Swiss advertising does not wash brains

Bans Swiss Advertising (SW) is defending itself against a commentary in the Tages-Anzeiger newspaper, which said that resistance to smoking bans shows that the tobacco industry's advertising messages have "the characteristics of brainwashing". The SW countered that advertising bans do not change consumption and that in socialist countries, where there was no advertising, more people smoked than here. "Who has been brainwashed here?" asks SW spokesman Piero Schäfer. He also notes that the SW is also in favor of smoking bans.