Public Health Groups Attack New Cigarette Ads, Fail to Reveal Public Health Corporate Partner of One Company that is Carrying the Ads

A number of public health groups, including the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids and the National Latino Council on Alcohol and Tobacco, today denounced a new cigarette marketing campaign they allege is aimed at recruiting Latino youths to smoke.

According to the press release: "In recent months, the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company has launched an elaborate, expensive new marketing campaign for Kool cigarettes that has included ads in publications popular with Latino youth, including Latina and Cosmopolitan en Espanol. The ad campaign, which includes an eight-page insert in some magazines, features multicultural images and slogans intended to appeal to the aspirations of ethnic minorities, including "It's about old world class and new world style" and "It's about pursuing your ambitions and staying connected to your roots. ... 'It is outrageous that the tobacco companies are exploiting the aspirations, culture and images of the Latino community to market deadly and addictive tobacco products to our children.'"

"'The tobacco companies are spending more than ever before to go after our children, including Latino children. That is why it is so important that we fight back with strong programs to protect our children,' said Guillermo Brito, executive director of the National Latino Council on Alcohol and Tobacco Prevention."

The Rest of the Story

One tobacco control group that is not fighting back "with strong programs to protect our children" is the American Legacy Foundation, which is actually helping to reinforce the ad campaign targeted at the Latino community, I believe, by partnering with one of the very companies that is responsible for delivering these ads to children: namely, the Hearst Corporation - publisher of Cosmopolitan.

For an outline of the American Legacy Foundation's contributions to the health of women in the United States through their support (through corporate partnerships) of magazine publishers that are bombarding women and girls with cigarette advertisements, see my previous post.