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January 21, 2022 – A tobacco the giant has stepped into the healthcare business, and respiratory specialists are doing their best to thwart the move.
The Forum of International Respiratory Societies, which has 70,000 members worldwide, served as an “official notice” that its organizations and members “cannot tolerate” working with any company “wholly owned by a tobacco company such as Philip Morris International,” the group said. Statement.
Health workers lobbied in the fall of 2021 to block the sale of Britons inhaler manufacturer Vectura tobacco company Philip Morris. But the £ 1.1 billion (or about $ 1.5 billion) acquisition was completed in September with nearly 75% of Vecture shareholders backing the deal.
“This takeover is a dark episode for lung health and health in general and should not be repeated in the future,” respiratory specialists said in a statement. “Tobacco products remain the leading cause of preventable and preventable diseases worldwide.”
Experts say they are “terribly disappointed” that shareholders, regulators and the UK government have allowed it to move forward. “This is just the latest example of tobacco companies diversifying into healthcare and we are very concerned about the implications for patients, scientists and doctors.”
Gregory Downey, MD, elected president of the American Thoracic Society, is among physicians expressing concern.
“We could not, with a clear conscience, remain silent about Philip Morris’ actions,” he said in an email. “We will continue to work with our International Respiratory Society Forum partners to protect patients and reduce the global impact of tobacco dependence.”
Key concern: The technology currently used to deliver drugs to treat respiratory diseases can now be used to more effectively deliver non-medical addictive products.
In response, Philip Morris International says speculation that the technology will be used for tobacco is “completely false and baseless.”
The company issued a statement stating that as it diversifies into healthcare, it intends to increase overall spending on Vectura’s medical research and development, “accelerating innovations that will make treatment more effective and affordable to patients.”
Doctors like Downey worry that the tobacco company’s scientific and sales tactics will re-enter the field of medicine and harm the public.
“The past scientific misconduct of the industry has sowed justified distrust on the part of respiratory researchers and clinicians,” experts say in a statement. “United as a community, our organizations will continue to strongly oppose future acquisitions of health companies by the tobacco industry.”
Scientific distrust
The group is urging governments to pass laws, and scientists are planning bold steps, such as banning employees of tobacco-owned companies like Vecture, a company with a 20-year history of healthcare, from publishing papers in their journals or exhibiting at future meetings.
In the magazine BMJ, Editorial writer Nicholas Hopkinson, of the British Lung Foundation, says “the leopard hasn’t changed its point.”
Tobacco companies have an “exhaustively documented history of dishonesty on an industrial scale,” he says. “It simply came to our notice then smokingpromoting false science and misrepresenting the impact of anti-smoking measures, as well as widespread misinformation and participation in corrupt practices. “
Experts are now urging healthcare professionals not to prescribe tobacco-owned company products. Such products will not be promoted at future group events, including educational and scientific meetings, or at any conferences, they say. This follows WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Controlthey say.
Responding to a public announcement, Philip Morris International says he would “set a dangerous precedent” if lobbying and attempts to exclude several organizations succeed.
Public opinion
One of the main questions in this discussion boils down to people who simply want their drugs to be effective when they need them: does it matter who produces and sells them?
In his argument, Philip Morris argues that public opinion is not on the side of choosing a treatment based on who brings it. A survey of more than 2,000 adults in the United States and the United Kingdom, conducted by Povaddo on behalf of Philip Morris, shows that “65% of respondents said it would be inappropriate for their doctor to switch them to a new treatment based solely on his or her personal opinion of the manufacturer, even if the medical treatment itself remained exactly the same “, and almost half (49%) said that the least important thing a doctor should consider when deciding which treatment to prescribe is” the company does the treatment . “
For those who took the survey, the most important thing was the treatment that would be successful.
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