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cigarettes and other forms of tobacco "are addicting"; nicotine is 

 "the drug in tobacco that causes addiction" and "the pharmacologic 

 and behavioral processes that determine tobacco addiction are simi- 

 lar to those that determine addiction to such drugs as heroin and 

 cocaine." 



Another impact of the industry's suppression campaign on Gov- 

 ernment policy relates to research on a less hazardous cigarette. I 

 use the term "less hazardous", Mr. Chairman, rather than the in- 

 dustry's term "safer cigarette" because the only safe cigarette is one 

 that is not lit. 



In August 1978, President Carter spoke of the possibility of a 

 safer cigarette. He was concerned about the tobacco farmers at that 

 time. Based on the advice of Dr. Richmond, I told the President 

 that there was no such thing as a safer cigarette, that what little 

 research had been done seemed to be going nowhere, and the talk 

 of one would undermine the public health. 



The National Institutes of Health had funded some outside re- 

 search on reducing the hazards of cigarettes under the direction of 

 Dr. Gio Batta Gori. That research was not promising, and Dr. Rich- 

 mond and I decided not to pursue it. Had we known what the to- 

 bacco companies knew at the time, we would undoubtedly have 

 conducted additional research to see if there was any possibility of 

 producing a less hazardous cigarette. To this day, however. Dr. 

 Richmond reminds me that our scientific knowledge suggests that 

 as long as cigarettes contain tobacco there is no such thing as a 

 safe cigarette. 



Thus, in two respects the tobacco companies' disinformation and 

 concealment campaign distorted the policy of the Carter adminis- 

 tration. First, they were able to avoid any attempt to regulate them 

 by hiding the research they had on the addictive nature of nicotine; 

 and, second, they led us to commit fewer resources to researching 

 the possibility of a less hazardous cigarette. 



The success of the anti-smoking campaign after the second Sur- 

 geon General's report is evidence that knowledge about the dangers 

 of smoking affects the smoking habits of America. In the 13 years 

 from 1965 to 1978, the portion of the population that smoked fell 

 from 40 percent to 34 percent, a decline of 6 percentage points. In 

 the 13 years since 1978 and the release of the second Surgeon Gen- 

 eral's report in 1979, the portion of the population that smoked fell 

 from 34 percent to 25 percent, a decline of 9 percentage points, a 

 50 percent greater drop. 



If our message had not been diluted by the big lie advertising of 

 the tobacco companies in their effort to portray smoking as chic 

 and healthy, we have every reason to believe that the drop in ciga- 

 rette smoking would have been much faster beginning in 1964. 



Perhaps most disturbing, by deciding to conceal and deny the 

 deadly consequences and addictive nature of smoking, tobacco com- 

 panies brought — tobacco companies bought the time to scrounge for 

 new markets. They chose two targets that were particularly vulner- 

 able to the advertising pitch of cigarettes, women and minorities. 



According to a report in Vogue magazine, in the 1960's, the to- 

 bacco industry placed 90 percent of its magazine ads in publica- 

 tions aimed mainly at men. By the late 1970's the industry was 

 running half its ads in women's magazines. It paid off for them. 



