Kilbourne Targets of Cigarette Advertising Jean Kilbourne, PhD Cigarettes are the only product advertised which are lethal when used as intended. Indeed they are a product about which nothing good can honestly be said. They are highly addictive. The damage they do to health has been documented by more than 50,000 research studies.
Smoking is the single largest preventable cause of death in America.
Over 1,000 people die every day because of cigarette-related diseases. In the twentieth century, more people have been killed by tobacco than by war. Contradictions abound in the world of tobacco advertising. Youthful, healthy people frolic and play with no apparent worries whatsoever. Macho men owe their freedom and independence, indeed their very masculinity, to their Camels and Marlboros, although the evidence indicates that cigarettes are linked with impotence, lower testosterone count, and sterility.