On Tuesday, U.K. Health Minister Tessa Jowell wrote to fellow European Union health ministers seeking their support for exempting Formula One auto racing events from the proposed EU ban on nearly all tobacco company advertising and promotional activities. This follows on the heels of a recent Labour government decision to postpone its own white paper and draft bill on tobacco advertising and sponsorship until after the EU health ministers' Dec. 4 vote. So is tobacco getting a reprieve from its status as a favorite regulatory punching bag? Hardly. Both the Labour government, and its EU partners, remain keen to clip the industry's wings.
This became clear when the Labour government recently applauded a decision by the Cancer Research Campaign, a prominent U.K.-based medical research charity, to shift to a "war footing" against tobacco companies. At the end of last month, the CRC announced that it will no longer provide grants to research teams who receive funding from tobacco companies, boasting that it was the first scientific organization to take an ethical stand against tobacco money.
The CRC's crusade was prompted by last year's Cambridge University vote, by a two-to-one margin, to accept a $2.5 million donation by British American Tobacco Industries PLC to fund a chair of international relations. The CRC was among those who threatened to withdraw future research funding for the university, which at the time amounted to $3.8 million annually. Ultimately, the CRC relented, and instead launched its recently unveiled "tobacco code of practice," which received ringing endorsements from the medical research community as well as Ms. Jowell. She praised the initiative as "bold and imaginative" and consistent with the government's commitment to developing a "tobacco control strategy."
The tobacco industry, it is estimated, provides several million pounds annually for medical research in British universities. Such funding has led to scores of published research and in-depth projects examining the origins and mechanisms of disease statistically associated with smoking (269 research papers that acknowledged industry support were published between 1988 and 1994 alone). The notion that tobacco funding compromises the quality of the research stands up to close scrutiny about as well as a bogus experiment.
Contrary to the impression created by CRC and others, tobacco companies have set up strict research-funding guidelines to ensure the integrity of the projects they fund. To receive BAT funding, for example, scientists must submit a proposal for review by a panel of consultants and independent scientists, wholly separated from BAT. Upon acceptance, grant recipients are free to publish their results and to decide whether or not to acknowledge BAT's funding, which casts doubt on CRC's claim that tobacco companies are always seeking to gain public approval and respect. Scientists claim the research as their own, demonstrating that BAT does not seek to influence the outcomes.
One of the largest tobacco companies, Philip Morris, often gives money with no strings attached to a specific department in a university. If it does decide to fund a specific project, it sets up an independent board of experts in their field to monitor the research. As a spokeswoman for Philip Morris noted, "What good would it do us to have just a bunch of tobacco experts on the board?"
These safeguards of course do not guarantee that the result will always be good science; they simply offer a reasonable assurance that the scientific process is not compromised by interference from the sponsor.
Image-conscious companies such as BAT and Philip Morris donate money to various causes (which include substantial non- tobacco related activities) not out of pure altruism but because they believe it helps improve the way society views the industry. That is precisely why industry has every interest in seeing that the research it funds is as rigorous and independent as possible. And with all things tobacco under intense scrutiny these days, it's far- fetched indeed to conclude that a scientist would risk both his career and his reputation in the medical community, whatever the bait, for the sake of a tobacco sponsor.
Taken to its logical conclusion, the reasoning used by the CRC would have far-reaching consequences. As Tobacco Manufacturers' Association spokesman John Carlisle asks, will CRC street collectors inquire of every private citizen offering a donation whether they are smokers, or whether they work for a tobacco company? Indeed, in the interest of consistency, should not the CRC snub any institution accepting money from the European Commission, which provides significant subsidies to tobacco growers, the source of all evil?
Diane Jarnham, a representative from the Association of Medical Research Charities, says these issues featured prominently in a recent AMRC discussion. "If a BAT employee offers a donation based on a give-as-you-earn scheme, where the company matches the employee's gift, what do you do?," she asks. "And what about a gift from a grocery chain that sells tobacco?" The AMRC however warmly welcomed the CRC's initiative and is currently drawing up guidelines to help its members navigate these difficult ethical waters.
As Labour's hop on the bandwagon demonstrates, an antitobacco stance is proving to be sure-fire politics. But however unsavory one might find these companies or their products, the producing, marketing and selling of tobacco is not illegal. A private charity or research organ is free to discriminate against industries or companies it finds offensive, but a line has surely been crossed when governments endorse interference in scientific research and seek to abridge the free-speech rights of an industry they have not chosen to outlaw.
Ms. Laffer is production editor for the Wall Street Journal Europe editorial page.
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