From Boston to Britain, snuffing out Big Tobacco

AS BOSTON pushes for more cigarette control, Britain is being urged to snuff out Big Tobacco completely.

Last week, the Boston Public Health Commission board voted to ban cigarette sales at drug stores and college campuses, joining San Francisco in the forefront of such bans. Big Tobacco and its enablers are not going along quietly. Walgreens, the nation's 40th-ranked Fortune 500 company, filed suit this week to block the San Francisco ban on the grounds that it unfairly singles out the company. That city's ban would still allow tobacco sales at supermarkets and big-box stores that also have pharmacies.

The executive director of the Boston Public Health Commission, Barbara Ferrer, said in a telephone interview that she was not yet concerned about a lawsuit here. The Boston ban was crafted to include supermarkets or any "retail establishment that operates or has a healthcare institution within it, such as a pharmacy or drug store."

Ferrer said, "We covered it everywhere. Our general counsel said we would be easily sued if we singled out certain kinds of healthcare stores."

Across the ocean, the issue is moving way past the singling-out stage. The Royal College of Physicians, concerned that existing smoke-free laws, advertising bans, and cigarette taxes will still leave 5 million smokers in the United Kingdom two decades from now, threw down a more stunning gauntlet. It wants to "eradicate tobacco smoking from the UK by 2025" by making smoking "as unappealing, unattractive, unaffordable and unavailable as possible, as quickly as possible."

The 490-year-old professional body said taxes should be increased 10 percent, every year, on cigarettes, cigars, and other smoked tobacco products. The college says the government should ban the sale of smoked tobacco products in any store where children are permitted. It should apply Class A drug penalties for smuggling and underage sales, thus treating tobacco like heroin, according to the college.

The college said that all tobacco outlets should be licensed and the number of licensed retailers should be reduced every year. Vending machines would be eliminated and Internet sales of smoked tobacco would be prohibited. The hours that tobacco can be sold should be restricted (like we do for alcohol) and plain generic packaging would be required for all products.

The college also recommended that movies and TV shows that "endorse, glamorize, encourage or otherwise condone smoking" receive age-ratings similar to entertainment that depicts violence, explicit sexual behavior, or illegal drug use. It said such TV shows should not be shown before 9 p.m.

That college would also make antismoking medicinal products more available over the counter and free to anyone using national health services.

Ferrer said she was excited by the proposal by the Royal College.

"They've got some interesting things in there that we haven't even thought about," she said. "I'm pleased that people are starting to talk about the fact that these are very dangerous products. We should be making it very difficult, if not impossible for kids to get access to it. Obviously, what we're doing is not good enough when you've got a concerted effort by the tobacco companies to lure new smokers against our tiny public health budgets."

Last month, the National Cancer Institute released a report that found that despite existing restrictions, cigarette companies spent $13.5 billion ($37 million a day) on advertising and promotion in the United States in 2005. Smoking is depicted in at least 75 percent of box-office hit movies, and one-third of movies showed identifiable cigarette brands. Twenty percent of television shows and 25 percent of music videos depict smoking. "The health consequences of smoking are rarely depicted in movies," the report said.

Ferrer said she thought the goal of a smokeless Britain or United States by 2025 was realistic, if government was serious about limiting access. "There is so much movement around this, that I will really bet that five to 10 years from now, it will be really difficult to buy tobacco products in this country. I can see it city by city. People are saying we have to protect our children."

Derrick Z. Jackson can be reached at jackson@globe.com.