This report from the Alcohol Health Alliance, Action on Smoking and Health and Obesity Health Alliance highlights common strategies and tactics used by the tobacco, alcohol and unhealthy food and drink industries to delay and disrupt public health policymaking and protect their business models.
These common tactics include:
- Deny or play down the evidence of harms linked to their products
- Position themselves as part of the solution
- Distort the science about their products
- Distort messaging about health risks and harms
- Use legal threats to interfere with the implementation of effective policies to protect public health
- Use Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) to signal their virtue at the expense of public health and wellbeing
- Use proxies to communicate their messages without always being transparent about their funding
- Give gifts, benefits and hospitality to MPs attempting to win their favour
We outline what needs to change and why public health policymaking must be protected from the vested interests of the tobacco, alcohol and unhealthy food and drink industries.