Stop tobacco industry sponsorship of continuing medical education

In a troubling development for tobacco control, Medscape, a continuing education website for health professionals, was recently discovered to be promoting a series on smoking cessation sponsored by tobacco company Philip Morris International (PMI).1 Observers will note the bizarre incongruity of education programmes for doctors being funded by a tobacco giant whose products are estimated to kill over a million people a year,2 yet such initiatives are all part of tobacco companies’ most recent attempts to rebrand themselves to ensure their continued financial health.

PMI, with the second largest market share of the global cigarette market,3 claims to be transitioning to the “health and wellness” sector, building on its acquisition of inhaler company Vectura in 2021.24 After The BMJ’s Medscape investigation was published, evidence emerged that other courses sponsored by PMI—all focused on its version of “harm reduction”—were being offered or planned in South Africa, the Middle East, and possibly other parts of the world.5

After an outcry led by clinicians and health professional organisations about course content (such as quitting smoking being omitted from the suggested options for patients concerned about how to reduce their lung cancer risk), …