A revolutionary attack on tobacco: Bolshevik antismoking campaigns in the 1920s

T.A. Starks

American Journal of Public Health, 2017, vol. 107, issue 11, 1711-1717

Abstract: Using archival records of the Commissariat of Public Health, journals, and propaganda materials from the antismoking campaign of the Soviet 1920s, this article argues that the revolutionary state pursued an antitobacco policy unique in the world in its attack on tobacco use at a national scale. The commissar of public health, Nikolai Alexandrovich Semashko, attempted to severely curtail tobacco cultivation and production, limit tobacco sales, and create a public opinion against tobacco with a propaganda campaign. Even in failing in its farther-reaching goals, the policy proved one of the most forward in terms of antismoking propaganda and state-sponsored treatment regimens, with the distribution of antismoking posters, pamphlets, articles, plays, and films as well as the creation of special state-sponsored smoking-cessation programs that boasted high success rates.

Date: 2017
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.2105/AJPH.2017.304048

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:aph:ajpbhl:10.2105/ajph.2017.304048_1

DOI: 10.2105/AJPH.2017.304048

Access Statistics for this article

American Journal of Public Health is currently edited by Alfredo Morabia

More articles in American Journal of Public Health from American Public Health Association
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Christopher F Baum ().