Tobacco advertising and coverage of smoking and health in women's magazines.

This study examines the extent of tobacco advertising and the coverage of smoking and health in all Irish produced women's magazines for 1989-93. There were 805 pieces in 402 magazines of which 684 (85%) were tobacco advertisements, 48 (5.7%) were new briefs; 27 (3.4%) were advice columns; 16 (2%) were feature articles; 15 (1.9%) were health promotion advertisements dealing with smoking and pregnancy; 10 (1.2%) were letters and 5 (0.61%) were editorials. Topics covered by the 106 articles on smoking were: smoking cessation-43 (40.6%); general health issues 35 (33%); smoking in pregnancy-4 (3.8%) and passive smoking 17 (16%). Of the 106 articles, 4 were negative about measures to control smoking. Four cigarette brands accounted for 70% of the advertisements. No tobacco advertisement carried the warning that "Smoking when pregnant harms your baby" or "Smoking kills". The 385002 cm2 of space devoted to tobacco advertising and negative messages about the dangers of tobacco and health represents 1.95% of total magazine space and is 14.5 times greater than the 26575 cm2 of positive messages about the dangers of smoking. That these magazines advertise tobacco without adequately covering the harmful effects of tobacco would suggest a degree of hypocrisy in their stated concern for women's health and lends further strength to the principle of a total ban on all tobacco advertising.