How to combat efforts to overturn bans on electronic nicotine delivery systems: lessons from tobacco industry efforts during the 1980s to open closed cigarette markets in Thailand

Until 1990, it was illegal for transnational tobacco companies (TTCs) to sell cigarettes in Thailand. We reviewed and analysed internal tobacco industry documents relevant to the Thai market during the 1980s. TTCs’ attempts to access the Thai cigarette market during the 1980s concentrated on political lobbying, advertising and promotion of the foreign brands that were illegal to sell in Thailand at the time.