Hungary: the complete consumer service
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As in Uzbekistan, BAT is not neglecting health in Hungary, which has among the most serious smoking epidemics in the world. In the medieval city of Pecs, home to its main factory, it has sponsored just about anything that is prepared to take its money, presumably in the hope of buying the maximum amount of silence about its Hungarian activities for as long as possible. For example, it funds a hostel for homeless people, now called BAT House, and the BAT Theatre. It has paid for a television studio and equipment for the local university's media centre (though in return, it wants the university to scrap its indoor no-smoking policy, to create a “cultured atmosphere” for students who smoke). But most thoughtful of all is a state-of-the-art clinic, by far the best equipped in the country, complete with the sort of whole body scanning apparatus so useful for finding the exact site of tobacco induced tumours.