Follow The Money is a Dutch investigative journalism outlet founded in 2010. It’s posted some interesting work over the years, including an expose of shady business practices that led to the resignation of the chairman of the Dutch VVD party, and last year's excellent investigation into the financial networks supporting Russia’s sanctions-evasion oil trade.
However, their latest article, Big Tobacco stops Brussels from getting tough on vaping, is so paranoid and conspiritorial, I was surprised it didn’t include a few paragraphs on Lizard People.
Let’s take a look.
The article
The central premise of the article is that major tobacco companies and lobby groups have used money, commissioned research, political access, and lobbying pressure to prevent tougher EU rules on vaping and other novel nicotine products. However, it stops far short of providing evidence that these activities have materially influenced policy.
Some of the types of influence alleged in the article include:
Direct Brussels lobbying: tobacco manufacturers and their representative bodies meet EU officials, MEPs, and national representatives to oppose stricter measures.
Research sponsorship and expert networks: companies finance, publicise, or lean on research that presents novel nicotine products as less harmful than smoking.
Narrative-setting: industry pushes the harm-reduction argument.
Delaying legislation: commercial pressure is alleged to help slow proposals on EU nicotine product legislation.
Use of third parties: trade groups, consultants, consumer campaigns, and ostensibly independent voices amplify industry-compatible positions.
Are these claims true?
Tangental support for the use of these tactics can be found in a recent Tobacco Control report titled Behind Closed Doors: Tobacco industry lobbying in the EU aims to weaken health policies worldwide. That February 2026 watchdog investigation, which was based on the EU Transparency Register, Parliament meeting records, and FOI requests, identified:
Around 50 organisations said to be working to influence EU policy in ways favourable to tobacco-industry interests.
Almost 140 people dedicated to lobbying activity.
Nearly €14 million annually in declared EU lobbying expenditure.
250+ recorded meetings between industry representatives or allies and MEPs between 2023 and September 2025.
There are EU-level transparency rules and a specific international tobacco-control obligation intended to limit undue tobacco-industry influence. However, the measures do not ban lawful businesses from contributing to policy debates. This detail is where Follow The Money’s piece starts to fall apart.
The publicly available material does not establish that:
A tobacco company bought a specific policy outcome.
Any EU official acted unlawfully.
The Commission knowingly suppressed valid science.
Every harm-reduction researcher or vaping consumer advocate is an industry proxy.
Most importantly, just because Big Tobacco says that vaping is safer than cigarettes doesn’t make it false. Indeed, outside of a few cranks, liars, and dishonest attention-seekers, no scientist thinks that vaping is more or as harmful as cigarettes. Instead, this alleged corruption is actually a policy dispute between an interested party and an increasingly captured EU.
Bloomberg and others lobbying
The other thing is, when it comes to EU vaping lobbying, Big Tobacco aren’t the only show in town. Indeed, Michael Bloomberg has built a very large, mission-driven tobacco-control infrastructure that funds research, NGOs, litigation, communications, technical assistance, and policy advocacy. He personally has spent $1.6 billion globally on tobacco control over the last 20 years.
Thrown in the Gates Foundation, national governments and development agencies, the WHO/FCTC system, cancer charities, and a network of advocacy and research organisations funded by those sources, and you have a power that influences Brussels far more significantly. These bodies produce endless amounts of laughable research and media each year that is aimed squarely at eliminating any and all nicotine use, even for adults.
More anti-industry nonsense
The Follow The Money piece frames industry participation in a Brussels regulatory debate as inherently illegitimate. But firms affected by regulation should have a say. Democracy is not broken when private businesses or consumers advocate for products, especially when around 1-in-5 adults still smoke in Europe.
Yes, companies that make vapes have incentives. Yet, so do:
Public health NGO’s desperate for funding and relevance.
Bureaucracies whose budget depends on manufacturing a vaping “epidemic.”
Politicians who are eager to score cheap wins from low-information voters spooked by moral panics.
The suspicion and hostility towards industry within Brussels is student politics from people who should know better. There is an existing ill-feeling towards Big Tobacco that is smuggled into discussions around vaping, too. The fact that tobacco firms can still be financially viable if people switch to safer products is a good incentive if your goal is reducing smoking-related deaths and illness. If your primary goal is to punish industry, then the malice is easier to understand.
Smoking is more harmful than vaping. Companies should be able to say that, and consumers should be able to make decisions about their health and lifestyle based on accurate information. Businesses lobby because governments wield immense power over their property, products, employees, and customers. As long as no rules are being broken, which is something Follow The Money failed to show, then there is little wrong with that.
