Big Tobacco and The Poor
By Egon E. Mosum
Man is the only creature that will enjoy poisoning itself, and pay for the privilege.
Huge industries are built upon products that sooner or later will kill or at least incapacitate the consumer of those products; they are populated by public corporations that sell toxins that destroy the health of the public while enriching the wealth of the stockholders.
When one demographic of the market for these products becomes educated enough to reject the neatly packaged poison being sold, the resilient manufacturers and distributors of the products will find a lesser educated, yet highly lucrative new market.
Often, they target the poor, who even if they do not have enough nutritious food to eat because of their economic debility, they will still make sure they have enough trans-fat fast meals to consume, and after eating, enough cigarettes to smoke.
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Smoking in the United States has significantly declined in the past decades. According to a Gallup article in 2023, regarding cigarette smoking in our country in that year, it was ‘significantly lower than any other year in Gallup’s nearly 80-year trend.’[1]
But it’s a wide world, and in those parts of the world where there are plenty of poor who lack the knowledge regarding the dangers of tobacco use, or don’t care and just want the nicotine ‘high’ to forget about life for a while, there is a welcome mat spread out for ‘weed.’
There’s a ready, willing and able market for the tobacco products among the poor that can eventually end the consumer’s poverty by ending the life of said individual;
the individual who would ‘walk a mile for a Camel’ until he is too short of breath to walk, the individual who ‘would rather fight than switch’ until he is too impaired by lung problems to fight.
These are the current demographics of death by cigarette consumption.
In a 2023 on the American Cancer Society’s website, it was revealed ‘While overall smoking rates have declined in recent years, smoking rates remain higher among specific populations, including people with limited incomes. These differences are in large part due to the tobacco industry’s targeted marketing through advertising, price discounting and other strategies.’[2]
In a 2015 article in Respiratory Therapy, it was acknowledged ‘The tobacco industry’s “sales are falling in high-income countries and so its future profitability depends on getting young people hooked on smoking in low-income countries.’[3]
Now, say what you want about big tobacco, but at least they are deeply concerned about children in low income countries—as a potential market.
In a report in The Conversation in 2022, it made a finding that ‘the world’s largest multinational tobacco companies are advertising cigarettes to kids near playgrounds and schools in 42 majority low- and middle-income countries.’[4]
If you get ‘em while their young, you can keep ‘em until they die, at least that seems to be the marketing idea of big tobacco.
In fact, in a 2022 marketing research study it was determined that nearly 80% of the world’s smokers live in low- and middle-income countries.’[5]
That same report states that these countries ‘have less health care infrastructure to care for those suffering from tobacco-related diseases. Tobacco use is also known to perpetuate cycles of poverty, with money for essentials like food and housing costs being spent on tobacco products instead.’[6]
One can imagine a future time when the fast food giant corporations go to war against the tobacco companies over who gets to kill the poor first in developing countries. Where there are profits to be made, even if those profits come from the poor, the public owned purveyors of poison will be there, ready, willing and able to market to the masses who know not what they do—to themselves.
But let us not cast stones solely on American companies, there seems to be a joint international effort to poison the youth of the developing world. ‘Philip Morris, British American Tobacco, Japan Tobacco and Imperial Tobacco are aggressively marketing cigarettes and other tobacco products near primary and secondary schools in more than 22 countries.’[7]
In Zambia for instance, ‘almost all shops and kiosks within 100 meters of primary and secondary schools, playgrounds and arcades sell tobacco products and expose children to tobacco marketing and promotional tactics.’[8]
WHY YOU SHOULD CARE
Over the last century, in the United States, we have seen a population of smokers suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous cancer and respiratory diseases, until that population, through experience and education realized that smoking is bad for one’s health. The citizenry realized that the filter tip could be fatal, that tobacco could be terminal.
So, as time went by, people quit smoking, the tobacco industry, despite its lobbying efforts and political contributions in the United States lost significant market share, and had its packages covered in government warnings that smoking could be hazardous to one’s health.
Recently there has been greater focus by big tobacco from a variety of producing and distributing countries on the less educated population of the poor countries, targeting their adults, and especially targeting their children—something that would not be welcome in the United States.
The tobacco industry is busy sowing the seeds for future generations of cancer patients, heart patients, lung patients in the Third World, and raking in present profits while they are doing it.
While one does not expect much morality in the manufacturing of poisons for human consumption, the toll of this tobacco targeting the poor is going to be paid by the richer countries, because while increasing their present market, they are in the process of killing off their future market.
Eventually, even the poor become better educated, even the poor realize that the richer world seeks only to exploit them as a market, and that people don’t even run a close second to profits. When they do learn the reality of the economics of exploiting children as a current and future market for cigarettes, when they do learn the public health burdens created by the tobacco industry in their country, it is likely that the market will decrease.
It is hoped that the market will decrease, at least by those among us who put public welfare above public corporation profits.
[1] U.S. Cigarette Smoking Rate Steady Near Historical Low Jones, 8/18/23 GALLUP https://news.gallup.com/poll/509720/cigarette-smoking-rate-steady-near-historical-low.aspx
[2] BIG TOBACCO TARGETS PEOPLE WITH LIMITED INCOMES 1/12/23 AMERICAN CANCER SOCIETY https://www.fightcancer.org/policy-resources/big-tobacco-targets-people-limited-incomes#:~:text=Big%20Tobacco's%20targeting%20of%20people,schools%20than%20in%20other%20neighborhoods
[3] POOR COUNTRIES INCREASINGLY TARGETED BY TOBACCO MARKETING 12/4/15 RESPIRATORY THERAPY https://respiratory-therapy.com/public-health/smoking/tobacco/poor-countries-increasingly-targeted-tobacco-marketing/
[4] CIGARETTE ADVERTISING AGGRESSIVELY TARGETS KIDS IN LOW AND MIDDLE INCOME COUNTRIES 8/10/22 The Conversation https://theconversation.com/cigarette-advertising-aggressively-targets-kids-in-low-and-middle-income-countries-a-new-study-finds-186628
[5] Targeting LMICs: The Tobacco Industry’s Latest Strategy? 8/15/22 STOP https://exposetobacco.org/news/tobacco-industrys-latest-strategy/
[6] IBID
[7] BIG TOBACCO TINY TARGETS 3/9/18 CAMPAIGN FOR TOBACCO FREE KIDS https://www.tobaccofreekids.org/press-releases/2018_03_09_tinytargets
[8] New Report Reveals Big Tobacco’s Continued Targeting of Zambian Youth 3/27/25 https://www.tobaccofreekids.org/press-releases/2025_03_27_new-report-reveals-big-tobaccos-continued-targeting-of-zambian-youth
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