Anti-tobacco movement in Nazi Germany

After German doctors became the first to identify the link between smoking and lung cancer, Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...

initiated a strong anti-tobacco movement and led the first public anti-smoking campaign

Anti-smoking movement

Tobacco control is a field of public health science, policy and practice dedicated to controlling the growth of tobacco use and thereby reducing the morbidity and mortality it causes...

in modern history

Modern history

Modern history, or the modern era, describes the historical timeline after the Middle Ages. Modern history can be further broken down into the early modern period and the late modern period after the French Revolution and the Industrial Revolution...

. Anti-tobacco

Tobacco

Tobacco is an agricultural product processed from the leaves of plants in the genus Nicotiana. It can be consumed, used as a pesticide and, in the form of nicotine tartrate, used in some medicines...

movements grew in many nations from the beginning of the 20th century, but these had little success, except in Germany, where the campaign was supported by the government after the Nazis came to power. It was the most powerful anti-smoking

Smoking

Smoking is a practice in which a substance, most commonly tobacco or cannabis, is burned and the smoke is tasted or inhaled. This is primarily practised as a route of administration for recreational drug use, as combustion releases the active substances in drugs such as nicotine and makes them...

movement in the world during the 1930s and early 1940s. The National Socialist leadership condemned smoking and several of them openly criticized tobacco consumption. Research on smoking and its effects on health thrived under Nazi rule and was the most important of its type at that time. Adolf Hitler's

Adolf Hitler

Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...

personal distaste for tobacco and the Nazi reproductive policies were among the motivating factors behind their campaign against smoking, and this campaign was associated with both antisemitism and racism

Racism

Racism is the belief that inherent different traits in human racial groups justify discrimination. In the modern English language, the term "racism" is used predominantly as a pejorative epithet. It is applied especially to the practice or advocacy of racial discrimination of a pernicious nature...

.

The Nazi anti-tobacco campaign included banning smoking

Smoking ban

Smoking bans are public policies, including criminal laws and occupational safety and health regulations, which prohibit tobacco smoking in workplaces and/or other public spaces...

in trams

Trams in Germany

Germany has an extensive number of tramway networks . Some of these networks have been upgraded to light rail standards, called Stadtbahn in German...

, buses and city trains, promoting health education

Health education

Health education is the profession of educating people about health. Areas within this profession encompass environmental health, physical health, social health, emotional health, intellectual health, and spiritual health...

, limiting cigarette rations in the Wehrmacht

Wehrmacht

The Wehrmacht – from , to defend and , the might/power) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the Heer , the Kriegsmarine and the Luftwaffe .-Origin and use of the term:...

, organizing medical lectures for soldiers, and raising the tobacco tax. The National Socialists also imposed restrictions on tobacco advertising

Tobacco advertising

Tobacco advertising is the advertising of tobacco products or use by the tobacco industry through a variety of media including sponsorship, particularly of sporting events. It is now one of the most highly regulated forms of marketing...

and smoking in public spaces, and regulated restaurants and coffeehouses. The anti-tobacco movement did not have much effect in the early years of the Nazi regime and tobacco use increased between 1933 and 1939, but smoking by military personnel declined from 1939 to 1945. Even by the end of the 20th century, the anti-smoking movement in postwar Germany had not attained the influence of the Nazi anti-smoking campaign.

Prelude

Anti-tobacco sentiment existed in Germany

German Empire

The German Empire refers to Germany during the "Second Reich" period from the unification of Germany and proclamation of Wilhelm I as German Emperor on 18 January 1871, to 1918, when it became a federal republic after defeat in World War I and the abdication of the Emperor, Wilhelm II.The German...

in the early 20th century. Critics of smoking organized the first anti-tobacco group in the country named the Deutscher Tabakgegnerverein zum Schutze der Nichtraucher (German Tobacco Opponents' Association for the Protection of Non-smokers). Established in 1904, this organization existed for a brief period only. The next anti-tobacco organization, the Bund Deutscher Tabakgegner (Federation of German Tobacco Opponents), was established in 1910 in Trautenau, Bohemia

Bohemia

Bohemia is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands. It is located in the contemporary Czech Republic with its capital in Prague...

. Other anti-smoking organizations were established in 1912 in the cities of Hanover

Hanover

Hanover or Hannover, on the river Leine, is the capital of the federal state of Lower Saxony , Germany and was once by personal union the family seat of the Hanoverian Kings of Great Britain, under their title as the dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg...

and Dresden

Dresden

Dresden is the capital city of the Free State of Saxony in Germany. It is situated in a valley on the River Elbe, near the Czech border. The Dresden conurbation is part of the Saxon Triangle metropolitan area....

. In 1920, a Bund Deutscher Tabakgegner in der Tschechoslowakei (Federation of German Tobacco Opponents in Czechoslovakia) was formed in Prague

Prague

Prague is the capital and largest city of the Czech Republic. Situated in the north-west of the country on the Vltava river, the city is home to about 1.3 million people, while its metropolitan area is estimated to have a population of over 2.3 million...

, after Czechoslovakia

Czechoslovakia

Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...

was separated from Austria

Austria

Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

at the end of World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

. A Bund Deutscher Tabakgegner in Deutschösterreich (Federation of German Tobacco Opponents in German Austria

German Austria

Republic of German Austria was created following World War I as the initial rump state for areas with a predominantly German-speaking population within what had been the Austro-Hungarian Empire, without the Kingdom of Hungary, which in 1918 had become the Hungarian Democratic Republic.German...

) was established in Graz

Graz

The more recent population figures do not give the whole picture as only people with principal residence status are counted and people with secondary residence status are not. Most of the people with secondary residence status in Graz are students...

in 1920.

These groups published journals advocating nonsmoking. The first such German language

German language

German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....

journal was Der Tabakgegner (The Tobacco Opponent), published by the Bohemian organization between 1912 and 1932. Deutscher Tabakgegner (German Tobacco Opponent) was published in Dresden from 1919 to 1935, and was the second journal on this subject. The anti-tobacco organizations were also against consumption of alcohol.

Hitler's attitude towards smoking

Adolf Hitler

was a heavy smoker in his early life—he used to smoke 25 to 40 cigarettes daily—but gave up the habit, concluding that it was a waste of money. In later years, Hitler viewed smoking as "decadent" and "the wrath of the Red Man

Native Americans in the United States

Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...

against the White Man, vengeance for having been given hard liquor", lamenting that "so many excellent men have been lost to tobacco poisoning". He was unhappy because both Eva Braun

Eva Braun

Eva Anna Paula Hitler was the longtime companion of Adolf Hitler and, for less than 40 hours, his wife. Braun met Hitler in Munich, when she was 17 years old, while working as an assistant and model for his personal photographer and began seeing him often about two years later...

and Martin Bormann

Martin Bormann

Martin Ludwig Bormann was a prominent Nazi official. He became head of the Party Chancellery and private secretary to Adolf Hitler...

were smokers and was concerned over Hermann Göring

Hermann Göring

Hermann Wilhelm Göring, was a German politician, military leader, and a leading member of the Nazi Party. He was a veteran of World War I as an ace fighter pilot, and a recipient of the coveted Pour le Mérite, also known as "The Blue Max"...

's continued smoking in public places. He was angered when a statue portraying a cigar-smoking Göring was commissioned. Hitler is often considered to be the first national leader to advocate nonsmoking, although James VI and I of Scotland and England has a better claim to that title

A Counterblaste to Tobacco

A Counterblaste to Tobacco is a treatise written by King James VI of Scotland and I of England in 1604, in which he expresses his distaste for tobacco, particularly tobacco smoking. As such, it is one of the earliest anti-tobacco publications....

by three hundred years.

Hitler disapproved of the military personnel's freedom to smoke, and during World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

he said on 2 March 1942, "it was a mistake, traceable to the army leadership at the time, at the beginning of the war". He also said that it was "not correct to say that a soldier cannot live without smoking". He promised to end the use of tobacco in the military after the end of the war. Hitler personally encouraged close friends not to smoke and rewarded those who quit smoking

Smoking cessation

Smoking cessation is the process of discontinuing the practice of inhaling a smoked substance. This article focuses exclusively on cessation of tobacco smoking; however, the methods described may apply to cessation of smoking other substances that can be difficult to stop using due to the...

. However, Hitler's personal distaste for tobacco was only one of several catalysts behind the anti-smoking campaign.

Reproductive policies

The Nazi reproductive policies were a significant factor behind their anti-tobacco campaign. Women who smoked were considered to be vulnerable to premature aging and loss of physical attractiveness

Physical attractiveness

Physical attractiveness refers to a person's physical traits which are perceived to be aesthetically pleasing or beautiful. The term often implies sexual attractiveness or desirability, but can also be distinct from the two; for example, humans may regard the young as attractive for various...

; they were viewed as unsuitable to be wives and mothers in a German family. Werner Huttig of the Nazi Party's Rassenpolitisches Amt
Office of Racial Policy
The NSDAP Office of Racial Policy was a Nazi Party office created in 1933 for "unifying and supervising all indoctrination and propaganda work in the field of population and racial politics"...

(Office of Racial Politics) said that a smoking mother's breast milk

Breast milk

Breast milk, more specifically human milk, is the milk produced by the breasts of a human female for her infant offspring...

contained nicotine

Nicotine

Nicotine is an alkaloid found in the nightshade family of plants that constitutes approximately 0.6–3.0% of the dry weight of tobacco, with biosynthesis taking place in the roots and accumulation occurring in the leaves...

, a claim that modern research has proven correct. Martin Staemmler, a prominent physician during the Third Reich, opined that smoking by pregnant women resulted in a higher rate of stillbirth

Stillbirth

A stillbirth occurs when a fetus has died in the uterus. The Australian definition specifies that fetal death is termed a stillbirth after 20 weeks gestation or the fetus weighs more than . Once the fetus has died the mother still has contractions and remains undelivered. The term is often used in...

s and miscarriage

Miscarriage

Miscarriage or spontaneous abortion is the spontaneous end of a pregnancy at a stage where the embryo or fetus is incapable of surviving independently, generally defined in humans at prior to 20 weeks of gestation...

s. This opinion was also supported by well-known female racial hygienist

Racial hygiene

Racial hygiene was a set of early twentieth century state sanctioned policies by which certain groups of individuals were allowed to procreate and others not, with the expressed purpose of promoting certain characteristics deemed to be particularly desirable...

Agnes Bluhm, whose book published in 1936 expressed the same view. The Nazi leadership was concerned over this because they wanted German women to be as reproductive as possible. An article published in a German gynecology

Gynaecology

Gynaecology or gynecology is the medical practice dealing with the health of the female reproductive system . Literally, outside medicine, it means "the science of women"...

journal in 1943 stated that women smoking three or more cigarettes per day were more likely to remain childless

Childless

Childlessness describes a person who does not have any children. The causes of childlessness are many and it has great personal, social and political significance...

compared to nonsmoking women.

Research

Research and studies on tobacco's effects on the population's health were more advanced in Germany than in any other nation by the time the Nazis came to power. The link between lung cancer

Lung cancer

Lung cancer is a disease characterized by uncontrolled cell growth in tissues of the lung. If left untreated, this growth can spread beyond the lung in a process called metastasis into nearby tissue and, eventually, into other parts of the body. Most cancers that start in lung, known as primary...

and tobacco was first proven in Nazi Germany, contrary to the popular belief that American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

and British

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

scientists first discovered it in the 1950s. The term "passive smoking

Passive smoking

Passive smoking is the inhalation of smoke, called secondhand smoke or environmental tobacco smoke , from tobacco products used by others. It occurs when tobacco smoke permeates any environment, causing its inhalation by people within that environment. Exposure to secondhand tobacco smoke causes...

" ("Passivrauchen") was coined in Nazi Germany. Research projects funded by the Nazis revealed many disastrous effects of smoking on health. Nazi Germany supported epidemiological research

Epidemiology

Epidemiology is the study of health-event, health-characteristic, or health-determinant patterns in a population. It is the cornerstone method of public health research, and helps inform policy decisions and evidence-based medicine by identifying risk factors for disease and targets for preventive...

on the harmful effects of tobacco use. Hitler personally gave financial support to the Wissenschaftliches Institut zur Erforschung der Tabakgefahren (Institute for Tobacco Hazards Research) at the University of Jena, headed by Karl Astel. Established in 1941, it was the most significant anti-tobacco institute in Nazi Germany.

Franz H. Müller in 1939 and E. Schairer in 1943 first used case-control

Case-control

A case-control study is a type of study design in epidemiology. Case-control studies are used to identify factors that may contribute to a medical condition by comparing subjects who have that condition with patients who do not have the condition but are otherwise similar .Case-control studies are...

epidemiological methods to study lung cancer among smokers. In 1939, Müller published a study report in a reputed cancer journal in Germany which claimed that prevalence of lung cancer was higher among smokers. Müller, described as the "forgotten father of experimental epidemiology", was a member of the National Socialist Motor Corps

National Socialist Motor Corps

The National Socialist Motor Corps , also known as the National Socialist Drivers Corps, was a paramilitary organization of the Nazi Party that existed from 1931 to 1945. The group was a successor organization to the older National Socialist Automobile Corps, which had existed since the beginning...

(NSKK) and the Nazi Party (NSDAP). Müller's 1939 medical dissertation was the world's first controlled epidemiological study of the relationship between tobacco and lung cancer. Apart from mentioning the increasing incidence of lung cancer and many of the causes behind it such as dust, exhaust gas from cars, tuberculosis

Tuberculosis

Tuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...

, X-ray and pollutants emitted from factories, Müller's paper pointed out that "the significance of tobacco smoke has been pushed more and more into the foreground".

Physicians in the Third Reich were aware that smoking is responsible for cardiac diseases, which were considered to be the most serious diseases resulting from smoking. Use of nicotine was sometimes considered to be responsible for increasing reports of myocardial infarction

Myocardial infarction

Myocardial infarction or acute myocardial infarction , commonly known as a heart attack, results from the interruption of blood supply to a part of the heart, causing heart cells to die...

in the country. In the later years of World War II, researchers considered nicotine a factor behind the coronary heart failures suffered by a significant number of military personnel in the Eastern Front

Eastern Front (World War II)

The Eastern Front of World War II was a theatre of World War II between the European Axis powers and co-belligerent Finland against the Soviet Union, Poland, and some other Allies which encompassed Northern, Southern and Eastern Europe from 22 June 1941 to 9 May 1945...

. A pathologist of the Heer

Heer (1935-1945)

The Heer was the Army land forces component of the German armed forces from 1935 to 1945, the latter also included the Navy and the Air Force...

examined thirty-two young soldiers who had died from myocardial infarction at the front, and documented in a 1944 report that all of them were "enthusiastic smokers". He cited the opinion of pathologist Franz Buchner that cigarettes are "a coronary poison of the first order".

Measures

The Nazis used several public relations tactics to convince the general population of Germany not to smoke. Well-known health magazines like the Gesundes Volk (Healthy People), Volksgesundheit (People's Health) and Gesundes Leben (Healthy Life) published warnings about the health consequences of smoking and posters showing the harmful effects of tobacco were displayed. Anti-smoking messages were sent to the people in their workplaces, often with the help of the Hitler-Jugend

Hitler Youth

The Hitler Youth was a paramilitary organization of the Nazi Party. It existed from 1922 to 1945. The HJ was the second oldest paramilitary Nazi group, founded one year after its adult counterpart, the Sturmabteilung...

(HJ) and the Bund Deutscher Mädel

League of German Girls

The League of German Girls or League of German Maidens , was the girl's wing of the overall Nazi party youth movement, the Hitler Youth. It was the only female youth organization in Nazi Germany....

(BDM). The anti-smoking campaign undertaken by the Nazis also included health education. In June 1939, a Bureau against the Hazards of Alcohol and Tobacco was formed and the Reichsstelle für Rauschgiftbekämpfung (Bureau for the Struggle against Intoxicating Drugs) also helped in the anti-tobacco campaign. Articles advocating nonsmoking were published in the magazines Die Genussgifte (The Recreational Stimulants), Auf der Wacht (On the Guard) and Reine Luft (Clean Air). Out of these magazines, Reine Luft was the main journal of the anti-tobacco movement. Karl Astel's Institute for Tobacco Hazards Research at Jena University purchased and distributed hundreds of reprints from Reine Luft.

After recognizing the harmful effects of smoking on health, several items of anti-smoking legislation were enacted. The later 1930s increasingly saw anti-tobacco laws implemented by the Nazis. In 1938, the Luftwaffe

Luftwaffe

Luftwaffe is a generic German term for an air force. It is also the official name for two of the four historic German air forces, the Wehrmacht air arm founded in 1935 and disbanded in 1946; and the current Bundeswehr air arm founded in 1956....

and the Reichspost

Reichspost

- Imperial Reichspost :* The Imperial Reichspost was the name of the postal service of the Holy Roman Empire, founded by Franz von Taxis in 1495...

imposed a ban on smoking. Smoking was also banned not only in health care institutions, but also in several public offices and in rest homes. Midwives were restricted from smoking while on duty. In 1939, the Nazi Party outlawed smoking in all of its offices premises, and Heinrich Himmler

Heinrich Himmler

Heinrich Luitpold Himmler was Reichsführer of the SS, a military commander, and a leading member of the Nazi Party. As Chief of the German Police and the Minister of the Interior from 1943, Himmler oversaw all internal and external police and security forces, including the Gestapo...

, the then chief of the Schutzstaffel

Schutzstaffel

The Schutzstaffel |Sig runes]]) was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Built upon the Nazi ideology, the SS under Heinrich Himmler's command was responsible for many of the crimes against humanity during World War II...

(SS), restricted police personnel and SS officers from smoking while they were on duty. Smoking was also outlawed in schools.

In 1941, tobacco smoking in trams was outlawed in sixty German cities. Smoking was also outlawed in bomb shelter

Bomb shelter

A bomb shelter is any kind of a civil defense structure designed to provide protection against the effects of a bomb.-Types of shelter:Different kinds of bomb shelters are configured to protect against different kinds of attack and strengths of hostile explosives. For example, an Air-raid shelter...

s; however, some shelters had separate rooms for smoking. Special care was taken to prevent women from smoking. The President of the Medical Association in Germany announced, "German women don't smoke". Pregnant women and women below the age of 25 and over the age of 55 were not given tobacco ration cards during World War II. Restrictions on selling tobacco products to women were imposed on the hospitality and food retailing industry. Anti-tobacco films aimed at women were publicly shown. Editorials discussing the issue of smoking and its effects were published in newspapers. Strict measures were taken in this regard and a district department of the National Socialist Factory Cell Organization (NSBO) announced that it would expel female members who smoked publicly. The next step in the anti-tobacco campaign came in July 1943, when public smoking for persons under the age of 18 was outlawed. In the next year, smoking in buses and city trains was made illegal, on the personal initiative of Hitler, who feared female ticket takers might be the victims of passive smoking.

Restrictions were imposed on the advertisement of tobacco products, enacted on 7 December 1941 and signed by Heinrich Hunke, the President of the Advertising Council. Advertisements trying to depict smoking as harmless or as an expression of masculinity were banned. Ridiculing anti-tobacco activists was also outlawed, as was the use of advertising posters along rail tracks, in rural regions, stadiums and racing tracks. Advertising by loudspeakers and mail was also prohibited.

Restrictions on smoking were also introduced in the Wehrmacht. Cigarette rations in the military were limited to six per soldier per day. Extra cigarettes were often sold to the soldiers, especially when there was no military advance or retreat in the battleground, however these were restricted to 50 for each person per month. Teenaged soldiers serving in the 12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend

12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend

The 12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend was a German Waffen SS armoured division during World War II. The Hitlerjugend was unique because the majority of its junior enlisted men were drawn from members of the Hitler Youth, while the senior NCOs and officers were generally veterans of the Eastern...

, composed of Hitler Youth

Hitler Youth

members, were given confectionary instead of tobacco products. Access to cigarettes was not allowed for the Wehrmacht's female auxiliary personnel. Medical lectures were arranged to persuade military personnel to quit smoking. An ordinance enacted on 3 November 1941 raised tobacco taxes by approximately 80–95% of the retail price. It would be the highest rise in tobacco taxes in Germany until more than 25 years after the collapse of the Nazi regime.

Effectiveness

The early anti-smoking campaign was considered a failure, and from 1933 to 1937 there was a rapid increase in tobacco consumption in Germany. The rate of smoking in the nation increased faster even than in neighboring France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, where the anti-tobacco movement was tiny and far less influential. Between 1932 and 1939, per capita

Per capita

Per capita is a Latin prepositional phrase: per and capita . The phrase thus means "by heads" or "for each head", i.e. per individual or per person...

cigarette consumption in Germany increased from 570 to 900 per year, while the corresponding numbers for France were from 570 to 630.

The cigarette manufacturing companies in Germany made several attempts to weaken the anti-tobacco campaign. They published new journals and tried to depict the anti-tobacco movement as "fanatic" and "unscientific". The tobacco industry

Tobacco industry

The tobacco industry comprises those persons and companies engaged in the growth, preparation for sale, shipment, advertisement, and distribution of tobacco and tobacco-related products. It is a global industry; tobacco can grow in any warm, moist environment, which means it can be farmed on all...

also tried to counter the government campaign to prevent women from smoking and used smoking models in their advertisements. Despite government regulations, many women in Germany regularly smoked, including the wives of many high-ranking Nazi officials. For instance, Magda Goebbels

Magda Goebbels

Johanna Maria Magdalena "Magda" Goebbels was the wife of Nazi Germany's Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels...

smoked even while she was interviewed by a journalist. Fashion illustrations displaying women with cigarettes were often published in prominent publications such as the Beyers Mode für Alle (Beyers Fashion For All). The cover of the popular song Lili Marleen
Lili Marleen
"Lili Marleen" is a German love song which became popular during World War II.Written in 1915 during World War I, the poem was published under the title "Das Lied eines jungen Soldaten auf der Wacht" in 1937, and was first recorded by Lale Andersen in 1939 under the...

featured singer Lale Andersen

Lale Andersen

Lale Andersen was a German chanson singer-songwriter born in Bremerhaven, Germany. She is best known for her interpretation of the song "Lili Marleen" in 1939, which became tremendously popular on both sides during the Second World War.- Early life :She was born in Lehe and baptized Liese-Lotte...

holding a cigarette.

**per year in Germany & the US**
	Year
	1930	1935	1940	1944
Germany	490	510	1,022	743
United States	1,485	1,564	1,976	3,039

The Nazis implemented more anti-tobacco policies at the end of the 1930s and by the early years of World War II, the rate of tobacco usage declined. As a result of the anti-tobacco measures implemented in the Wehrmacht, the total tobacco consumption by soldiers decreased between 1939 and 1945. According to a survey conducted in 1944, the number of smokers increased in the Wehrmacht, but average tobacco consumption per military personnel declined by 23.4% compared to the immediate pre-World War II years. The number of people who smoked 30 or more cigarettes per day declined from 4.4% to 0.3%.

The Nazi anti-tobacco policies were not free of contradictions. For example, the Volksgesundheit (People's Health) and Gesundheitspflicht (Duty to be Healthy) policies were enforced in parallel with the active distribution of cigarettes to people who the Nazis saw as "deserving" groups (e.g. frontline soldiers, members of the Hitler Youth). On the other hand, "undeserving" and stigmatized groups (Jews, war prisoners) were denied access to tobacco.
In the Theresienstadt concentration camp

Theresienstadt concentration camp

Theresienstadt concentration camp was a Nazi German ghetto during World War II. It was established by the Gestapo in the fortress and garrison city of Terezín , located in what is now the Czech Republic.-History:The fortress of Terezín was constructed between the years 1780 and 1790 by the orders...

, prisoners in possession of medicines or tobacco could even face death.

Association with antisemitism and racism

Apart from public health concerns, the Nazis were heavily influenced by ideology; specifically, the movement was influenced by concepts of racial hygiene

Racial hygiene

and bodily purity. Nazi leaders believed that it was wrong for the master race

Master race

Master race was a phrase and concept originating in the slave-holding Southern US. The later phrase Herrenvolk , interpreted as 'master race', was a concept in Nazi ideology in which the Nordic peoples, one of the branches of what in the late-19th and early-20th century was called the Aryan race,...

to smoke and that tobacco consumption was equal to "racial degeneracy". The Nazis viewed tobacco as a "genetic poison". Racial hygienists opposed tobacco use, fearing that it would "corrupt" the "German germ plasm". Nazi anti-tobacco activists often tried to depict tobacco as a vice of the degenerate Negroes.

The Nazis claimed that the Jews were responsible for introducing tobacco and its harmful effects. The Seventh-day Adventist Church

Seventh-day Adventist Church

The Seventh-day Adventist Church is a Protestant Christian denomination distinguished by its observance of Saturday, the original seventh day of the Judeo-Christian week, as the Sabbath, and by its emphasis on the imminent second coming of Jesus Christ...

in Germany announced that smoking was an unhealthy vice spread by the Jews. Johann von Leers

Johann von Leers

Dr. Johann von Leers, alias Omar Amin , was an Alter Kämpfer and an honorary Sturmbannführer in the Waffen SS in Nazi Germany, where he was also a professor known for his anti-Jewish polemics. He was one of the most important ideologues of the Third Reich, serving as a high-ranking propaganda...

, editor of the Nordische Welt (Nordic World), during the opening ceremony of the Wissenschaftliches Institut zur Erforschung der Tabakgefahren in 1941, proclaimed that "Jewish capitalism" was responsible for the spread of tobacco use across Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

. He said that the first tobacco on German soil was brought by the Jews and that they controlled the tobacco industry in Amsterdam

Amsterdam

Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...

, the principal European entry point of Nicotiana
Nicotiana
Nicotiana is a genus of herbs and shrubs of the nightshade family indigenous to North and South America, Australia, south west Africa and the South Pacific. Various Nicotiana species, commonly referred to as tobacco plants, are cultivated and grown to produce tobacco. Of all Nicotiana species,...

.

After World War II

After the collapse of Nazi Germany at the end of World War II

End of World War II in Europe

The final battles of the European Theatre of World War II as well as the German surrender to the Western Allies and the Soviet Union took place in late April and early May 1945.-Timeline of surrenders and deaths:...

, American cigarette manufacturers quickly entered the German black market. Illegal smuggling

Smuggling

Smuggling is the clandestine transportation of goods or persons, such as out of a building, into a prison, or across an international border, in violation of applicable laws or other regulations.There are various motivations to smuggle...

of tobacco became prevalent, and the Nazi anti-smoking campaign was silenced. In 1949, approximately 400 million cigarettes manufactured in the United States entered Germany illegally every month. In 1954, nearly two billion Swiss

Switzerland

Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

cigarettes were smuggled into Germany and Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

. As part of the Marshall Plan

Marshall Plan

The Marshall Plan was the large-scale American program to aid Europe where the United States gave monetary support to help rebuild European economies after the end of World War II in order to combat the spread of Soviet communism. The plan was in operation for four years beginning in April 1948...

, the United States sent free tobacco to Germany; the amount of tobacco shipped into Germany in 1948 was 24,000 tons and was as high as 69,000 tons in 1949. The Federal government of the United States

Federal government of the United States

The federal government of the United States is the national government of the constitutional republic of fifty states that is the United States of America. The federal government comprises three distinct branches of government: a legislative, an executive and a judiciary. These branches and...

spent $70 million on this scheme, to the delight of cigarette manufacturing companies in the United States, who profited hugely. Per capita yearly cigarette consumption in post-war Germany

History of Germany since 1945

As a consequence of the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II Germany was split between the two global blocs in the East and West, a period known as the division of Germany. While seven million prisoners and forced laborers left Germany, over 10 million German speaking refugees arrived there from...

steadily rose from 460 in 1950 to 1,523 in 1963. At the end of the 20th century, the anti-tobacco campaign in Germany was unable to exceed the seriousness of the Nazi-era climax in the years 1939–41 and German tobacco health research was described by Robert N. Proctor

Robert N. Proctor

Robert Neel Proctor is an American historian of science and Professor of the History of Science at Stanford University. While a professor of the history of science at Pennsylvania State University in 1999, he became the first historian to testify against the tobacco industry.At Pennsylvania State...

as "muted".