Voice in the wilderness

A recent study published in JAMA Network Open suggests that court ordered anti-smoking ads sponsored by the tobacco industry reached only around 40 percent of adults and about half of all smokers in the U.S.

To assess the reach of these ads, researchers led by Sanjay Shete of the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston surveyed a nationally representative sample of 3,484 adults between January and May 2018, during which time the ads were running.

Participants were asked whether they recalled seeing ads specifically mentioning that a federal court had ordered tobacco companies to make statements about the dangers of smoking cigarettes.

Only 40.6 percent of adults recalled seeing the advertisements. Exposure was even lower among certain ethnic and socioeconomic groups historically targeted by tobacco industry marketing.

Just 37 percent of people aged 18–34, about 35 percent of those with no more than a high school diploma and 38 percent of those with household income under $35,000 a year reported having seen any of the ads.

“Anti-smoking campaigns run by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention or other government organizations in the past seem to have had a much greater reach,” Shete said. “It is possible that young people are no longer watching TV or reading newspapers and are getting their news on social media.”

In 2006, U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler ruled in favor of the Department of Justice in a lawsuit against the tobacco industry, requiring cigarette companies to sponsor anti-smoking advertisements in major newspapers, on television, in retail displays, on cigarette packages and on their corporate websites.