jeff Collin (Director of the Global Public Health Unit at the University of Edinburgh) called out the disconnect between the British government’s ostensible embrace of a multi-sectoral approach to global health in its “Health is Global” framework – and the reality of its trade policy, including the active promotion of hard liquor as a key export.
Sven-Olov Carlsson, International President of IOGT International, compared the tactics of Big Alcohol to those of Big Tobacco and found many parallels, including the creation of front groups to “fill the policy space.”
Sri Lanka’s Shakyra Nanayakkara detailed the various legal maneuvers utilized by alcohol industry interests to undermine that nation’s National Authority on Tobacco and Alcohol (NATA) Act – which prohibits the sale of alcohol and tobacco to person under the age of twenty-one. These maneuvers include legal challenges and infiltrating the NATA training panel with industry-funded lawyers.
A key takeaway of the conference is that understanding the current gap between alcohol policy science and alcohol policy practice is impossible without taking into consideration the machinations of an industry which profits handsomely from underage and excessive adult alcohol consumption.
Thus, reducing the global burden of alcohol-related harm will require advocates to effectively counter that industry influence – through reliance on the best science, savvy media advocacy, and robust grassroots organization.
By Robert Pezzolesi is the Founding Director at NY Center for Alcohol Policy Solutions/NY Alcohol Policy Alliance
In a blog on PLOS Medicine, Heather Wipfli, from the University of Southern California, highlights the lack of consensus regarding the role of private industry in efforts to control the burden of non-communicable diseases. At the May meetings of the World Health Assembly, there was widespread discussion about the role of the private sector in NCD control. While WHO’s position on the tobacco industry is definitive, the definition and parameters of partnerships with other industries driving NCD epidemics are not, despite recent efforts to put safeguards in place. The lack of clarity on when and how to engage with the private sector and the increasing push for public-private partnerships to address global health challenges provides industries with vested interests in policy outcomes direct access to, and greater influence on, decision makers.
Lethal But Legal: Corporations, Consumption, and Protecting Public Health
By Nicholas Freudenberg published by Oxford University Press in February 2014 with new paperback edition with an afterword by the author released in March 2016.
“In his new book, “Lethal but Legal: Corporations, Consumption, and Protecting Public Health” Freudenberg’s case is that the food industry is but one example of the threat to public health posed by what he calls “the corporate consumption complex,” an alliance of corporations, banks, marketers and others that essentially promote and benefit from unhealthy lifestyles. It sounds creepy; it is creepy. .. Freudenberg details how six industries — food and beverage, tobacco, alcohol, firearms, pharmaceutical and automotive — use pretty much the same playbook to defend the sales of health-threatening products. This playbook, largely developed by the tobacco industry, disregards human health and poses greater threats to our existence than any communicable disease you can name.” – Mark Bittman, contributing op-ed writer,New York Times
“A superb, magnificently written, courageous, and compelling exposé of how corporations enrich themselves at the expense of public health—and how we can organize to counter corporate power and achieve a healthier and more sustainable food environment. This should be required reading for anyone who cares about promoting health, protecting democratic institutions, and achieving a more equitable and just society.” –Marion Nestle, Professor of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health, New York University; author of Food Politics: How the Food Industry Influences Nutrition and Health.
In this century, it is estimated that one billion people will die prematurely because of tobacco use, according to “Lethal but Legal,” a smart new book about corporate irresponsibility by Nicholas Freudenberg, a professor of public health at City University of New York. Put that one billion in perspective. That’s more than five times as many people as died in all wars of the 20th century. Freudenberg notes that smoking grew in part because of deliberate manipulation of the manipulation of the public by tobacco companies. For example, tobacco executives realized that they could expand their profits if more women smoked, so they engineered a feminist-sounding campaign to get females hooked: “Women! Light another torch of freedom! Fight another sex taboo!”– Nicholas Kristof in the New York Times
“A reservoir of constructive indignation that can arouse all Americans who adhere to basic human values.” ―Ralph Nader
“Freudenberg is optimistic that, despite the enormity of the challenges facing us as we confront the power of the multinational companies, a tipping point will be reached when the many thousands of pro-health organisations around the world come together and create the political power—and therefore the political will—necessary for success. Lethal But Legal buoyed my optimism.” Robert Beaglehole, The Lancet
“A real eye-opener. Freudenberg lays out the labyrinth of connections between corporate misbehavior and the health of the world, then gives a roadmap to fix it. I love this book.” –Cheryl G. Healton, Director, NYU Global Institute of Public Health; former President and CEO, American Legacy Foundation
“After documenting how multinational corporations manipulate us into hyperconsumption, this book goes on to identify the strategies we can, together, use to liberate ourselves.” –Richard Wilkinson, Emeritus Professor of Social Epidemiology, University of Nottingham
Lethal but Legal examines how corporations have shaped ― and plagued― public health over the last century, first in industrialized countries and now in developing regions. It is both a current history of corporations’ antagonism towards health and an analysis of the emerging movements that are challenging these industries’ dangerous practices. The reforms outlined here aim to strike a healthier balance between large companies’ right to make a profit and governments’ responsibility to protect their populations. While other books have addressed parts of this story, Lethal but Legal is the first to connect the dots between unhealthy products, business-dominated politics, and the growing burdens of disease and health care costs. By identifying the common causes of all these problems, then situating them in the context of other health challenges that societies have overcome in the past, this book provides readers with the insights they need to take practical and effective action to restore consumers’ right to health. Nicholas Freudenberg, DrPH, is Distinguished Professor of Public Health at the City University of New York School of Public Health and founder and director of Corporations and Health Watch, an international network of activists and researchers that monitors the business practices of the alcohol, automobile, firearms, food and beverage, pharmaceutical, and tobacco industries.
Four alcohol brands – Patron tequila, Hennessy cognac, Grey Goose vodka, and Jack Daniel’s whiskey – accounted for more than half of alcohol brand mentions in the songs that mentioned alcohol use in Billboard’s most popular song lists in 2009, 2010 and 2011, according to a new study published online by Substance Use & Misuse. The first study to examine the context of specific brand mentions in depth, researchers found that alcohol use was portrayed as overwhelmingly positive, with negative consequences rarely given.
In an editorial in Addiction, David Jernigan explains that South Africa’s proposed ban on alcohol advertising in Africa is a bellwether for the continent, whose populations are already among the most adversely affected by alcohol use in the world. An advertising ban may give the public health community a chance to keep the abstainers abstaining, and to convince the heavy drinkers that there are better ways to live—and die.
Health groups have strongly condemned the government for last week’s decision to shelve minimum unit pricing for alcohol and substitute a series of measures to curb excessive drinking that they say will not work. They warn that more lives will now be lost, reports the Guardian. The Alcohol Health Alliance (AHA) accused the government of buckling to pressure from the drink industry, which has fiercely opposed minimum pricing – a measure which is supported by doctors, children’s charities, pub landlords and the police.
A renewed effort in the United Kingdom to phase out sponsorship of sports events by the alcohol industry has elicited predictable industry responses, reports the Irish Times. Senior sporting figures have been lined up to warn of the dangers of removing sponsorship by alcohol companies. As usual, alcohol companies are positioning themselves as philanthropists. Yet the reality is that sponsorship helps secure a whole new generation of drinkers. Read more.
In a new report called Stick to the Facts, Alcohol Concern, a United Kingdom charity working on alcohol issues, calls for a ban on alcohol advertising at music and sporting events in an effort to protect young people from such promotional messages. The report concludes that “advertising self-regulation is insufficient. Regulation needs to be independent of interested industries and given real teeth” in order to offer a “ framework of effective regulatory controls that balances commercial with public interest.”
Corporations and Health Watch 