The Industry's Public Statements On Nicotine

The tobacco industry has repeatedly told the public that nicotine is not addictive. Most specifically and most dramatically, at a congressional hearing on April 14, 1994, seven tobacco company CEOs—each in turn—stated that nicotine is not addictive. Thomas Sandefur, the CEO of B&W, testified, "I do not believe that nicotine is addictive."

In discussing the pharmacological properties of nicotine, the industry has largely relied on the way nicotine was discussed in the 1964 Surgeon General's report (2). This report draws a distinction between habituating and addicting drugs based on the then current understanding of the importance of tolerance and withdrawal phenomena in defining addiction. However, the report clearly states that nicotine is responsible for a variety of pharmacological actions in smokers and that the habituating nature of the process can make it difficult to stop. The addictive nature of nicotine is now well documented and widely appreciated (3). Significantly, even before the 1964 Surgeon General's report, B&W and BAT privately had concluded that nicotine is addictive.

Although industry representatives have suggested that nicotine contributes to the flavor of tobacco, the Food and Drug Administration, in its investigation of nicotine-containing cigarettes and smokeless tobacco products, found no evidence that nicotine serves such a function (6). In fact, the agency found that consumers perceive nicotine as an irritant, and that the industry uses additives to disguise the sensations which nicotine contributes to the experience of ingesting tobacco products.

The documents include an example of one industry formula for discussing the addiction question. It is contained in an undated set of questions and suggested answers (which appear to date from the early 1980s), titled "Tobaccotalk," that a B&W employee might use when questioned by people outside the industry.

Q: Aren't cigarettes addictive?

A: It is difficult to discuss addiction today because people apply the term to many different circumstances. Some people say their children are addicted to TV. The 1964 Surgeon General's report concluded that cigarettes should be classified as habituative, like coffee, and not addictive, like morphine. Many people have given up smoking. Why do some people continue to smoke who say they want to quit? Why do people continue to overeat when they say they are overweight? {2133.01, p. 5}

The exchange coaches the B&W employee on how to deal with this issue from the industry perspective. The proposed answer confuses the matter by blurring the term "addiction" to include a very broad array of activities, such as compulsive TV watching. Nicotine is addicting in exactly the same sense that heroin, cocaine, and alcohol are addicting (3). It is a drug that has powerful, reinforcing actions on the brain, and repeated use tends to produce continued use. The 1964 Surgeon General's report employed a different definition of addiction than is generally understood today. At about the same time, B&W's general counsel, Addison Yeaman, accepted, without hesitation, the fact that nicotine is addictive and that "we are ... in the business of selling nicotine, an addictive drug" {1802.05, p. 4}.

The fact that many people have stopped smoking is no more proof that nicotine is not addictive than is the fact that many people who have been clearly addicted to other drugs, such as heroin, have stopped using them as well (3, 34). Spontaneous recovery is part of the natural history of addictions, and indeed forms the basis for public health advice about drug use. Focusing on those who have recovered from addiction ignores those who still use a substance but who would like to stop. As discussed above, in any given year about a third of smokers attempt to quit, but only about 10 percent succeed, because of nicotine addiction (3). B&W's suggested answer seeks to avoid the real question at hand.

The tobacco industry has consistently avoided talking about nicotine in its marketing campaigns. One of the documents {1203.01} shows how references to nicotine and withdrawal (a drug addiction term) were edited out of an externally prepared prospectus for a marketing campaign for a low-delivery cigarette. Around 1978 Lisher and Company, a marketing

management consulting firm in New York, submitted a draft proposal for a low-delivery cigarette to B&W for review. The goal of the project was to develop cigarettes that matched the parameters suggested as desirable by Dr. Gio Gori of the National Cancer Institute, discussed in chapter 4. Before editing, the second paragraph of the proposal had read,

Current market trends clearly indicate a major trend toward low-tar brands, although current "ultra" low tar brands have had limited success because of their failure to deliver satisfaction/maintain an adequate nicotine level . An ancillary concern relative to nicotine delivery is that if a satisfying, low-nicotine cigarette were to be developed, it could represent an effective means of withdrawal with severe implications for long-term market growth [emphasis added]. {1203.01, p. 1}

The editor changed it to read,

Current market trends clearly indicate a major trend toward low-"tar" brands, although current "ultra" low "tar" brands have had limited success because of their failure to deliver satisfaction. {1203.01, p. 1}

All specific mention of nicotine, including the stated need to maintain an "adequate nicotine level," was excised. As originally written, the paragraph accurately reflects a concern with providing a pharmacologically sufficient dose of nicotine to consumers. The editing process concentrated all of this meaning into the euphemism "satisfaction." This is an example of the use of code words such as "satisfaction" to obscure the genuine pharmacological intent of the tobacco companies. The intent to provide satisfaction is, in this instance, clearly an intent to maintain an "adequate nicotine level." Examples such as this comprise one kind of evidence that the FDA could use to make the case that tobacco companies intend that tobacco products affect the structure or function of the body.

As discussed in more detail in chapter 7, the documents include another comment on nicotine from a public relations perspective. It appears in an attachment to a memo from Ernest Pepples, B&W's assistant general counsel, to J. V. Blalock, the director of public relations, dated February 14, 1973 {1814.01, p. 1}. Pepples asked Blalock to assemble current clippings on nine different topic areas regarding tobacco. One of those topic areas was addiction, and this is how Pepples framed the problem:

ADDICTION —Some emphasis is now being placed on the habit-forming capacities of cigarette smoke. To some extent the argument revolving around "free choice" is being negated on the grounds of addiction. The threat is that

this argument will increase significantly and lead to further restrictions on product specifications and greater danger in litigation [emphasis added]. {1814.01, p. 3}

"Restrictions on product specifications" because of addiction did not become a realistic possibility for another twenty years, when the Food and Drug Administration began to show an interest in this area (4) and when lawsuits focusing on the plaintiffs' addiction began to be filed. The industry's defense is now as it has been in the past: a denial that nicotine is addictive and that the industry in any way intends the pharmacological effects that nicotine provides.

Even as this position comes to appear more and more absurd, some commentators with ties to the industry have actually argued that addiction does not impair free will (35). This argument has been used to help justify the conclusion that it would not be good public policy to raise excise taxes on tobacco products (36).