A Comment in this week's Lancet discusses legal action taken by the tobacco company Philip Morris against Uruguay, as the Latin American country takes steps to increase coverage on tobacco packs of health warnings to 80%, and to require plain or coloured packaging. The Comment is by Dr Raphael Lencucha, University of Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada.
Lenucha discusses the obvious clash faced by nations trying to step up tobacco control, given that discriminatory treatment of trademarks (in this case tobacco branding) is strictly forbidden by the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Agreement. Yet WHO's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), to which Uruguay is a signatory, provides specific requirements for countries to implement warning labels of at least 30% coverage of the tobacco pack, and that warnings should be visible on all sides of the pack. Uruguay is not the only country to face this issue. With its recent commitment to plain packaging, Australia is also facing the wrath of tobacco giants.
The Uruguay-Philip Morris case has important implications for global health governance. "The first pertains to the general debate about how health governance should be treated in view of trade and investment treaties", says Lencucha. The second pertains to governmental control over health protection and promotion, and the third is related to precedence for future tobacco-control litigation and the power of FCTC to legitimise governmental tobacco-control legislation.
"The regulation of tobacco packaging, such as warning labels and plain packaging, is an important intervention to both dissuade non-smokers from becoming smokers and encourage smokers to quit. It is also an intervention the tobacco industry has worked to resist in the past. Individuals with an interest in global health governance should follow Philip Morris' case against Uruguay with interest to observe whether, and if so how, international health law is used to support governmental decisions to protect health."
Dr Raphael Lencucha, University of Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada. T) +1 403-332-4086 E) Raphael.lencucha@uleth.ca
For full Comment see: http://press.thelancet.com/uruguay.pdf
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Journal
The Lancet