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Can new regulations requiring corporations to disclose harmful practices lead to improvements in the health of the public? A study by researchers from Yale and CUNY says yes.
In the article, Yale School of Public Health grad Raquel Burgess, CUNY SPH Distinguished Professor Nicholas Freudenberg, and colleagues say that by requiring businesses to report data on marketing, toxic emissions, workplace hazards, and other adverse outcomes, governments can better protect the health of consumers, workers, and the public.
The authors identify two main priorities for moving the field forward: first, developing systems to measure and track the practices of commercial entities that affect health; and second, creating effective policy recommendations to address these influences. One of the biggest obstacles, they note, is the lack of accessible, high-quality data on what companies are actually doing. While some monitoring efforts exist, these often rely on voluntary disclosures or public data, which can be incomplete or inconsistent.
The study explores the potential of corporate nonfinancial reporting, including environmental, social, and governance disclosures, as a way to gather more information about corporate impacts on health. Although most large companies now produce some form of nonfinancial reporting, the authors caution that these reports can be inconsistent, hard to compare, and sometimes more about public relations than transparency. There are also concerns about “greenwashing” or “health washing,” where companies exaggerate their positive impact or downplay negative effects.
To address these challenges, the authors look at lessons from other global efforts, and suggest five key principles for policy development: focusing on a manageable set of high-impact actions; targeting harmful practices at multiple levels; encouraging collaboration among governments, civil society, and international organizations anticipating unintended side effects of new policies; and communicating the urgency and benefits of addressing commercial determinants of health clearly to both policymakers and the public.
“By following these actions, governments and businesses can reduce the harmful impact of corporate practices and lower the heavy burden of chronic and infectious diseases, mental health problems, global warming, and pollution that these practices impose on the world today,” says Freudenberg.
