Australia Ahead of Its Time
As of 2012, Australia not only has gone big on graphic effects-of-tobacco-use photos in ads and on packaging, they’ve banned all branding text, colors, and logos from every pack of cancer sticks sold. Australia was at the vanguard of finally out-messaging the previously all-powerful tobacco lobby, and we applaud the other nations that have followed. With the World Health Organization’s blessing, every country should do it.
Australia passed the world’s first so-called plain-packaging regulations in 2011 and implemented them the following year. By law, the government established a collection of 14 rotating images that must be used on all cigarette packages. These images include tongue cancer, blackened lung, and foot with gangrene, as well as “a toilet stained with bloody urine and a skeletal man named Bryan who is dying of lung cancer.” This material must cover 75% of the package’s face. Trademarks, decorative styling, embossing, and any other unique design are banned. 2-2
To add insult to opprobrium, equally ferocious warnings must be posted on one side of the package (the other side reserved for barcode and company address) and overlay 90% of the back — not one percentage point less. 2-3
The bottom quarter of front-of-package real estate is reserved for the brand name in uniform Lucida Sans font against a color fill — also legally decreed — of “drab dark brown” Pantone 448C. (The government originally characterized the backdrop color as “olive green” until the Australian Olive Association complained that it gave their product a bad name.) Over a comprehensive course of seven studies comprising 1,000 smokers, researchers concluded that Pantone 448C had the lowest appeal and implied the lowest quality and maximum harm in a cigarette. Survey participants commonly described this color as “‘death,’ ‘dirty,’ or ‘tar’ without any positive adjectives.” 2-4 2-5
What’s It Gonna Take?
So — you’re still smoking? What’s it gonna take? A selfie of you in a Pantone 448C-colored coffin emblazoned on your favorite brand of smokes?
In 1965 — a year after then-Surgeon General Dr. Luther Terry averred that smoking causes cancer and most likely heart disease — 42% of Americans, including the good doctor, smoked cigarettes.
A six-decade messaging war has been waged since then between Mad Men-style marketing geniuses (backed by Big Tobacco law firms) and U.S. government regulators. The government initially was near-impotent in fighting this war, but over the past half-century it has made significant progress. Ultimately we learned that habitual smoking (“Is there another kind?” — thanks to Col. Nathan R. Jessup, aka Jack Nicholson, “A Few Good Men”) 2-6 severely harms most bodily systems and causes numerous torturous diseases. And the smoking rate for Americans fell to 15% by 2015. 2-7 The number dropped further to 12.5% by 2020, per the CDC.
But why isn’t that rate at zero? Sure, it’s extremely painful to quit smoking. So is a root canal, but you do it to save your tooth (which is a far cry from your life). The drop in the smoking rate over the past two or three generations has occurred largely through convincing young people not to start. And that’s where Australia has been trying to make real gains.
The cigarette pack has been the tobacco companies’ last best source of advertising potential. They were kicked off television and radio. Their ads are all but gone from magazines, newspapers, and internet sites. But they still were able to draw your attention with their flashy packaging — at least until December 2012 in Australia.
And 2017 in France and the U.K. And 2018 in New Zealand, Norway, and Ireland. And by 2025 in another dozen countries. Based upon legislative enlightenment and progress in Australia, these governments have followed Oz and found the courage to stand up to Big Tobacco. 2-8 2-9 It’s called standardized (or “standardised”) cigarette packaging, and the percentage of the pack devoted to disturbing images and warnings is slightly less in some countries. But the theme is the same: Force smokers to view and think about the real, obscene effects of smoking on the human body.
Gross Is Good
Do Australia’s gross-out cigarette packaging laws work? Not surprisingly, tobacco companies say “no.” The data still is being gathered, but most signs point to a modest “yes,” with strong potential for expanded effectiveness. In 2015 a series of comprehensive studies was published. It found that standardized packaging reduced the allure of cigarettes, encouraged smokers to quit, and more effectively emphasized the health warnings. In the three years after plain-packaging laws were implemented, it’s estimated they accounted for a quarter of Australia’s 2.2% drop in smoking from the previous three-year period. (The remainder of the drop was attributed to increased tobacco taxes, other advertising bans, and smoking area restrictions.) 2-10 2-11
So far, public smoking aversion therapy has had modestly significant (Now there’s an oxymoronic modifier) positive effects. Since plain-packaging laws are only several years old in most national markets that have them, public health professionals are optimistic about future increased efficacy, especially in preventing young people from lighting up that first fag.
Clearly, the small, unobtrusive warnings on U.S. cigarette packages do not get the attention that graphic images and messages covering most of the pack do. Maybe Congress will grow a backbone. Until then, it remains invertebrate — unwilling to stand up to American tobacco lobby money.
For those partially motivated potential quitters in the states who need a little more impetus, start your collection of voluntary cigarette package cozies today. Get a jump on the U.S. government and collect all 14 in the Greatest Hits series of headlines and photos, including such timeless classics as “Smoking Causes Lung Cancer,” “Smoking Causes Peripheral Vascular Disease,” “Smoking Damages Your Gums and Teeth,” “Smoking Harms Unborn Babies,” and many more.
The time to quit is now. Help is available (CDC quit line: 1-800-QUIT-NOW).
And if nothing else matters to you: Smoking makes your face look older.■
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