Death In The West Essay Questions
According to the National Cancer Institute, in the United States, 1 out of 10 smokers is diagnosed with Lung Cancer. The film, Death in the West, is an anti-smoking exposé documentary produced by Thames Television in 1976, which originally aired on British Television before being banned. Considered one of the most powerful anti-smoking films ever made, the film takes on one of the biggest, richest tobacco companies: Philip Morris International Inc., and more specifically, the Marlboro brand. Despite the educational and informing aspect of the film, it was banned completely by Philip Morris International Inc. Despite the fact that Philip Morris sued the filmmakers soon after it’s release and after a 1979 secret settlement all the copies were
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According to the filmmakers and their research, tobacco smoke contains carcinogens, which are cancer producing substances. When interviewing a representative of the Philip Morris International Inc., Dr. Helmut Wakeham (V.P. Science & Technology), he was asked questions about the negative side effects and ingredients and asked if they, the company, denied it or if their research showed otherwise; ultimately, he did not disagree with or deny the claims. He was more specifically questioned about whether he could “say that cigarettes do no harm to the cigarette smoker”, but he completely dodged the question by stating, “I’m not in a position to say, I don’t know what harms a cigarette smoker or what doesn’t harm him…you must be trying to get me to admit that cigarette smoking is harmful”. This simply shows that these tobacco companies know exactly what their product is, and what harm it can cause, and despite the shocking facts revealed or known, they continue to grow their businesses and continue to sell the harmful product to the naive public. In fact, once Marlboro became recognized as the number one selling cigarette brand, after twenty-five years of hard work and research, the World Health Organization named smoking as one of the primary causes of Lung Cancer, Bronchitis, Emphysema, and Heart Disease. If it weren’t for the ban, the public would have knowledge of these important studies that could ultimately impact their life in a drastic way considering lives are lost due to lung cancer and heart
According to the filmmakers and their research, tobacco smoke contains carcinogens, which are cancer producing substances. When interviewing a representative of the Philip Morris International Inc., Dr. Helmut Wakeham (V.P. Science & Technology), he was asked questions about the negative side effects and ingredients and asked if they, the company, denied it or if their research showed otherwise; ultimately, he did not disagree with or deny the claims. He was more specifically questioned about whether he could “say that cigarettes do no harm to the cigarette smoker”, but he completely dodged the question by stating, “I’m not in a position to say, I don’t know what harms a cigarette smoker or what doesn’t harm him…you must be trying to get me to admit that cigarette smoking is harmful”. This simply shows that these tobacco companies know exactly what their product is, and what harm it can cause, and despite the shocking facts revealed or known, they continue to grow their businesses and continue to sell the harmful product to the naive public. In fact, once Marlboro became recognized as the number one selling cigarette brand, after twenty-five years of hard work and research, the World Health Organization named smoking as one of the primary causes of Lung Cancer, Bronchitis, Emphysema, and Heart Disease. If it weren’t for the ban, the public would have knowledge of these important studies that could ultimately impact their life in a drastic way considering lives are lost due to lung cancer and heart