“Keep it a secret”: leaked documents suggest Philip Morris International, and its Japanese affiliate, continue to exploit science for profit' by Sophie Braznell, Louis Laurence, Iona Fitzpatrick and Anna B Gilmore in (2024) Nicotine and Tobacco Research comments
The tobacco industry has a long history of manipulating science to conceal the harms of its products. As part of its proclaimed transformation, the world’s largest tobacco company, Philip Morris International (PMI), states it conducts “transparent science”. This paper uses recently leaked documents from PMI and its Japanese affiliate, Philip Morris Japan (PMJ), to examine its contemporary scientific practices. ...
23 documents dating 2012 through 2020 available from Truth Tobacco Industry Documents Library were examined using Forster's hermeneutic approach to analysing corporate documentation. Thematic analysis using the Science for Profit Model was conducted to assess whether PMI/PMJ employed known corporate strategies to influence science in their interests.
... PMJ contracted a third-party external research organisation, CMIC, to covertly fund a study on smoking cessation conducted by Kyoto University academics. No public record of PMJ’s funding or involvement in this study was found. PMJ paid life sciences consultancy, FTI-Innovations, ¥3,000,000 (approx. £20,000) a month between 2014 and 2019 to undertake extensive science-adjacent work, including building relationships with key scientific opinion leaders and using academic events to promote PMI’s science, products and messaging. FTI-Innovation’s work was hidden internally and externally. These activities resemble known strategies to influence the conduct, publication and reach of science, and conceal scientific activities. ...
The documents reveal PMI/PMJ’s recent activities mirror past practices to manipulate science, undermining PMI’s proclaimed transformation. Tobacco industry scientific practices remain a threat to public health, highlighting the urgent need for reform to protect science from the tobacco industry’s vested interests. ...
Japan is a key market for PMI, being a launch market for IQOS and having the highest heated tobacco product use globally. Our findings, in conjunction with other recent evidence, challenge PMI’s assertion that it is a source of credible science and cast doubt on the quality and ethical defensibility of its research, especially its studies conducted in Japan. This, in turn, brings into question the true public health impacts of its products. There is urgent need to reform the way tobacco-related science is funded and conducted. Implementation of models through which research can be funded using the industry’s profits while minimising its influence should be explored. ...
Science is essential to understanding and improving public health. Unfortunately, science is also used as a tool by corporate actors across diverse industries to conceal or create doubt about the harms of their products or manufacturing activities; to position their products as solutions to complex problems; and to legitimise their role in both science and policy. Corporate misuse of science is detrimental to public health as it delays and weakens policies, prevents litigation to protect consumers, and maximises use of potentially damaging products. These mechanisms ultimately serve to maximise corporate profits rather than primarily improve public health. Tobacco companies have a particularly well-documented history of scientific misconduct because of the release of internal industry documents which revealed they repeatedly prioritised their bottom line over the health of billions of people.
Philip Morris International (PMI), the largest transnational tobacco company in the world, played a prominent role in the tobacco industry’s history of scientific misconduct and manipulation. In 2016, under threat from declining cigarette sales, PMI announced that it would be undergoing a “smoke- free” transformation, with the aim of replacing its cigarettes with its newer nicotine and tobacco products. Its flagship newer product brand is a heated tobacco product (HTP), IQOS, which it claims is less harmful than cigarettes.
Scientific research is fundamental to PMI’s claimed transformation and substantiating the harm reduction claims it makes about its newer products. PMI promotes its role in science to both the public and policymakers, proclaiming it conducts “transparent science”. Yet recent evidence contradicts this claim and raises questions about whether PMI has truly transformed. For example, the Foundation for a Smoke-Free World (FSFW) claims to be independent but is solely funded by PMI and publishes PMI-favourable research, mirroring the long-standing tobacco industry practice of using scientific third parties to promote products and corporate messaging. Moreover, journalist investigations and academic reviews of PMI’s science have raised serious concerns over the quality and ethical standing of PMI’s clinical research.
In this context, a small sample of recently leaked documents relating to the scientific activities of PMI and its Japanese affiliate, Philip Morris Japan (PMJ), provide limited but unique insight into PMI’s contemporary scientific practices. Japan is of particular interest because it has the highest prevalence of HTP use of any country worldwide. PMI therefore often uses Japan as the location for its studies on HTPs, including those submitted to regulatory bodies in the US and EU, and publicly promotes Japan as “an example of successful harm reduction to other countries”. The aims of this study were to examine these new documents in order to gain insight into PMI’s contemporary research practices and use of science; assess whether PMI continues to employ known strategies to influence science; and discuss the implications of its practices for wider tobacco research.
