The Lancet: Delay in Tobacco Directive will raise serious questions
The EU's revised Tobacco Products Directive – which was set to place substantial new restrictions on tobacco companies' promotion of cigarettes and smokeless tobacco, including banning "e-cigarettes" – is dangerously close to stalling, and "further delay will raise serious questions about whose interest the EU Commission is promoting", according to the authors of a Comment, published in The Lancet journal today.
A Lancet News podcast special report also looks at these issues, including an interview with John Dalli, the former EU Commissioner for Health and Consumer Policy.
Just two days after Mr Dalli's resignation, the offices of anti-tobacco campaigners in Brussels were the target of a sophisticated burglary, in which laptops and documents were stolen, but other valuables left untouched.
According to Professor Martin McKee, Professor of European Public Health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and one of the authors of the Comment, these events have "set alarm bells ringing."
"While the truth about these events will emerge eventually, it may be too late for the revised Tobacco Products Directive. Yet there is no reason why this should be so. The only beneficiaries of delay are the tobacco companies," he said.
Comment co-author Paul Belcher, Senior EU Government Affairs Advisor at the Royal College of Physicians in London, added, "The current situation is undermining both citizens' confidence in EU decision making as well as public health efforts to combat the scourge of tobacco."
In an interview with The Lancet News podcast, former Commissioner Dalli describes the circumstances of his resignation: "I was called to a meeting for which I had no agenda, then I was confronted immediately...'listen, we have this report, [containing] these allegations, and you have to go. You can resign, or I can fire you.'... I resisted the question of resignation. I said, first of all, I don't know exactly what the basis of this message is. Secondly, I did not do anything wrong...I asked for some time to consult lawyers...I asked for 24 hours, also to inform my family, and I was given thirty minutes."
When asked about the safeguards that are in place to prevent any weakening of the Directive now that progress has stalled, Mr Dalli told The Lancet News podcast that "The safeguard was me."
Monika Kosinska, Secretary General of the European Public Health Alliance, one of the organisations whose offices were burgled in Brussels, and a co-author of The Lancet Comment, also spoke to The Lancet News podcast, describing the delays to the revised Tobacco Products Directive as "paralysing", and speculating that "there's no reason to immediately think that everyone in the commission is going to be behind the Tobacco Products Directive."
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wayne scicluna
Oct 26th 2012, 15:15
Banning e-cigarettes....what for????? Its not as if they are worse than regular smokes. I personally quit smoking thanks to them and so did many people.
Evarist Saliba
Oct 26th 2012, 13:06
Most comments are completely irrelevant. Here we have a scientific journal of internationsal reputation expressing fear that the break-in and stealing of data underpinning a promised EU directive, immediately after the forced resignation of Dalli, should be a cause of alarm. This is the real issue.
Joseph Brincat
Oct 26th 2012, 13:04
Barroso , Barroso , Barroso >> in the Name of Justice !!!
You have made a BIG mistake making Mr Dalli to resign,
You should have let the court decides the outcome and
then YOU decide !!
Mary Ann Borg
Oct 26th 2012, 12:17
So far Mr Dalli has threatened to take OLAF, Barroso and the lot to court. I wonder why the person who has apparently caused all this grief to John Dalli hasnt been taken to court by the victim yet. And who is this female lawyer that met Dalli by the pool in Gozo? OLAF didnt mention by name the 'Maltese business' but it soon became public. And the female lawyer? Who's she?
Ivan cachia
Oct 26th 2012, 13:20
Well said Ms Borg!!!
Francis Saliba M.D.
Oct 26th 2012, 10:52
And yet, Barroso et al would like us to believe the lie that the forced resignation of Dalli does not "affect" the progress of the Tobacco Directive when this is manifestly stalled already and only time can tell if it has or hasn't been stalled for ever as intended by OLAF's whiter-than-white informants from tobacco merchants Swedish Match.
Peter Murray
Oct 26th 2012, 08:58
Restrictions on advertising and promotion of tobacco products have had little or no effect on smokers cutting back or stopping their usage ,with the only real deterrent for such aims and objectives being pricing and the cost of these products.This is a smokescreen-pardon the pun!
mark johnson
Oct 26th 2012, 08:36
Come on, John, it hardly came out of the blue. You had two meetings with OLAF at which your lawyer was present.
Willie Grech
Oct 26th 2012, 11:02
@ Mark Johnson.
For frankness sake, one should state that when the two meetings with OLAF happened they informed JD that he was being investigated. Then, after three months of hearing nothing (at least, nothing was ever mentioned that anything happened between the OLAF meeting and the Barroso one), JD was given only 30 mins to resign. I tend to agree. It was out of the blue!
C Muscat
Oct 26th 2012, 08:27
"The safeguard was me."
...
I agree 100%;
unfortunately locally somebody found it convenient to help the tobacco giants.
Chris Gatt
Oct 26th 2012, 08:12
In 2005 Die Welt reported that Barroso had spent a week on the yacht of the Greek shipping billionaire Spiro Latsis. It emerged soon afterwards that this had occurred only a month before the Commission approved 10 million euros of Greek state aid for Latsis's shipping company – though the state aid decision had been taken by the previous European Commission before Barroso took up his post
Edgar Gatt
Oct 26th 2012, 08:07
We have here another Franco Debono. The safeguard was me, Mr. Dalli said. Egocentricity at its best.
Peter Galea
Oct 26th 2012, 07:59
hafna paroli, u sa issa l-ebda prova conkreta ta x'seta ghamel hazin John Dalli. Nahseb li kien ser joqros lil kumpanija tat-tabakk u riedu jehilsu minnu. U x'mod dizonest il mod kif galuh jirrezenja
j
m. borg (slm)
Oct 26th 2012, 09:48
Il-partit u l-mexxej ta' l-istess partit tieghu ramewh qisu lumija mghasura.
Andrew Agius
Oct 26th 2012, 07:43
Banning e-cigarettes isn't an attempt to control tobacco or nicotine products - it's a gift to the tobacco companies to apologise for being forced to restrict their activities in branding and promotion.
Ronnie Callus
Oct 26th 2012, 07:38
All this shows that the issue was only to delay or totally hinder the tabocco directive. The winners are the companies themselves as they succeeded to halt the directive and not those citizens which are dying by lung cancer and other health related matters. John Dalli was used as the lamb of sagrifice.
Mr Leon Zawadzki
Oct 26th 2012, 10:46
Tobacco companies may be making big money but this is way surpassed by governments on the monies they receive through tax'es. If smoking is curtailed, governments will be forced to raise tax'es through other means. I'm all for encouraging smoking, keep my tax'es down and keep Doctors, nurses and undertakers in full time employment. If a person is stupid enough to smoke, I can live with that.
Tony Borg
Oct 26th 2012, 07:32
Smells of big rat Mr. Barroso.............your resignation letter should be next.
Peter Murray
Oct 26th 2012, 10:28
Yeah right -closely followed by Gonzi's.
Edward Mallia
Oct 26th 2012, 07:31
Dalli has given a classic answer about safeguards to the Tobacco Directive: he was the safeguard. The new commissioner-elect, yet to face hearings, even if approved cannot be expected to rubber stamp the existing text. He will need to acquaint himself with all aspects of the subject; that's bound to take time. OLAF and Barroso should face the music for their timing if nothing else. It stinks.
Joseph Vassallo, (Bugibba)
Oct 26th 2012, 06:55
If Mr Dalli's new regulations do not come into force, the pro-tobacco lobby will have succeded. So... who is likely to attract the money that Swedish Match was prepared to pay Silvio Zammit, be that €60 or €60 millions? It is public knowledge that they offered him money to lobby Mr Dalli (his MEP) in their favour, no?
Does anyone know of any lobbyist who works for free?
Please choose the reason of your report below: