The ”German Model” in Tobacco Prevention – Made by Imperial Tobacco and Philip Morris

Abstract

A legend is born, the legend of a wonderland in effective tobacco prevention where youth do not smoke because of health education and school programs: Tobacco prevention made in Germany with no regulations of the tobacco industry for example like in United Kingdom (UK) or Ireland. The UK based tobacco company Imperial Tobacco recommends enthusiastically: ”Education programmes – German model: Germany, which permits the advertising and display of tobacco products and has no plans for standardised packaging [...] has a tobacco control strategy with education embedded at its core, and it delivers proven results” (Imperial Tobacco, 2014). The target groups of this message are the governments in Ireland and UK who are planning to introduce plain cigarette packaging with standardised design and the same packaging for all cigarette products so that the tobacco industry can no longer use the packs as an instrument for glamorous advertisement. The first country worldwide that introduced such a new regulation, in 2013, was Australia. Immediately, the tobacco industry challenged the Australian government, but theAustralianCourt ruled pro health, so these plain packs are currently on the market in Australia. Encouraged by this success, Ireland and United Kingdomalso intend go for plain packaging, to protect their citizens, especially their young people against attractive cigarette packaging arguing that this regulation is needed as part of tobacco prevention. Tobacco lobbyists started a campaign against this intention, targeting political decision makers. In a letter to members of the Irish Parliament in November 2013, the tobacco company Philip Morris recommended a change in the Irish tobacco policy. Their misleading contention being that, it was not the tobacco industry that should be regulated, but, rather health education should be introduced for tobacco prevention, according to the best and “effective” example of Germany: ”Educational programmes, seen as and proven to be one of the most effective drivers in discouraging youth smoking and helping smokers quit are proving successful. For example the German programme ”Be Smart – Don t Start” forms part of a comprehensive education programme that has seen youth smoking rates more than halved since 2001” (Dardis, 2013). And other tobacco lobbyists incorrectly suggest in a public letter that the German school-based programmes for smoking prevention are mandatory parts of the German school curriculum (Basham et al., 2013). Yes, it is true, thanks to the comprehensive tobacco prevention strategies, the prevalence of smoking among German youths has decreased over a decade: In 2012, only 12 percent of teenagers aged 12 to 17 smoked, compared to 28 percent in 2001. However, the real reasons for the success in smoking prevention among German youth are severalfold.