World Health Organization Explicitly Rejects Harm Reduction in Tobacco Control, Endangering Millions of Lives Worldwide

The Conference of the Parties to the World Health Organization's (WHO) Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) met recently to update their international strategies to (supposedly) reduce the international burden of tobacco-related morbidity and mortality. Today, the Tobacco Tactics team published an article in the journal Tobacco Control that summarizes the consensus approach to the issue of harm reduction in tobacco control.

Here is the summary:  

"COP11 included a specific agenda item on nicotine addiction in light of the tobacco industry’s narrative on ‘harm reduction’, during which Parties discussed proposed decisions. This year’s discussion demonstrated the strong interest among Parties in identifying the best approaches to protect future generations from both tobacco and nicotine addiction. In preparation for this discussion, the Convention Secretariat prepared a report,10 making it clear that there is no legitimate ‘tobacco harm reduction’ based on advancing the commercial and vested interests of the tobacco industry. In the context of the WHO FCTC, ‘harm reduction’ is ‘harm elimination, the intended outcome from the full implementation of the treaty’s existing, evidence-based measures."

The Rest of the Story

This is a shocking statement. It explicitly asserts that there is no legitimacy to the concept of harm reduction in tobacco control and it claims that tobacco harm reduction is only promoted by the tobacco industry and its sole purpose is to advance the commercial interests of the tobacco industry. It goes so far as to say that the only legitimate harm reduction regarding smokers is harm elimination, meaning that there is only benefit if a smoker becomes abstinent from nicotine, not if that smoker quits smoking using one of the most popular and effective methods in the world.

It is demonstrably false that harm reduction is only promoted by the tobacco industry. In fact, harm reduction is a central concept of public health and is promoted widely by tens of thousands of public health professionals, organizations, and agencies throughout the world. Harm reduction is a central approach in the field of drug addiction. It is also being promoted widely throughout the world by scientists and advocates who have no affiliation with Big Tobacco.

Moreover, the overwhelming majority of the companies selling e-cigarettes are not part of the tobacco industry. And the idea of e-cigarettes for harm reduction did not originate with Big Tobacco. These products came to market in 2005 and the tobacco industry did not get involved until 2011. 

It is also demonstrably false that harm reduction is solely being promoted to advance the interests of the tobacco industry. In fact, the more smokers switch to e-cigarettes, the lower the profits are for cigarette sales. While it is true that the cigarette companies that also produce e-cigarettes will obtain sales revenue from e-cigarettes, is that not a far better outcome than these companies gaining revenue from cigarette sales? 

The rejection of harm reduction by WHO endangers the lives of millions of smokers worldwide. The WHO is literally abandoning smokers and using them as sacrificial lambs in an effort to demonize safer alternatives to cigarettes because the FCTC leaders can't stand the idea that the use of a nicotine product could actually be beneficial to health (even though they have no problem with pharmaceutical companies reaping in billions of dollars based on the same concept - perhaps this is because the WHO Foundation receives millions from the pharmaceutical industry). 

While it is bad enough that tobacco control organizations and health agencies in the United States have shunned harm reduction in tobacco control, the fact that WHO has rejected harm reduction strategies to address the worldwide burden of smoking-related disease is truly a global public health disaster.