A question of standards
More suggestions of bad behaviour by tobacco companies. Maybe
ANOTHER round has just been fought in the battle between tobacco companies and those who regard them as spawn of the devil. In a paper just published in the Lancet, with the provocative title “Secret science: tobacco industry research on smoking behaviour and cigarette toxicity”, David Hammond, of *Waterloo University[1] in Canada and Neil Collishaw and Cynthia Callard, two members of Physicians for a Smoke-Free Canada, a lobby group, criticise the behaviour of British American Tobacco (BAT). They say the firm considered manipulating some of its products in order to (1)make them low-tar in the eyes of officialdom while they actually delivered high tar and nicotine levels to smokers.
It was and is no secret, as BAT points out, that people smoke low-tar cigarettes differently from high-tar ones. The reason is that they want a decent dose of the nicotine which tobacco smoke contains. They therefore *pull[2] a larger volume of air through the cigarette when they *draw on[3] a low-tar rather than a high-tar variety. (2)The extra volume makes up for the lower concentration of the drug.
But a burning cigarette is a complex thing, and that extra volume has some unexpected consequences. In particular, a bigger draw is generally a faster draw. (3)That pulls a higher proportion of the air inhaled through the burning tobacco, rather than through the paper sides of the cigarette. This, in turn, means more smoke per unit volume, and thus more tar and nicotine. The nature of the nicotine may change, too, with more of it being in a form that is easy for the body to absorb.
According to Dr Hammond and his colleagues, a series of studies conducted by BAT's researchers between 1972 and 1994 quantified much of this. The standardised way of analysing cigarette smoke, as *laid down[4] by the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO), which regulates everything from computer code to greenhouse gases, uses a machine to make 35-millilitre puffs, drawn for two seconds once a minute. The firm's researchers, by contrast, found that real smokers draw 50-70ml per puff, and do so twice a minute. (4)Dr Hammonds's conclusion is drawn from the huge body of documents disgorged by the tobacco industry as part of various legal settlements that have taken place in the past few years, mainly as a result of disputes with the authorities in the United States.
Dr Hammond suggests, however, the firm went beyond merely investigating how people smoked. A series of internal documents from the late 1970s and early 1980s shows that BAT at least thought about applying this knowledge to cigarette design. A research report from 1979 puts it thus: “There are three major design features which can be used either individually or in combination to manipulate delivery levels; filtration, paper permeability, and filter-tip ventilation.” A conference paper from 1983 says, “The challenge would be to reduce the mainstream nicotine determined by standard smoking-machine measurement while increasing the amount that would actually be absorbed by the smoker”. Another conference paper, from 1984, says: “(5)We should strive to achieve this effect without appearing to have a cigarette that cheats the league table. Ideally it should appear to be no different from a normal cigarette...It should also be capable of delivering up to 100% more than its machine delivery.”
None of the documents discovered by the three researchers shows that BAT actually did redesign its cigarettes in this way, and the firm denies that it did. However, BAT's own data show that some of its cigarettes delivered far more nicotine and tar to machines which had the characteristics of real smokers than to those which ran on ISO standards. In the most extreme example, in a test carried out in 1987, the “real smoking” machine drew 86% more nicotine and 114% more tar from Player's Extra Light than the ISO machine detected, although smoke intake was only 27% higher.
(6)Regardless of how this [b][color=#0000FF]*came about[5], the irony is that low-tar brands may have ended up causing more health problems than high-tar ones.[/color][/b] As one of BAT's medical consultants put it as early as 1978, “Perhaps the most important determinant of the risk to health or to a particular aspect of health is the extent to which smoke is inhaled by smokers. If so, then deeply inhaled smoke from low-tar-delivery cigarettes might be more harmful than uninhaled smoke from high-tar cigarettes.” The firm, meanwhile, points out that the ISO test has been regarded as unreliable since 1967, and says its scientists have been part of a panel that is working on a new ISO standard.
注释：
[1]Waterloo：在比利时中部靠近布鲁塞尔的城镇，为拿破仑1815年6月18日遭到决定性失败的“滑铁卢”;而在加拿大安达略省东南部和美国衣阿华州东北部各有一座城市，一般译名为“沃特鲁”，以示区分。
[2]pull: 深吸; 对烟或饮料大口的吸或喝
[3]draw on: 吸收
[4]lay down: 规定，制定
[5]come about: 发生
参考译文：
一个关乎标准的问题
也许，烟草公司对那些不良行为应多提点建议
烟草公司与那些视其为“魔鬼之子”的人之间刚刚又进行了新一轮的交锋。新近出版的《柳叶刀》刊登了一篇题目颇具煽动性的论文《秘密科研——烟草业开展对吸烟行为和香烟毒性的研究》，作者是加拿大沃特鲁大学的戴维•哈蒙德以及加拿大一个名为“无烟加拿大医师”游说团的两名成员尼尔•科里肖和辛西娅•加拉德。他们对英美烟草公司的行为提出了批评，称该公司拟对某些烟草产品进行处理，企图让监督部门误以为其焦油含量低，而实际上这些产品仍会使得烟民吸收高浓度的焦油和尼古丁。
正如英美烟草公司所指出，人们吸低焦油含量香烟的感觉不同于高焦油含量香烟，这在过去和现在都不是什么秘密。这是因为他们需要烟草中含有适量尼古丁，抽低焦油品种的香烟时所吸入的空气含量也因此比抽高焦油品种的香烟时高，(译者注：也就是说，尼古丁含量过高，烟就很难吸，不容易抽得动。)而这高出来的空气含量也弥补了瘾性物质(尼古丁)的不足。
不过，一支点燃的卷烟可是一个复杂的玩意儿，并且空气量增加也会带来意想不到的结果，特别是当我们大口吸烟时往往会很快抽完一支烟，此时所吸入的空气更多来自于燃烧的烟草而非卷烟纸侧。因而，这就意味着每多吸一口空气，就会多吸一口焦油和尼古丁。多数尼古丁都以一种易被人体吸收的形式存在，因此尼古丁的性质也可能发生改变。
据哈蒙德医生及其同事们称，英美烟草公司的研究员已于1972年到1994年间通过一系列研究对上述大部分问题进行了定量检测。卷烟烟尘分析的标准方法，是由国际标准化组织(ISO，该组织可对包括计算机代码和温室气体在内的所有问题作出规定)制定的，此法利用一台机器喷发出35毫升的烟雾，受试者每分钟吸一次、每次持续2秒即可吸完。以此为对照，英美公司研究员发现，真正的烟民每分钟2次即可吸完50至70毫升烟雾。哈蒙德医生是从烟草业提供的大量文献中得出这一结论的。过去几年烟草业与美国当局一直僵持不下，遂签署了各类法律协议。作为其中的一项内容，烟草业被迫拱手交出这些文献。
不过哈蒙德医生表示，英美公司所调查的不仅仅人们的吸烟方式。英美公司上世纪70年代末、80年代初的一系列内部文献表明，该公司至少曾考虑过将这一知识用于卷烟设计。1979年的一份研究报告上这样说道：“可分别或联合应用与设计有关的三个要素，即过滤、烟卷包装纸的通透性以及过滤嘴的通气效果，来控制焦油和尼古丁的释放水平。”1983年一份会议论文也提到，“关键在于，要在提高吸烟者尼古丁实际吸收量的同时，减少可被标准检测方法测定到的含量。”1984年另一份会议论文说：“我们应当努力达到这一效果并能在检测中蒙混过关。理想化的结果是，这种香烟看上去应与一般香烟无任何差异…… 并且释放的尼古丁及焦油量要比机器释放的高出100%。”
三名研究人员发现的文献中没有一篇表明英美公司确曾采用这种方法对其生产的卷烟进行了改良，而且该公司也矢口否认这么干过。英美公司内部资料显示，其生产的某些卷烟向机器(具有实际吸烟者特征)释放的尼古丁和焦油量远远超出ISO标准。最为极端的例子是，在1987年进行的一项实验中，“真吸烟”机器从Player's Extra Light牌卷烟中吸收的尼古丁和焦油量比ISO仪器实际检测到的量分别高出86%和114%，而烟雾摄入量仅高27%。
不管事实真相是怎样的，具有讽刺意味的是，低焦油卷烟竟然比高焦油卷烟可能更有损于健康。正如一名英美公司医学顾问1978年所言，“也许，吸烟者吸烟时的深浅度是危及健康或者健康某一特定方面的最重要决定性因素。若果真如此，从低焦油卷烟中深深吸入的烟对人的危害可能比高焦油卷烟中未被吸入的烟更大。”与此同时，英美公司指出，自1967年以来，ISO的试验一直都被认为是不可靠的。并且言称其公司的科学家们已加入某评估委员会，正在研究制定新的ISO标准。
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