Sweet carbonated water that does not quench thirst, yogurt with “live bacteria” that only creates the illusion of benefit, wheat from fields heavily irrigated with pesticides that are banned in the European Union, meat grown on antibiotics and growth hormones. All this is not the reality in which Ukrainians live every day. And it did not arise by chance, but was the result of conscious decisions made under the influence of global corporations, for which profits are measured in billions of dollars, and losses – in the health, life and future of millions of people. While the population suffers more and more from cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes and obesity, those who promote harmful products and drugs also profit from the “treatment” of such effects.
Systemic Harm: The Invisible Mechanisms of Killing Industries
In conditions of weak regulation by the state, the food, agricultural, pharmaceutical and chemical industries in Ukraine often put financial benefit above consumer safety. Today, we increasingly observe how powerful industries in Ukraine and abroad influence state policy, bribe experts, put pressure on regulatory bodies, and at the same time create a false sense of choice. Business has long learned to manage not only the market, but also the trust of people.
For data WHO, every day in the European region about 7,500 people die due to diseases caused by “commercial determinants” – tobacco, alcohol, unhealthy food, environmental pollution and industrial conditions. We are not talking about individual accidents, but about a systemic catastrophe: a quarter of all deaths in the region are caused by such causes. For example, metabolic diseases provide 90% of hospitalizations and 25% of deaths. Companies have long since made profit the measure of their success and have learned to protect revenue, even if it harms human health or the environment.
Regardless of the sector, be it food, pharmaceuticals or energy, their playbook is almost identical: lobbying, manipulating science, promoting through marketing, removing liability from products. Therefore, the WHO introduces new terms – “commercial determinants of health” and “health-harming industries”. The idea is that no matter what goods or services companies produce, their actions are usually guided by the same logic, which is to maximize profits at any cost, disregarding the consequences for public health and the environment.
Today’s commercial industry, in particular its most powerful players in the food, pharmaceutical, chemical and tobacco sectors, has long ceased to be simply part of the market. It has turned into a subject of political influence, which cleverly disguises its commercial interests under social care, and responsibility for damage under “personal consumer choice”. Profit is the ultimate goal in this game, and no incidence rate will stand in the way when power, money, and control over regulatory policy are at stake.
However, the worst situation is when victims and perpetrators switch places. Those who systematically harm society, in particular through the marketing of harmful products or working conditions, manage to present themselves as responsible and irreplaceable partners of the state. While the public tries to figure out why the rate of metabolic diseases is increasing rapidly, corporations sit down at the negotiating table, where they pretend to be honest allies in search of “compromises”. But this trade-off always leans towards preserving profits, not health. The conflict is deeper: a government that recognizes the corporation as a partner in dealing with the consequences simultaneously lets it into the source of policymaking, paving the way for regulatory capture.
Along with changing roles and shifting focus, an elaborate system of myths comes into play. Such loud words as “self-regulation”, “voluntariness”, “market incentives”, “economic benefits” become real mechanisms of exploitation. The most popular myth that everything depends on the conscious choice of the consumer is heard everywhere. Like, no one forces anyone to smoke, drink sugary soda or work without the right to sick leave. But behind this “freedom of choice” are millions of budgets for advertising campaigns, psychological triggers, packaging manipulation and research. And when countries try to introduce at least some restrictions on advertising, sales or content of products, they are immediately threatened by international courts. Industries act clearly, quickly and aggressively. They know how to turn any regulation into a “threat to the economy” and the loss of profit into “impermissible interference in the market”.
In order to protect their monopoly position, transnational players use the classic formula of mergers and acquisitions. When a snack maker buys a pharmaceutical holding company and a drug distributor buys a supermarket chain, a vicious cycle is created. One company provokes the problem, the other allegedly cures it, but the profit settles in the same pockets. And these pockets are too big for the government to dare advance their interests. Because along with taxes and jobs, large corporations also receive informal immunity. The government, which depends on the monopoly payer, actually becomes its agent.
Lobbying works especially well. It is not visible because it is not like direct pressure. The industry comes to round tables, symposia, conferences and silently paves the way to solutions. She does not just promote her opinion, but tries to normalize it and quite successfully. When a business presents itself as a “legitimate stakeholder”, there is no need to prove anything, because it immediately becomes an equal participant in the political dialogue. He also finances scientific programs, trains “independent” experts, launches a media machine and calmly broadcasts his own ideas as universal. The result is a scientific base that has nothing to do with real research, but is convenient for business and at the same time deadly for society.
Unfortunately, all these techniques are not new at all. The tobacco industry invented them back in the 20th century, and it became the standard of corporate hypocrisy. However, now alcohol companies and even agrochemical giants have joined it. All of them willingly demonstrate “social responsibility”: they donate money for education, build playgrounds, organize charity races. The problem is that these initiatives cost much less than the taxes they avoid or the fines the government doesn’t dare to write. But the main thing is that they work perfectly for the image: the community begins to believe that this corporation is really kind and sincere, and its interests are completely in line with the interests of the entire local community.
And here we rest on an even deeper layer. Corporations not only influence politics and science, but also exploit the economy. They avoid taxes, take profits offshore, buy back their own shares, simulating growth. It is clear that all this is not done in order to create a product or service. In this case, we are talking about a new form of capital accumulation, which actually destroys the economic balance between countries, and within countries between classes. While the big players prey on loopholes, governments lose billions that could be spent on health care, education, housing. But this money settles in private funds and banks.
We are watching how under the mask of “economic growth” the industry hides the face of systematic exploitation. They skillfully play the role of the main employers and locomotives of local economies, convincing everyone around them that without them factories will stop, taxes will disappear, and unemployment will increase. And at the same time, these same players produce the worst working conditions, especially for the least protected seasonal, unskilled workers and internally displaced persons. Unstable contracts, low pay, no union protection and a toxic work environment that injures not only the body, but also the psyche. In mines, in warehouses, in textile factories, in agriculture, people work without guarantees, control and choice and become the first victims of this ideology of profit at any price.
Industrial giants, technology corporations, pharmaceutical monopolies prefer to talk about jobs, but never mention the conditions in which these jobs exist. They lobby for lower health and safety standards, minimize security spending, and at the same time spend outrageous sums on automated surveillance systems to monitor workers’ every last move. Instead, the state, fearing to lose the investor, prefers not to interfere. Because such a system is convenient, because it keeps cheap labor in submission, and society in the illusion of stability.
Another illusion is manifested in the attempt to replace structural changes with decorative “social responsibility”. When a giant company builds flowerbeds near a hospital, and nearby advertises its sugary drink as a source of energy for children. It is quite clear that there is no mention of any charity. A carefully calculated PR campaign is taking place here, and its goal is to take the pressure off the reputation and weaken potential regulation. The authorities have no choice, because there is no other sponsor on the horizon. And thus the mechanism of toleration starts up again: the business receives a credit of trust that it never deserved.
Corporations’ play on crises looks especially cynical. In moments of catastrophes such as pandemics, wars, natural disasters, they appear like those savior superheroes from comics. But they do not aim at real help, because, in fact, they see the catastrophe as a new market for their interests. Their donations are not an act of charity, but only an advertising investment. The tobacco company gave one ventilator, and you can turn a blind eye to the harm caused by the millions of cigarettes produced by it. One free lunch from a fast food giant and you can watch in silence as childhood obesity becomes a national epidemic.
Bioillusion: how the market shapes the food and medical habits of Ukrainians
The example of Ukraine can be particularly indicative. Before the war, the level of breastfeeding was high, which enabled thousands of children to start life from a healthy foundation. But after the start of a full-scale invasion, under the guise of humanitarian aid, the country was literally flooded with commercially produced baby formula. They were supplied not for free and not with good intentions, but with a clear intention to change eating habits. And the companies succeeded. As a result, we received mass artificial feeding, which, according to many studies, is associated with a decrease in immunity and an increase in the risk of chronic diseases.
The Ukrainian market of food products, farmers, pharmacists and chemical giants has long gone beyond the boundaries of simple business. This is not just a market, but a field for a large-scale game of human health. Behind the glitter of the labels “organic”, “healthy” and “immune booster” hides a cold, ruthless calculation. The winner here is the one who knows how to “sell” the disease the most and not bear any responsibility for it.
Take, for example, “healthy” bars and juices. The marketing shell is presented here in the form of bright packages, promises about naturalness and vitamins. The real composition is often closer to artificial carbonated water: corn syrup, stabilizers, flavorings, which are invisible enemies that destroy immunity, but look appetizing on the shelf. Manufacturers are cunning by hiding the word “sugar” behind maltodextrin or fructose, although it is the same sweet drug. And parents, frightened by “dangerous” diseases, buy these products, believing that they are choosing better.
The most fertile lands of Ukraine long ago turned into an industrial factory of monocultures, where herbicides and pesticides became the norm. Particularly shocking is the fact that glyphosate, a chemical with the potential to cause cancer, was found even in those soils where it was not officially applied. Control by the state resembles a parody, because state services are either unable or unwilling to effectively check the quality of products. Chemical lobbyists are doing their thing by gently reducing safety standards, tailoring the rules to the interests of large corporations.
At the same time, medicine in Ukraine is, at best, a tool for supporting the disease, not curing it. In the worst case, people get a placebo effect or harm their health with low-quality drugs for a lot of money. Pharmacies have become marketplaces for drugs designed to dull the symptoms instead of eliminating the cause. Advertisements of “medicines for everything” pour in an endless stream, often these are drugs with dubious effectiveness that do not pass EU or US standards. Usually, these are not medicines, but food supplements or biologically active supplements that do not require rigorous research. As a result, we have cheap marketing that kills the quality of medical care.
Words like “eco”, “bio” and “green” have long become a cover for toxic substances that harm the environment and health. Phosphates, first-generation PARA in washing powders have long settled on Ukrainian store shelves. When “ecological” powder contains substances that do not decompose in nature and kill aquatic ecosystems, this can hardly be considered a simple coincidence. This is a business that skilfully exploits gaps in legislation and consumer consciousness.
Regulation: the paradox of irresponsibility
The main reason for all these problems lies in the inability of state institutions to control and protect the interests of people, not corporations. Audits tend to fall like a lottery, and legislation is a veritable sphere of influence for lobbyists, where business interests trump common sense. The “blind” eyes of officials and the weakness of the system give the green light to large-scale exploitation, where the winner is not the consumer, but the one who is better able to manipulate. The Ukrainian consumer remains a helpless hostage of a system where useful and harmful things are mixed in an attractive package. And until the regulators become real arbiters, and the consciousness does not soar to a new level, this game will continue, and new and new dark secrets will be hidden in the consumer’s basket.
But legislation remains the most dangerous battlefield. Within the EU, there is rhetoric of “health protection”, but in practice, everything is subordinated to the dogma of economic integration. Any strict regulation that a national government tries to introduce is immediately blocked either by lobbying pressure at the European Union level or in the courts as “infringing the rules of the common market”. We have a kind of cynical blackmail under the banner of European unity. Commercial interests, masquerading as the principles of free trade, get the right to dictate what the law should be.
In addition, international trade agreements have long ceased to be an instrument of development, but only a tool of coercion. They have built-in regulations that allow investors to be compensated if a country suddenly decides to tighten environmental or health standards. The state loses not only its political subjectivity, but also the motivation for reforms, because for every attempt to protect citizens, it will have to pay fines from its budget. This effectively forces governments to make decisions favorable to transnational business before the law is even put to a vote.
A special place in this business orchestra is the field of evidence, or rather, what corporations want to pass off as evidence. The so-called “science for profit”, which has become a tool of influence. Companies have learned to distort scientific discourse as adeptly as they have distorted ideas about health, risk, and choice for years. They fund “neutral” research, but with a clear editorial mission, creating pseudo-scientific platforms where decisions are made on the basis of statistically manipulated data. They form a pool of loyal academics who have spent years promoting narratives beneficial to industry. All this allows you to create the illusion of a balanced expert dialogue, in which the truth is simply not heard. It is silenced by a consensus of bought votes.
As a result, falsified or biased “research” is used as the basis for policy, which contributes to the creation of a reality where the companies that produce the risks themselves become the main experts in overcoming them. Tobacco players educate about the dangers of smoking, pharma giants build knowledge about diseases they themselves complicate, and producers of sugary and processed junk food become government advisers on obesity.
The emphasis on “personal responsibility” has also become an active technique. This argument is so convenient that everyone uses it. The problem is not in advertising, not in access, not in aggressive marketing, but in the person himself who “eats poorly”, “does not take care of himself”, “cannot stop”. And it’s as if one of them will say out loud that addiction to sugar or trans fats is not a “personal choice”, but a physiologically conditioned craving to which the product has been purposefully adapted.
It is quite clear that without funding for independent science, no country will be able to break this cycle. And if there are no funds for own research, then it is worth at least relying on independent international ones, of which there are enough. And it is important to make it a rule never to accept as truth what is written under the label “sponsored by the manufacturer”.
All the rhetoric about the “social responsibility” of business is also illusory. Patronage, charity, support for education, environmental initiatives are presented as a generous gift to society. But the generosity is calculated cynically, because the cost of PR is only pennies compared to the millions that the company could lose if the government really imposed serious taxation or restrictions. That is why one of the most effective tools for combating this hypocrisy is an economic comparison: how much their “help” costs and how much society really loses from their activities in the form of health care costs, ecological restoration, and social consequences.
Yet the root of evil lies not in individual businesses, but in the system itself, which rewards profit and punishes responsibility, measuring progress by GDP growth rather than quality of life. It allows corporations to be bigger than states, more influential than institutions, more impunity than military dictators. And if we do not revise the very model of capitalism, which operates according to the logic of maximum profit even at the cost of mass disease, then any individual reforms will remain patches on a rotten fabric. At the same time, talking about the reform of the health care system without economic policy reform is like repairing the roof of a house that is already cracking on the foundation. And here, the role of public organizations is not simply to monitor or inform, but to create an alternative, offering the logic of health, justice and care for people, not income.
A world where GDP is no longer the main thing
Such initiatives are already shifting the system in some countries. Foreign experience shows that changes are quite possible and are already taking place. In various countries, governments dare to make atypical but far-sighted decisions that focus not just on economic indicators, but on the person and his future. For example, Wales has a unique Future Generations Act, which legally obliges authorities to take into account the interests of the unborn. It is not just a declaration, but a legislative framework that changes the approach to politics in general.
In Finland, the state has already moved away from classic GDP indicators as the only measure of success and introduced new measures of well-being with an emphasis on psychological health, the level of trust in society, environmental sustainability and the quality of education.
Kyrgyzstan, while not a typical role model, is surprisingly distinguished by its political focus on public health and the environment, bringing these issues to the forefront of public administration.
In Estonia, a strategic decision was made to reorient public investments from “efficiency” to “long-term quality of life”. That is, it is no longer just “how quickly and cheaply”, but “how long and with what benefit for a person”.
All these examples demonstrate that the system can be moved by changing the focus. And as more such examples appear in the world, it will be easier to exert pressure not from within, but from below through public demand, new ideas, culture and civic activism. This is how transformations are born. Finally, it is worth recognizing that the real fight against the commercial determinants of health is not just for doctors, lawyers or economists. This should become a political matter. And the main task is not to “come to an agreement” with the industries. And in order to draw a line between private interest and public good.
We now live in an era where corporations have learned to perfectly mask their own toxicity. The most dangerous thing is that not only consumption is imposed on society, but also a way of thinking: supposedly harmful becomes a matter of personal choice, not of the system. That is why the problem of commercial determinants of health indicates that abuse has become the norm. Business knows how to adapt to criticism, integrate into reforms, and even lead “changes”, if only to leave untouched the logic of profit above all else. In such conditions, a compromise on the part of the state becomes a real capitulation. Rejection of naïve partnerships with disease-infesting industries should be the rule, not the exception.
A fundamental distinction is needed: there is a space for politics, science, health care, and there is a space for commerce. They should not merge, because every time the government allows business to dictate the rules, not only do corporate profits rise, but so do the rates of diabetes, cancer, mental illness and loss that become daily statistics. Health should not be a market category that can be bought, because where life and profit compete, profit always wins, because the rules of the game are not written by society, but by those who make money from it.
