[Intl-tobacco] Hungary: Under the Influence of Big Tobacco

[Robert Weissman]

A Taste of the West / Developing Countries Come up Against Big Tobacco
Hungarian Town Under the Influence of Big Tobacco
by Lucrezia Cuen
HUNGARY/GAMBIA;
Source: ABC News, Wednesday, 10/18/00
Dobo Square, the main square in the town of Eger, Hungary. Smoking is on
the
upswing in Eastern Europe and critics charge that American tobacco
company
marketing is getting people hooked at an alarming rate.
(Molnar Istvan Geza)

L O N D O N, Oct. 18
— In the Hungarian town of Eger, northeast of Budapest, if you asked
directions
to its 13th century castle or its famous therapeutic baths the answer
might go
something like this:


“Head down past the Philip Morris symphonic orchestra, take a left when
you see
the Philip Morris sponsored county hospital, a few blocks further you
should
pass the Philip Morris AIDS prevention program, and when you see the
Philip
Morris homeless shelter you are almost there.”

“This situation is not unique,” says Tibor Szilagyi, Secretary of Health
21
Hungarian Foundation, which raises money for health projects. “It’s
happening
in many Hungarian cities. Tobacco companies are entering every segment
of
Hungarian society.”

When Eastern Europe opened up, Western cigarette manufacturers moved
swiftly to
capture the market. They not only open new plants but also poured money
into
local communities. Governments have become dependent on tobacco money,
which
now flows into schools, student scholarship programs, police and fire
brigades,
the Red Cross, even anti-smoking programs.

Tobacco companies say this is simply good corporate citizenship. Critics
say at
best it’s an attempt to buy influence and at worst it is veiled
marketing to
the most vulnerable in society.

When Philip Morris sponsored an anti-smoking campaign in Hungarian
schools in
1996 it used the slogan, “We don’t want our children to smoke. Smoking
is an
adult habit.” The campaign was a spectacular failure.

On the streets of Mexico City a young smoker.

Anti-smoking activists charge tobacco companies are targeting children
in the
developing world. (Tobacco Free Kids)

“Cigarette smoking among secondary-school pupils shot up 20 percent,”
says
Szilagyi, “It was just a trick, they knew what they were doing.”

In Hungary today more than 40 percent of adults smoke cigarettes. The
government is now struggling to fund health services burdened with a 150

percent increase in lung cancer cases among men and a 200 percent
increase for
women.

Exporting an American Problem

Over the past decade the Western tobacco market has continued to
decline.

Big American tobacco companies responded by increasing marketing efforts
in
Eastern Europe, Asia and Africa.

More and more of those efforts are coming under fire.

Tobacco companies have sponsored disco nights from Moscow to Beijing and
Sri
Lanka where free cigarettes are handed out at the door.

In Gambia, the British American Tobacco recently sponsored beach
volleyball
games during a school break where young women on the sidelines hand out
free
cigarettes.

In struggling countries where people dream of the opportunities in
America,
billboards offer them, “The Taste of Freedom,” in cigarettes sold in
red, white
and blue packs.

Tobacco companies have even tried getting sponsorships of zoos in India.

Anti-smoking groups claim the companies are focusing special attention
on the
“untapped markets” of women and children in the developing world.

“This is the worst single thing we do to the rest of the world,” says
former US
Ambassador to Hungary, Mark Palmer an outspoken critic of the tobacco
companies.

The World Health Organization maintains tobacco use is killing four
million
people a year globally. If left unchecked, WHO claims the death toll
will climb
to 10 million annually by the year 2030 and 70 percent of those deaths
will be
in developing countries.

“There is one underlying reality we must all keep in mind,” said WHO
chief
Gro Harlem Brundtland, ex-premier of Norway and a medical doctor,
“Tobacco
remains the only legal consumer product that kills half its regular
users.”

Bitter Battle

In what is bound to be a long, difficult fight, the World Health
Organization
is taking on Big Tobacco, seeking a global treaty to ban tobacco
advertising,
sponsorship and marketing worldwide.

Officials from 191 governments have been meeting in Geneva to begin
negotiating
the treaty that would not only target advertising but could raise
cigarette
taxes, cut output, ban vending machines and control under-age smoking.

Big Tobacco, which wants to avoid a global avalanche of litigation, is
trying
to convince WHO it’s serious about reducing the harm caused by
cigarettes.

“We agree that smoking is addictive,” David Davies, vice president of
corporate
affairs for Philip Morris Europe admitted to a World Health Organization
panel.
He even acknowledged that smoking causes lung cancer and heart disease
but said
it would be wrong to expose tobacco companies to U.S.-style lawsuits in
the
rest of the world.

Tobacco companies say they will support “sensible regulation,” but
defend their
right to sell and advertise cigarettes.

Analysts say the draft treaty, which is being negotiated this week, is a
noble
effort but unlikely to have teeth because many countries may vote
against the
tough proposals.

Tobacco firms are lobbying governments vulnerable to their influence —
governments like Hungary’s — torn between needing the money tobacco
firms
provide and desperate to curb smoking and its crippling health costs.