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Tobacco firm Philip Morris calls for ban on cigarettes within decade:
The chief executive of tobacco business Philip Morris International has called on the UK government to ban cigarettes within a decade, in a move that would outlaw its own Marlboro brand.
Jacek Olczak said the company could “see the world without cigarettes … and actually, the sooner it happens, the better it is for everyone.” Cigarettes should be treated like petrol cars, the sale of which is due to be banned from 2030, he said.
Government action would end the confusion felt by smokers, some of whom still thought the “alternatives are worse than cigarettes”, Olczak told the Sunday Telegraph. “Give them a choice of smoke-free alternatives … with the right regulation and information it can happen 10 years from now in some countries. You can solve the problem once and forever.”
Philip Morris International (PMI) recently said it wanted half its turnover to come from non-smoking products as it morphs into a “healthcare and wellness company” with executive pay tied to its new mission to “unsmoke the world” by phasing out cigarettes.
Nonetheless the company has come under fire from anti-smoking campaigners who accused it of hypocrisy after it launched a £1bn takeover bid for Vectura, a British pharmacy company that makes asthma inhalers.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Retian on Tuesday July 27 2021, @03:38AM
Oh well that's just peachy. First they profit for decades by addicting millions to poison, and now they stand to profit even more from the healthcare needs of their customers who are still alive.
Yeah, there's the kind of greed I expect from corporate sociopaths.
I'm guessing them suddenly demanding the inevitable cigarette bans means they think they're in a better position than their competitors right now, ready to outcompete them on the tobacco alternatives they're shifting towards. The only thing I'm certain of is that nobody involved in this decision did it out of any sense of altruism.