Smoking and Tobacco Control Monograph No. 7 
PARTICIPANT: You said that this information would be useless unless 
smokers had ready access to information, including smokers of generic 
brands. In view of what you said about the FTC's jurisdiction, how do 
you anticipate getting that? 
DR. FREEMAN: This came up very honestly today. We have not had 
time to think in depth about it. This was probably a surprise, even to this 
committee, that that problem is so large, that 40 percent of cigarettes are of 
the generic type, and honestly I do not have a good answer to that question. 
It may be that the FDA and other agencies could help in some respects, but 
I will refer this question to my colleagues to see if there is an answer to that. 
DR. PETITTI: I could only repeat, I think, what we heard this morning, 
which is that some of these changes might, in fact, require congressional 
action, particularly if they resulted in changes in the labeling law. We are 
saying that there may be the need to put things on cigarette packs in order 
to adequately inform the American public about the FTC protocol. 
PARTICIPANT: Looking ahead to the next 5-year review, do you see any gaps 
in research areas that need to be addressed? 
DR. FREEMAN: Yes, we do. First of all, we have this paper. Where we are 
now with respect to our current knowledge, of course, is based on research, 
not perfect research, but we know a lot more now than we knew in 1950, 
when Ernst Wynder and others showed that tobacco is associated with 
death. So, research is a critical element and at any time I think we must act 
on what we know, but we must always move forward to finer knowledge. 
For example, further research is needed to determine the extent to which 
smokers of lower tar and nicotine cigarettes are less likely to attempt to quit 
smoking. There is some preliminary evidence, for example, that low-tar 
smokers may have less tendency to quit smoking. This would be very bad 
if it turns out to be true. It needs further research. 
Next, to adequately understand and evaluate the impact of what 
is called compensation, research is required to assess the extent to which 
other biomarkers are correlated with machine-measured yields of the same 
substance. By compensation we refer to the point that low-tar smokers 
frequently smoke more cigarettes apparently to get the physiological dose 
of nicotine, which of course is an addictive substance. Compensation needs 
to be studied further to see what effect it may have, and certain biomarkers 
may come in handy to help us. Third, the differences in smoking patterns 
in different ethnic groups should be studied for the implications for health 
education and consumer information. We know, for example, that African- 
Americans tend to smoke cigarettes that are higher in tar and tend to smoke 
mentholated cigarettes. Other examples could be given. Poor Americans 
tend to smoke higher tar cigarettes. Educated Americans tend to smoke 
lower tar cigarettes. These are all very important questions that we only 
have preliminary information on, and these things need to be studied much 
more deeply. Finally, a system should be developed to help smokers gauge 
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