Reclaiming the narrative: countering harmful commercial discourses

The discourses promoted by powerful commercial actors whose business activities are damaging to health undermine the potential for the transformational changes urgently needed to address pressing public health and environmental threats globally. This piece provides an analysis of corporate discursive practices and the mechanisms through which they contaminate scientific and policy debates and harm public and environmental health. We refer to this phenomenon as 'discursive pollution' to reflect the parallels between the effects of informational strategies and the commercial activities of harmful industries. It aims to contribute to the literature on the commercial determinants of health by offering a cross-industry perspective of discursive practices and the contradictions that underpin industry-favourable discourses. We propose how the health community can facilitate the construction of alternative discourses by revealing the contradictions and assumptions underpinning industry-favourable discourses.