History of Smoking and the Tobacco Industry's Efforts to Hide the Dangers — Transcript

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1. 0:04the story starts in the early
2. 0:061950s there had been a number of
3. 0:08scientific studies that had been
4. 0:09performed at that time that established
5. 0:12a strong link
6. 0:15between smoking and cancer the studies
7. 0:21involved uh laboratory rats and painting
8. 0:25the tar that was gathered from the
9. 0:28smoking
10. 0:30byproducts uh painting it on the backs
11. 0:33of of laboratory rats and observing the
12. 0:37growth of cancer on those rats and those
13. 0:40studies received a great deal of public
14. 0:45attention and the the the mass media
15. 0:49began to raise serious questions about
16. 0:52the health effects of smoking as we sit
17. 0:56here today it's hard for us to imagine a
18. 0:59Time when that link between smoking and
19. 1:04cancer was not well established in the
20. 1:07scientific Community but as recently as
21. 1:10the early
22. 1:111950s it was big news when these studies
23. 1:14began to demonstrate dramatically that
24. 1:17that link in fact
25. 1:19existed the result was a very immediate
26. 1:24drop in cigarette sales as the smoking
27. 1:28public reacted to this this bad
28. 1:31news and the cigarette companies
29. 1:33obviously took notice immediately of
30. 1:36what was going on and it was an
31. 1:39emergency in the eyes of the tobacco
32. 1:43industry the top Executives from the
33. 1:47major cigarette manufacturers
34. 1:49interrupted their Christmas vacations in
35. 1:531953 and gathered at the Plaza Hotel in
36. 1:57order to decide how they could respond
37. 2:02to the public reaction to this new and
38. 2:06startling information and before they
39. 2:09conducted that meeting they didn't
40. 2:11consult with health officials or
41. 2:15scientists or persons from the public
42. 2:20health realm their consultations were
43. 2:23with the best advertising agency they
44. 2:28could find and and a decision was made
45. 2:32at that meeting at the Plaza Hotel among
46. 2:36these Chief Executives of the tobacco
47. 2:40manufacturers that what they needed to
48. 2:43do was to
49. 2:46discredit that scientific evidence to
50. 2:49give the American
51. 2:52public the American smoking public
52. 2:55reasons to doubt the accuracy of that
53. 3:00scientific
54. 3:01information and it was at those meetings
55. 3:05that the conspiracy was born and the
56. 3:08plan was hatched
57. 3:11to question the science to fund
58. 3:15competing
59. 3:17studies that would create doubt in the
60. 3:22minds of the general public in spite of
61. 3:25the growing consensus in the legitimate
62. 3:27scientific community
63. 3:30and to try to reverse the trend that had
64. 3:36dramatically developed to reduce smoking
65. 3:41the plan was remarkably successful and
66. 3:44it continued for five decades when the
67. 3:50tobacco industry denied the
68. 3:52addictiveness of nicotine in tobacco
69. 3:56denied the health effect the ill health
70. 3:58effects of smoking
71. 4:00and were able to
72. 4:03maintain an increase in their sales that
73. 4:07resulted in over
74. 4:11400,000 deaths per year for each of
75. 4:16those years for more than 50
76. 4:21years it is an
77. 4:25astounding
78. 4:27example of a success
79. 4:30ful media
80. 4:32campaign that was
81. 4:35designed to conceal the truth and was
82. 4:39designed to mislead the general public
83. 4:44and the internal documents of the
84. 4:45tobacco
85. 4:48industry talk about how very successful
86. 4:52they were in carrying out this campaign
87. 4:55to to mislead and to lie to the American
88. 4:59public
89. 5:00do you agree that people are dying
90. 5:03prematurely as a result of smoking
91. 5:04cigarettes no sir I do notes cause the
92. 5:08death and disease that have been
93. 5:09attributed
94. 5:11to uh my position is simply they may or
95. 5:13they may not