In order to stop the tobacco epidemic, the World Health Organization (WHO) has encouraged its member-States to become legally-bound Parties to the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO-FCTC), the first international treaty on health negotiated under the auspices of the WHO ¹1. Instituto Nacional de Câncer José Alencar Gomes da Silva. Convenção-Quadro para o Controle do Tabaco. Texto oficial. Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional de Câncer José Alencar Gomes da Silva; 2011., and which has been force since 2005. As of 2016, 179 countries and the European Union are Parties to this treaty ²2. World Health Organization. Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. 2016. Parties to the WHO FCTC. http://www.who.int/fctc/signatories_parties/en/ (acessado em 13/Abr/2016).
http://www.who.int/fctc/signatories_part... . In order to evaluate and define WHO-FCTC guidelines, every two years, member-States gather in the Conference of the Parties (COP) and establish recommendations on best practices for treaty implementation.

Brazil ratified the treaty in 2006 (Decree 5,658/2006) ³3. Presidência da República. Decreto nº 5,658 de 2 de janeiro de 2006. Promulga a Convenção-Quadro sobre Controle do Uso do Tabaco, adotada pelos países membros da Organização Mundial de Saúde em 21 de maio de 2003 e assinada pelo Brasil em 16 de junho de 2003. Diário Oficial da União 2006; 3 jan. and, in doing so, tobacco control became a State policy. Brazil was a pioneer in implementing several policies, such as: promoting smoking-free environments, offering smoking cessation treatments in the public health system - Brazilian Unified National Health System (SUS), restricting advertising, regulating tobacco product components, carrying out research on the prevalence of tobacco use and, more recently, launching a policy to increase taxes and prices of tobacco products. In order to implement WHO-FCTC recommendations, the National Commission for Implementing the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (CONICQ, in Portuguese) was created in 2003. Presided by the Health Minister, the CONICQ was initially composed of representatives of 11 ministries and is currently composed of representatives of 18 federal agencies ⁴4. Instituto Nacional de Câncer José Alencar Gomes da Silva; Comissão Nacional para Implementação da Convenção-Quadro para Controle do Tabaco (CONICQ). Política Nacional de Controle do Tabaco: relatório de gestão e progresso 2011-2012. Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional de Câncer José Alencar Gomes da Silva; 2014..

According to the WHO’s report on the CONICQ’s progress ⁵5. World Health Organization. Global Progress Report, 2014. http://www.who.int/fctc/reporting/2014globalprogressreport.pdf?ua=1 (acessado em 13/Apr/2016).
http://www.who.int/fctc/reporting/2014gl... , one of the biggest obstacles to implementing the policies established in the WHO-FCTC has been the tobacco industry’s interference in public policy. Article 5.3 of the WHO-FCTC establishes the need for protecting public policy from the tobacco industry’s commercial interests, in accordance with national law ¹1. Instituto Nacional de Câncer José Alencar Gomes da Silva. Convenção-Quadro para o Controle do Tabaco. Texto oficial. Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional de Câncer José Alencar Gomes da Silva; 2011.. Guidelines for implementing Article 5.3 highlight the importance of monitoring the tobacco industry’s activities, something that is also highlighted as crucial to tobacco control in the World Health Assembly’s decision 54.18, which states that member-States must be alert to the tobacco industry’s attempts at interference (http://www.who.int/tobacco/resources/publications/Tobacco%20Industry%20Interference-FINAL.pdf).

Though the need to combat tobacco industry strategies for impeding tobacco control was already present in the WHO-FCTC from its conception, the strategies for governments to defend themselves against the industry have developed gradually. To that end, non-governmental organizations and governments have constantly, but not systematically, monitored and denounced industry tactics ⁶6. Cavalcante T, Carvalho AM, Rangel EC. El argumento de responsabilidad social de la industria tabacalera en Brasil. Salud Pública Méx 2006; 48 Suppl 1:s173-82.. During COP, especially COP6, in 2014, it was recommended that member-States intensify collaborative actions in order to contain the transnational tobacco industry’s efforts. The WHO-FCTC secretariat, backed by member-States, identifies the need to create centers for monitoring the tobacco industry or observatories for analyzing and publicizing current and future tobacco industry strategies so as to inform governments and policymakers and prevent industry interference ⁷7. World Health Organization. Establisment of tobacco industry monitoring centers, 2016. http://www.who.int/fctc/mediacentre/news/2016/TI-observatories-in-BRICS-countries/en/ (acessado em 20/Abr/2015).
http://www.who.int/fctc/mediacentre/news... ^,88. Centro de Estudos sobre Tabaco e Saúde, Escola Nacional De Saúde Pública Sergio Arouca, Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Observatório das estratégias da indústria do tabaco, 2015. http://cetab.ensp.fiocruz.br (acessado em 10/Mai/2015).
http://cetab.ensp.fiocruz.br... ^,99. World Health Organization. Framework Convention on Tobacco Control FCTC/WHO. Guidelines Tobacco Industries Interference 2012. http://www.who.int/tobacco/wntd/2012/industry_interference/en/ (acessado em 10/Mai/2015).
http://www.who.int/tobacco/wntd/2012/ind... ^,1010. Costa e Silva VL, Pantani D, Andreis M, Sparks R, Pinsky I. Bridging the gap between science and public health: taking advantage of tobacco control experience in Brazil to inform policies to counter risk factors for non-communicable diseases. Addiction 2013; 108:1360-6.^,1111. World Health Organization. Framework Convention on Tobacco Control FCTC/WHO. Tobacco Industries Interference with Tobacco Control, 2008. http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/83128/1/9789241597340_eng.pdf (acessado em 10/Mai/2015).
http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665... .

One such initiative is the website Tobacco Tactics (http://www.tobaccotactics.org), created by the University of Bath (UK) in 2012 in order to demonstrate how the tobacco industry acts to compromise tobacco control actions in the United Kingdom and the European Union. It also includes some global activities.

Through contacts with researchers from the University of Bath, and partnering with CONICQ, the Alliance for the Control of Tobacco (ACT), the Pan-American Health Organization (PAHO) and the International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease (UNION), the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz) launched, in March 2016, the Observatory of Tobacco Industry Strategies. The Observatory is part of a global project promoted by the WHO-FCTC Secretariat to establish an international platform that acts as a sentinel for tobacco industry activities. This is the first Observatory established in a public research institution and it seeks to monitor, analyze and publicize tobacco industry activities and their impacts in Brazil. Another part of its mission is to provide strategic subsidies to the Brazilian National Tobacco Control Policy ⁸8. Centro de Estudos sobre Tabaco e Saúde, Escola Nacional De Saúde Pública Sergio Arouca, Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Observatório das estratégias da indústria do tabaco, 2015. http://cetab.ensp.fiocruz.br (acessado em 10/Mai/2015).
http://cetab.ensp.fiocruz.br... . This on-line platform was created based on the free-software wiki model, the same used by the Tobacco Tatics website (http://www.tobaccotactics.org).

The WHO-FCTC Secretariat initiated a process to broaden the creation of tobacco industry monitoring centers in BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa). These countries are home to more than 40% of the world population and, despite WHO-FCTC implementation efforts, they are countries where the tobacco industry is present and strongly active in attempts to compromise tobacco control measures ⁷7. World Health Organization. Establisment of tobacco industry monitoring centers, 2016. http://www.who.int/fctc/mediacentre/news/2016/TI-observatories-in-BRICS-countries/en/ (acessado em 20/Abr/2015).
http://www.who.int/fctc/mediacentre/news... . It is expected that centers consider each country’s specificities and, at the same time, generate evidence-based results and data.

Observatories are document repositories that, simultaneously, have a dynamic process for communicating and divulging tobacco industry strategies. Based on WHO categories ⁹9. World Health Organization. Framework Convention on Tobacco Control FCTC/WHO. Guidelines Tobacco Industries Interference 2012. http://www.who.int/tobacco/wntd/2012/industry_interference/en/ (acessado em 10/Mai/2015).
http://www.who.int/tobacco/wntd/2012/ind... ^,1111. World Health Organization. Framework Convention on Tobacco Control FCTC/WHO. Tobacco Industries Interference with Tobacco Control, 2008. http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/83128/1/9789241597340_eng.pdf (acessado em 10/Mai/2015).
http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665... , the Fiocruz Observatory is organized according to tobacco industry tactics to oppose tobacco control policies, that is, they are didactically organized in six categories: (1) tobacco companies’ maneuvers to appropriate political and legislative processes; (2) overestimating the tobacco industry’s importance to countries’ economic development; (3) manipulating the public opinion to gain respectability; (4) creating front groups to defend industry interests; (5) disparaging scientific research with the purpose of weakening tobacco control legislation; (6) intimidating governments through litigation or threat of litigation. It also has a section with names of organizations and individuals connected, whether directly or indirectly, with the tobacco industry, such as front companies used to defend its interests, advertisement agencies, public relations companies, pro-tobacco unions and associations and individuals such as activists, lobbyists, politicians and bloggers who are pro-tobacco (Figure 1).

The information that makes up the Observatory comes from public sources, available in books, scientific articles, audiovisual files (photos, films, documentaries, advertisements), legal documents, theses, dissertations and other documents available in websites such as those belonging to tobacco companies and groups defending their interests. Internal tobacco industry documents, made publicly available as a result of legal settlements between governments and the industry, are also used (https://industrydocuments.library.ucsf.edu/tobacco/).

The Observatory will bring together, in a didactic fashion, diverse documents which show how the tobacco industry has attempted to prevent the adoption of measures to implement the WHO-FCTC. It will work alongside Brazilian National Cancer Institute José Alencar Gomes da Silva’s (INCA) National Tobacco Control Policy Observatory (Figure 2).

In the medium-term, this platform will favor the creation of a specific line of investigation for students, investigative reporters and other social actors interested in developing research on tobacco industry tactics, in order to better understand what these strategies are and how they undermine public policy, as well as how to contest them.

In the long term, the Observatory will consolidate a model that may be useful in monitoring the actions of other industries, such as the ultraprocessed foods industry, the soft drinks industry and the alcohol industry, since there is an undeniable similarity between these industries’ practices. This will favor actions to reduce Chronic Noncommunicable Diseases. In addition to being a model for other BRICS countries, the Fiocruz Observatory may serve as an example for all countries where this industry is active, considering its modus operandi is the same in all of these countries.

Dr. Margaret Chan, the WHO’s Director-General, in her address at the 15th World Conference on Tobacco or Health, in 2012, declared that “the enemy, the tobacco industry, has changed its face and its tactics. The wolf is no longer in sheep’s clothing and it has bared its teeth” (speech by Dra. Margareth Chan in the 15^th World Conference on Tabacco or Health 2012, in Singapore. http://actbr.org.br/uploads/conteudo/703_Discurso_Margaret_chan.pdf, accessed on 26/Mar/2013), calling us to reflect on how countries, informed by the systematic monitoring of the tobacco industry, may work together in order to contain its influence.

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Cláudio Roberto Cordovil Oliveira.

References

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