After the judgment, tobacco companies appealed over details of the statements for more than a decade, and delayed correcting false statements into a new media era. Four in 10 Americans now regularly get news online, where tobacco companies will not have to publish any corrective statements. “The tobacco companies’ basic strategy for everything, whether it’s science or regulation or litigation, is delay,” said Stan Glantz, an expert on tobacco company strategy at the University of California San Francisco. In appealing against publication of corrective statements, tobacco companies argued against specific words in statements, fonts and even the phrase “here is the truth”. To promote their products, tobacco companies still spend roughly $1m per hour in America, or $8.2bn per year, on advertisements in convenience stores, discounts, coupons, at adult entertainment venues and through wholesalers.

Source: The Guardian November 26, 2017 12:02 UTC