After owning up to bias against blacks, it should admit its old ties with Big Tobacco
Jump to full article: Chicago Sun-Times, 2008-07-21
Author: HOWARD WOLINSKY AND DR. ALAN BLUM
Intro: Since the AMA is in an apologetic mood, we think it is high time for the doctors' organization to apologize for the role it played in the deadly tobacco pandemic.
Back in 1964, when the U.S. surgeon general unequivocally warned the American public for the first time of the dangers of cigarette smoking, one major organization failed to support this stand. It was the AMA. The War on Smoking was joined. But the AMA was MIA.
The physicians' group instead put its support behind the tobacco industry's efforts, a pre-emptive strike that funneled $18 million of tobacco money toward "research" managed by the AMA. The industry used this strategy to claim that the dangers of smoking were still an open question -- one being investigated by America's doctors. This conspiracy bought the AMA's silence for 14 crucial years following publication of the surgeon general's report, as hundreds of thousands of people, including disproportionately high numbers of African Americans, died and were disabled from smoking-related illnesses.
Since the AMA is in an apologetic mood, we think it is high time for the doctors' organization to apologize for the role it played in the deadly tobacco pandemic.
Back in 1964, when the U.S. surgeon general unequivocally warned the American public for the first time of the dangers of cigarette smoking, one major organization failed to support this stand. It was the AMA. The War on Smoking was joined. But the AMA was MIA.
The physicians' group instead put its support behind the tobacco industry's efforts, a pre-emptive strike that funneled $18 million of tobacco money toward "research" managed by the AMA. The industry used this strategy to claim that the dangers of smoking were still an open question -- one being investigated by America's doctors. This conspiracy bought the AMA's silence for 14 crucial years following publication of the surgeon general's report, as hundreds of thousands of people, including disproportionately high numbers of African Americans, died and were disabled from smoking-related illnesses.
To add insult to injury, in 1981, the Chicago Sun-Times revealed that the AMA's Physician Retirement Fund owned shares in Philip Morris and R.J. Reynolds. . . .
To really clear the air, the AMA should step up, as it now has on its racist policies of the past, and apologize for long being in cahoots with the tobacco industry.
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