From: bill@smokescreen.org
Date: Mon, 03/03/03
US May Send Tobacco Pact Up In Smoke
By Clare Nullis
CBS News/AP
Saturday, March 1, 2003
http://www.cbsnews.com/[...]lth/main542453.shtml
<http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/03/01/health/main542453.shtml>
GENEVA -- An international treaty aimed at curbing the spread of tobacco
use may lose U.S. support over Bush administration concerns that the
agreement does not allow individual nations the right to opt out of
individual clauses of the accord.
Over the U.S. objections, more than 170 nations agreed Saturday on a
text for a tobacco treaty that would impose worldwide restrictions on
advertising and labeling, while clamping down on smuggling and
second-hand smoke.
The draft accord, four years in the making, next goes to the World
Health Assembly in May for adoption. Germany and China also joined the
United States in expressing reservations.
"We had hoped this could have been concluded as a consensus text," U.S.
health attache David Hohman said. "Unfortunately this is not possible."
Hohman hinted to exhausted delegates that the United States might press
for parts of the text to be renegotiated at the forthcoming World Health
Organization assembly. That risks the unraveling of the entire treaty.
The accord, called the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, proposes
a ban on cigarette advertising except in countries, such as the United
States, where this would be violate constitutional safeguards. These
nations would have to adopt lesser restrictions instead.
The text also proposes that health warnings should occupy at least 30
percent of the pack and encourages the use of pictures of health
problems such as diseased gums.
For the first time in an international treaty, the accord introduces the
concept that manufacturers may be held liable for the health effects of
their products. But, to avoid a legal minefield, the wording is fairly
vague.
It says governments should consider tax hikes and do more to foster
international cooperation to stamp out tobacco smuggling. The text also
calls for policies against secondhand smoke -- which are common in the
United States but rare elsewhere in the world.
"The convention is a real milestone in the history of global public
health," said WHO Director-General Gro Harlem Brundtland, who made the
anti-tobacco campaign the focal point of her five-year term.
"Tobacco kills in every country of the world, and probably most of us
know someone who has died," she added. "Due to the actions that will
follow from our shared commitments, millions and millions of lives will
be saved"
Although the United States has some of the toughest anti-tobacco
legislation and long since banned television advertising, it was
pilloried by health activists throughout the negotiations. Developing
countries were suspicious that the United States -- home to the world's
biggest exporter Philip Morris -- was more interested in protecting the
tobacco industry than the health of the poor.
The U.S. delegation tried in vain to insert a provision allowing
"reservations" a device that allows a government to opt out of
individual clauses.
U.S. officials said such opt-out flexibility would be crucial in
determining the acceptability of the treaty.
"We are disappointed that reservations are excluded which is a
complication for our legislative process," Hohman said.
Hohman said the proposals for minimum size of health warnings on packs
were unacceptable. The cigarette industry has argued this is in breach
of its trademark rights.
He also criticized the provisions to ban distribution of free cigarettes
to the public. Federal legislation allows for the regulation of
commercially sold goods but not free products, he said.
The United States, he added, could not agree to the section of the text
that expresses concern about high smoking levels in "indigenous
peoples." Washington fears that use of "peoples" rather than "people"
could imply sovereignty and would send a wrong signal to native American
Indians.
Anti-smoking campaigners dismissed the U.S. concerns.
"We didn't expect the United States to ratify anyway," said Clive Bates,
director of ASH UK. "They haven't ratified treaties like this for years.
Their presence here is academic."
In any event, says CBS News correspondent Tom Fenton, imposition of
worldwide restrictions wouldn't be easy or automatic. There is so much
resistance from the tobacco industry, says Fenton, and from smokers
themselves, that "one of the boldest projects in public health" could
still come apart.
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