How Do Media Campaigns And Tobacco-relevant News Coverage Influence Adolescent And Adult Smoking?
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$411,177.00
Summary
The study will merge measures of exposure to televised anti-smoking advertising, press coverage about tobacco issues and other tobacco control policies with (a) an annually interviewed cohort of 2,000 adult smokers from 2002-2008 and (b) triennial surveys of smoking among adolescents 1993-2008 (n-150,000). Analysis will determine the role of anti-smoking advertising and tobacco-related press coverage in moving smokers towards quitting and changing adolescent smoking.
ANALYSIS OF TOBACCO INDUSTRY INTERNAL DOCUMENTS: AUSTRALIA
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$150,000.00
Summary
In 1998, the Minnesota court ordered US tobacco companies to place over 30 million pages of hitherto secret internal documents on the www. Many thousands of these explicitly concern Australian tobacco control. This project will locate, catalogue, review and disseminate the strategic national, regional and international significance of these industry documents. Since the documents have been released, three legal cases have for the first time succeeded against the industry and the tobacco industry ....In 1998, the Minnesota court ordered US tobacco companies to place over 30 million pages of hitherto secret internal documents on the www. Many thousands of these explicitly concern Australian tobacco control. This project will locate, catalogue, review and disseminate the strategic national, regional and international significance of these industry documents. Since the documents have been released, three legal cases have for the first time succeeded against the industry and the tobacco industry agreed to a $US208 billion settlemnt with the US states -- the largest settlement in legal history. Detailed critical examination of industry documents addressing issues such as product formulation, health research, advertising and marketing, and political lobbying against tobacco control, holds great promise to provide unprecedented insights into local tobacco industry ambitions, research, marketing, public relations and lobbying activities, and counter-measures against tobacco control. These insights will be invaluable to public health scientists, policy advocates, lawyers and historians both in Australia and internationally. They will also provide a large amount of news material, essential to continuing efforts at keep tobacco control as a neon public and political issue deserving action.Read moreRead less
Extending The Australian Arm Of The International Tobacco Control Policy Evaluation Study
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$881,295.00
Summary
This project is to provide for the Australian arm of a large multi-national study to determine how tobacco control policies work. It is being conducted in the context of the implementation in 2005 of the World Health Organisation's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, to which Australia is a party. We will provide new knowledge on the impacts of specific policies which are being implemented in Australia, as well as ones that occur in other countries that are part of the larger study. These i ....This project is to provide for the Australian arm of a large multi-national study to determine how tobacco control policies work. It is being conducted in the context of the implementation in 2005 of the World Health Organisation's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, to which Australia is a party. We will provide new knowledge on the impacts of specific policies which are being implemented in Australia, as well as ones that occur in other countries that are part of the larger study. These include the adoption of graphic health warnings on tobacco packaging, removal of misleading constituents levels information from packs, bans of misleading descriptors such as Light and Mild, and implementation of smoke-free bars. In addition it will advance our understanding of how policy effects persist over time, their equity, and the means by which they contribute to increased cessation and reduced relapse. We do this by following smokers every year in each of the countries and asking them about their thinking and actions with regard to smoking, as well as about their awareness of the policies. By comparing the responses of smokers exposed to policies with those from other countries that are not exposed, we can work out the contribution of the policies to changes in smoking. Understanding policy effects on smokers and smoking cessation will lead to improved policies in Australia and the likelihood of improved dissemination of policies that work here to other countries. Similarly policies found to work in other countries, can be best adapted to Australia if we understand how they work. Taken in total, it should advance our efforts to reduce the burden of smoking-related harm both in Australia and the rest of the world.Read moreRead less
Investigation Of Tobacco Industry Efforts To Counteract Tobacco Control In Australia, 1970-2000
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$333,225.00
Summary
Tobacco use continues to be both the most important preventable cause of premature death and a key determinant of health inequity in Australia. Tobacco is a legally sold product which addicts many of its consumers, mostly as adolescents, and then kills half of them when used as intended. Comprehensive policy change, product regulation and litigation is required to put a halt to the tobacco industry's decades of avoidance, delay and disruption of tobacco control. In an interview for the Wall Stre ....Tobacco use continues to be both the most important preventable cause of premature death and a key determinant of health inequity in Australia. Tobacco is a legally sold product which addicts many of its consumers, mostly as adolescents, and then kills half of them when used as intended. Comprehensive policy change, product regulation and litigation is required to put a halt to the tobacco industry's decades of avoidance, delay and disruption of tobacco control. In an interview for the Wall Street Journal in 1995, Stan Glantz, from the University of California at San Francisco, equated the tobacco industry with other disease vectors: If you want to do something about malaria, you have to study mosquitoes and if you want to do something about lung cancer, you have to study the tobacco industry. Regulatory changes can only be justified by specific local evidence of both the private plans and knowledge of the tobacco industry to attack tobacco control and their public statements and actions designed to mislead consumers and effectively prevent or delay tobacco control. This study will document the public actions and statements of the tobacco industry in Australia between 1970 and 2000. It will draw on interviews with and personal records of tobacco control experts and former state and federal health ministers; as well as tobacco retail trade publications; print media reports; material obtained via Freedom of Information from State and Federal Health Departments; Federal Cabinet papers released under the 30 year rule (ie papers are available from prior 1972); and radio and television reports. It will complement a parallel study of the tobacco industry's internal documents. The outcome will be provision of strategically vital evidence to support effective tobacco control advocacy, policy formation, regulation and litigation in Australia, in the face of continuing industry countermeasures.Read moreRead less
The Use Of Web 2.0 Internet Sites To Undermine Tobacco Advertising Bans And To Mobilise Tobacco Control Advocates
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$365,531.00
Summary
With advertising bans eroding direct tobacco advertising opportunities, tobacco companies are embracing covert means of keeping their products and policies in current and potential consumers' minds. While the Internet is being used extensively to sell cigarettes, its largely unregulated status holds much potential as a vehicle for promoting smoking and tobacco products, as well as anti-smoking dialogue. This project assesses the potential of globally popular websites to promote and discourage sm ....With advertising bans eroding direct tobacco advertising opportunities, tobacco companies are embracing covert means of keeping their products and policies in current and potential consumers' minds. While the Internet is being used extensively to sell cigarettes, its largely unregulated status holds much potential as a vehicle for promoting smoking and tobacco products, as well as anti-smoking dialogue. This project assesses the potential of globally popular websites to promote and discourage smoking.Read moreRead less
Smoking Cessation For Youth Project Booster And Cohort Tracking Study
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$135,550.00
Summary
Adolescence is a critical period for the establishment of adult drug use behaviours. If smoking does not commence in teenage years it is unlikely to occur. This innovative project not only continues to address tobacco control with this important age group but also builds on evidence from a randomised intervention trial involving over 4,000 Year 9 students tracked over two years. This project was called the Smoking Cessation for Youth Project (SCYP). Preliminary longitudinal analyses of the SCYP ....Adolescence is a critical period for the establishment of adult drug use behaviours. If smoking does not commence in teenage years it is unlikely to occur. This innovative project not only continues to address tobacco control with this important age group but also builds on evidence from a randomised intervention trial involving over 4,000 Year 9 students tracked over two years. This project was called the Smoking Cessation for Youth Project (SCYP). Preliminary longitudinal analyses of the SCYP data indicate that the intervention students were significantly less likely to smoke heavily (smoking five or more days per week) than the control group and that intervention students were also significantly less likely to have tried smoking than the control group. These results represent a world first in evidence that population-based smoking cessation interventions among teenagers can be successful. The proposed project will determine the extent to which these positive intervention effects are sustainable, two years post intervention, as our cohort moves into Year 12. In addition to tracking the possible decay of SCYP intervention effects, the proposed project will also measure the effects of a booster intervention delivered students when they are in Year 12 (2002). The Year 12 intervention will comprise an innovative self-help 'magazine style' booster and a supportive environmental intervention involving school nurses and local GPs. This proposal represents a cost-effective opportunity to measure the effectiveness of a Year 12 tobacco cessation booster intervention. Further data on tobacco smoking behaviour in 2002 will also enable us to determine how long the SCYP intervention appears to affect behaviour and whether 'boosters' are needed in later secondary school years to maintain the benefits.Read moreRead less
A Randomised Controlled Trial Of A Family Tobacco Control Program To Reduce Respiratory Illness In Indigenous Infants
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$1,157,688.00
Summary
Over 60% of Indigenous children live in households with one or more regular smokers, where they are exposed to high levels of environmental tobacco smoke (ETS). ETS is a significant and preventable cause of respiratory illness. The aim of this research project is to test whether a family-based program about ETS smoke will reduce the number of clinic presentations of infants for respiratory illness. If successful, it has the potential to improve the health of Indigenous children across Australia.
The Future Of Tobacco Control: Exploring The Feasibility, Acceptability And Cost-effectiveness Of New Policy Directions
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$495,752.00
Summary
We will examine the practical feasibility, ethical and public acceptability, and likely cost effectiveness of a number of different ways of reducing tobacco smoking and the harm caused by smoking in Australia. These policy options will include: (1) more restrictive policies towards tobacco products (such as prohibiting tobacco smoking and creating a government monopoly on the manufacture and supply of tobacco); (2) encouraging smokers to switch from smoking cigarettes to less harmful ways of usi ....We will examine the practical feasibility, ethical and public acceptability, and likely cost effectiveness of a number of different ways of reducing tobacco smoking and the harm caused by smoking in Australia. These policy options will include: (1) more restrictive policies towards tobacco products (such as prohibiting tobacco smoking and creating a government monopoly on the manufacture and supply of tobacco); (2) encouraging smokers to switch from smoking cigarettes to less harmful ways of using nicotine, such as using nicotine patches or gum ; (3) using new biotechnologies to improve smokers chances of quitting (e.g. genetic screening of smokers to select the most effective way of helping them to stop smoking and vaccinating ex-smokers against the effects of nicotine); and (4) new biotechnologies that may prevent nonsmokers from beginning to smoke (e.g. vaccinating nonsmokers against the effects of nicotine) or reduce the chances of their developing tobacco-related diseases (e.g. screening the population for genes that predict an increased susceptibility to nicotine dependence and tobacco-related diseases). The project will provide important information that will assist government in formulating policies to reduce the rate of cigarette smoking in the Australian population below current levels.Read moreRead less
Effects Of Current And Plain Cigarette Package Design On Smokers Cigarette Evaluation
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$654,339.00
Summary
This project proposes to better understand the role of cigarette pack design on consumers' judgements that some cigarettes are safer than others. Three experimental studies are proposed, which will evaluate the influence of pack branding and colours, the potential impact of plain packaging, and the effect of larger size health warnings on consumer perceptions of cigarette health risks.
Effects Of Anti-smoking Advertising, Tobacco-related Press Coverage And Tobacco Control Policies On Smoking Behaviour
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$358,696.00
Summary
Tobacco control programs invest significant resources into the production, development, and placement of anti-smoking advertisements. Evaluation of anti-smoking advertising campaigns is made difficult by the fact that they operate within the broader social context of changing tobacco control policies, tobacco marketing, and other forms of relevant paid and unpaid media. Public health advocates spend considerable effort attempting to obtain favourable news coverage about tobacco control issues, y ....Tobacco control programs invest significant resources into the production, development, and placement of anti-smoking advertisements. Evaluation of anti-smoking advertising campaigns is made difficult by the fact that they operate within the broader social context of changing tobacco control policies, tobacco marketing, and other forms of relevant paid and unpaid media. Public health advocates spend considerable effort attempting to obtain favourable news coverage about tobacco control issues, yet virtually no research has systematically related the volume and nature of news coverage on tobacco issues to smoking behaviour change. This study will exploit the existing variation in tobacco control acitvity between states and over time to study effects of these two forms of media and tobacco control policies on youth and adult smoking behaviour. The study will merge reliable measures of exposure to televised anti-smoking advertising, press coverage about tobacco issues and detailed quantified measures of other tobacco control policies, with monthly surveys of smoking prevalence and consumption from 1991 to 2005. This unique monthly survey database has tracked smoking behaviour changes over time and between states using a standard method over the course of a 15-year period. Analysis of the data will determine the most optimum levels of anti-smoking advertised required to reduce smoking, the potential influence of news reporting as a way of educating people to reduce smoking and effects of tobacco policies, such as advertising bans, smoke-free policies and youth access policies on smoking behaviour. By assessing the effectiveness of anti-smoking advertising and other tobacco policies in changing smoking behaviour, this study will guide public health policy and funding decisions related to tobacco control.Read moreRead less