This statement demonstrates the industry’s awareness early on that they were in the business of selling addictive nicotine. Note that this statement to tobacco industry management was made prior to the 1964 Surgeon General’s report. The committee working to produce that report had requested that the industry share all the information they had that may be pertinent to their report on tobacco and health. However, the industry did not share its knowledge about nicotine, it received scant mention in the 1964 report, and it wasn’t until 1988 that the US Surgeon General produced a report properly reflecting this critical aspect of tobacco’s impact on health.