BHF report bombs
Wednesday, January 7, 2015 at 9:47 News editors are getting wise, it seems, to the rubbish spewed out by plain packaging campaigners.
I'm not sure I should even dignify the British Heart Foundation's latest report but here goes:
Yesterday, one o'clock, we were sent a press release that began:
Smokers are almost twice as likely to take notice of health warnings on tobacco products when their packaging is stripped of advertising, according to a new report by the British Heart Foundation (BHF).
The BHF’s Standardised Packaging for Tobacco Products report reviewed data from almost 3,000 smokers and ex-smokers to test how effective standardised packaging is as a tobacco control strategy.
The research showed that after tobacco packets were stripped of branding in Australia in December 2012, the number of people taking notice of the warning labels almost doubled.
Naturally we jumped into action and responded with a press release of our own:
Campaigners have dismissed claims by the British Heart Foundation that health warnings have a bigger impact on smokers when tobacco products are stripped of branding.
Simon Clark, director of the smokers' group Forest which runs the Hands Off Our Packs campaign, said:
"There's no evidence plain packaging has had any impact on smoking rates since it was introduced in Australia. The only people who have benefited are counterfeiters and illicit traders.
"Tobacco control campaigners said graphic health warnings would deter people from smoking but they've had minimal effect.
"The fact that they now want to introduce plain packaging is an indictment of existing health warnings and there's nothing to suggest standardised packaging will be any more successful.
"Introducing plain packaging in the UK where illicit trade is already a huge problem would be a big risk with no beneficial effect."
Someone then pointed out something I had forgotten, so we added a further comment:
"Next year, under the EU's Tobacco Products Directive, health warnings will increase substantially in size. Surely government should assess the impact of that policy before proceeding with more regulations?"
We had one media enquiry - from Sky Radio - and that was it.
This morning I can find only two references to the report, one in the Glasgow Herald, the other in its stablemate the Glasgow Evening Times. Media-wise the BHF report has bombed almost without trace.
You can be sure though that copies will be winging their way to ministers and other members of parliament. When they receive it they I hope they will reflect on what I trust is screaming obvious.
One, "twice as likely to take notice of health warnings" is meaningless without knowing how much notice smokers take of health warnings on branded packets.
My guess is the figure is very small so "twice as likely" is still very small. (As someone once said, 2 x 0 = 0.)
Two, there is still no evidence plain packaging works. "Taking notice" of a warning label is quite different to actually quitting (or being deterred from taking up smoking in the first place).
The fact is, if there was any evidence standardised packaging has had an impact on smoking rates in Australia tobacco control campaigners would be shouting it from the rooftops.
Instead they resort to nonsense like this. Even the BBC isn't taken in.
PS. Politics.co.uk has got it spot on here:
New plain packs 'evidence' is worthy of a laugh and little else
Update: Convenience Store has a short piece, including our response, here.
Reader Comments (3)
There is also the rather glaring (and in my view funny) observation that simpy changing the packet design certainly results in more people "noticing" the warning - i.e. if you forced manufacturers to put a cartoon of Bugs Bunny on every pack people will "notice" the change.
This is research by cretins 101.
I stopped supporting the BHF years ago because I found the propaganda it was then producing utterly unacceptable. It seems that nothing has improved so you have saved me the bother of checking to see if it had become more honest. .
Plain packs are ridiculous. They won't reduce smoking. In Australia (which is the model tobacco control advocates point to) the results are not as successful as claimed. The smoking rate was declining before the move to plain packages, cigarettes sales increased, youth smoking actually increased, and illicit tobacco smuggling and black market cigarette trade increased.