The Phenol Crisis

On May 22, 1962, the P. Lorillard Company precipitated a crisis within the cigarette industry: it announced that it had introduced a modification to the Micronite filter of its Kent brand that selectively removed 90 percent of the phenols from mainstream smoke (8). (The filter Lorillard had announced for Kent had been produced in collaboration with Dr. Ernst Wynder of the Sloan-Kettering Institute for Cancer Research.) The fallout from this announcement was still being felt in July, and the phenol problem was a major topic of discussion at BAT's 1962 research conference in Southampton.

The phenols were regarded as irritants and probable cocarcinogens. The irritating effects of phenols were thought to account for paralysis of normal ciliary function in the tracheo-bronchial tree that cigarette smoke causes. The cilia, little hairs that line the windpipe, help cleanse the lung by moving mucus up to the throat. As reported in the Wall Street Journal , Lorillard's public relations firm issued a statement claiming that "studies on the cilia in frogs show that the workings of the cilia are unaffected by smoke from Kents with the new filter. ... Smoke from another brand of filter cigarette, it claims, slowed the cilia down by 67 percent, while smoke from an unfiltered cigaret slowed action of the cilia by 85 percent. There is no mention made [by Lorillard's public relations firm] of any research or theories on the possibility that phenols may be cocarcinogens. The statement also claims that in smoke from an unfiltered cigarette there are about 105 micrograms of phenol. By comparison, it claims, there are 35 micrograms in a filtered cigarette, 24 micrograms in an old-style Kent and 12 micrograms in Kents with the new filter" (9). Lorillard's announcement, then, meant that it sought a competitive advantage from a product that seemed to offer a genuinely "health-oriented" benefit.

Ernst Wynder had made numerous contributions to the scientific understanding of cigarettes and disease in the 1950s and 1960s, initially at

Washington University and then at the Sloan-Kettering Institute. He participated in major epidemiological and laboratory studies of smoking and health. In the mid-1950s he developed the mouse skin-painting model that was to become the cigarette industry's standard for assessing the carcinogenicity of cigarette smoke condensate.

In testimony before Congress in 1957, Wynder had pointed out that the cigarette filters of the day were not selective. That is, they did not remove toxins to any greater degree than they removed harmless smoke components (3). He also criticized some cigarette manufacturers for blending the tobaccos in their filter cigarette brands so that they produced smoke with higher levels of tar than came from the nonfilter brands of the same manufacturer. The year before Lorillard's announcement, a paper Wynder and Hoffman had published in the journal Cancer had drawn attention to the fact that the phenolic fraction of cigarette smoke had cocarcinogenic activity (10). This finding provided a rationale for seeking the selective removal of phenols.

The problems that the new Kent filter created for BAT—and, particularly, B&W—are reflected throughout the general proceedings of the Southampton conference {1102.01}. The matter was of such urgency and importance that a special session at the conference was devoted to the problem, and a full transcript of this session, including both the presentations and the discussion, was made {1102.02}. The mood at this session suggested that BAT was about two years behind Lorillard in the development of selective filtration. In his opening remarks at this session, Sir Charles Ellis acknowledged the profound embarrassment the BAT scientists had felt as well as the challenge that lay before them.

Gentlemen, we must all recognise that it is natural for our Boards to wonder why scientists of another Company should have brought to their Board's attention the possible importance of the problem of the selective filtration of phenols and that we ourselves unfortunately did not. I suspect that this has already been mentioned in their discussions and they are now awaiting anxiously for the next surprise to burst upon them. It is precisely to avoid such unpleasant situations that they provide themselves with expensive research establishments. Let us admit that it would be both natural and reasonable for our Boards to think in this way and irrespective of whether they do or do not, as may be the case, there is definitely something for us to answer. I personally feel this responsibility very keenly for I am in as good a position, if not better, than anyone to know the facts and to guess trends. If there were to be any kicks to be distributed I think they should first land on me. I suggest that this morning anyone should feel free to job [sic ] backwards and say what in their opinion should have been done. If this involves the suggestion that someone should have done some-

thing different or acted more quickly then let it be said openly and frankly—straight speaking—we are all friends.

Now the reason for raising this point in rather a direct manner is because of the overriding importance of making our Group Research a successful reality—a reality which can grapple with situations like this. Obviously, it can be successful Group Research if it expresses joint opinions of you all acting as equals with equal responsibilities. I hope our discussions this morning will help that onwards. {1102.02, pp. 1–2}

These opening remarks were followed by presentations by H. D. Anderson from Millbank, who gave an overview of the situation; by T. M. Wade, Jr., who presented the problem from the B&W perspective; and by Mr. Laporte, who commented on the problem from a Canadian point of view. In his presentation Anderson emphasized the political importance of Lorillard's going public with the connection between phenol and ciliatoxicity, since the impairment of ciliary activity was, in his view, "implicated in the cancer problem" {1102.02, p. 8}.

How important is phenol? There are two sides to this—the scientific side and the political attitude. Let's be quite certain about this: the political implications have at the moment by far the greater importance and they have been summed up very adequately in a letter from Add [Addison] Yeaman, the lawyer at B. & W. Now that Lorillards have come right out into the open and made it publicly known that the [sic ] connection between phenol and cilia activity, and because cilia activity goes back a long way and has been implicated in the cancer problem, the argument would run like this—I quote from Yeaman's letter:

"Query: In this state of knowledge is it negligence on the part of the cigarette manufacturer either

Yeaman was suggesting that B&W had legal vulnerability if it did not act to remove phenols or warn smokers of the problem. Of course, these discussions took place before the advent of warning labels, which, ironically, have had the effect of largely protecting the industry from liability under a failure-to-warn theory.

The phenol crisis presented a real-world example of the competitive problems that would arise if a tobacco company were to develop a "safe" cigarette—most notably, that all other cigarettes would be admittedly more dangerous. The potential liability issues were formidable (see chapter 7).

In his presentation Tom Wade, of B&W research and development, complained about the absence of a cooperative approach in the United States.

This is a typical example of too little, too late. This situation of ours [B&W's] is somewhat different from yours [BAT's] over here as it is now proven that certain elements of the industry will go it alone, rather than through T.I.R.C, in spite of the fact that they are members of the T.I.R.C. That leaves us in a very awkward situation in the States. Of course, we don't know the level of activity of phenols or the importance of them, but the Reader's Digest can make a powerfully good case of this; in all practical purposes they are anti-tobacco to begin with—thanks to their association with our boyfriend (Wynder). Secondly, it increases the circulation [of the Reader's Digest ] by having a good scare ..., and on top of that, they are very much insulted at the United States Government and the Federal Trades [sic ] Commission in particular for having stopped all kinds of reference to filtration in terms of total tar; we can talk about the foolish side if we want to, taste and flavour and so on, but the implications from the medical standpoint are being carried by the Reader's Digest in opposition to the Federal Trades [sic ] Commission. ...

We have gone through to the battle of the total tar and we are now in the battle of the phenols—tomorrow it will be something else. Of course Wynder does not believe that a cigarette will ever be completely safe. {1102.02, pp. 15–16}

The Reader's Digest had a long history of publishing articles about smoking and health, and since the mid-1950s it had published important articles about the relative tar and nicotine deliveries of various filter and nonfilter cigarettes. In 1955 the Federal Trade Commission put a stop to the most obvious health claims in cigarette advertising. References to "health protection" and to "reduced irritation" disappeared and were replaced by what Wade calls "the foolish side," an emphasis on taste and flavor. Wade's complaint, in part, was that although the FTC had barred the manufacturers from making the most flagrant health claims in their cigarette advertising, the Reader's Digest was still publishing articles on the relative benefits of various cigarette brands in terms of tar delivery (11). These articles were, inevitably, detrimental to some particular companies' brands, and the companies could not respond in their advertising.

The phenol crisis illustrates the complex environment in which the R&D scientists operated. Most important, it illustrates the fact that the tobacco companies' scientific agenda was set by competitive and public relations needs as much as by scientific priorities.