There are a lot of people complaining that the Food and Drug
Administration isn’t doing its job to protect us from unsafe drugs.
It’s not just us and all the other consumer
groups complaining. It’s former regulators (Also see here and here). It’s doctors. It’s victims. Its … tobacco companies?
Perhaps I am still confused from April Fool's day, but I am pretty sure this is real. The NY Times reported that the huge tobacco company, Reynolds American - maker of Camel cigarettes - is running ads pointing out the flaws in the FDA. But let’s examine why.
Well, for one thing, tobacco has notoriously fought FDA regulation of cigarettes (i.e., nicotine delivery devices) for years. And because they don’t wanna be regulated, they thought they’d just dump on the competence of the FDA like everyone else, including those who are actually legitimately concerned about recent and upcoming U.S. Supreme Court decisions over preemption. (Of course, the other thing tobacco companies fight are laws that subject them to liability for creating the biggest public health disaster of our time. See, e.g., our recent post about the Council for Tobacco Research.)
Personally, I’d just assume they slink back into their hole and come out again when they’re ready to accept both federal regulation and liability for promoting a product that is lethal and addictive and kills 400,000 Americans each year.
Check out the commercial below:
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