Bronwyn King: UTDRO Alumna who Took on the Tobacco Industry

“Force of nature”, “Superwoman”, “Powerhouse”. These are just some of the adjectives used in headlines to describe Dr. Bronwyn King, the woman who took on Big Tobacco. 

Bronwyn is an Australian radiation oncologist who trained at Melbourne University and came to the University of Toronto’s Department of Radiation Oncology (UTDRO) for a clinical fellowship in 2008. Today, she is a radiation oncologist at Epworth Healthcare, holds an honorary appointment with the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre (Peter Mac), and is the CEO of Tobacco Free Portfolios.

In the early day of her medical career, Bronwyn worked in the lung cancer ward at Peter Mac. Most of her patients had been impacted by tobacco, and most of them died of tobacco-related cancer. “It really struck me then,” said Bronwyn. “I became acutely aware of the suffering and devastation caused by tobacco.”

Fast forward to ten years later, Bronwyn and her husband, Dr. Mark Shaw set out to buy a house in Melbourne. Their accountant advised them to look into their finances, including their pension plan. In Australia, contributing to the pension plan is mandatory and does not require much, if any, decision-making from the members.

Bronwyn set up a meeting with a representative from her pension plan. As the meeting ended, Bronwyn realized that she did not know how her money was being invested. The representative informed her that she was in the ‘default option’, but that there was a different ‘greenie’ option for those who do not want to invest in mining, alcohol or tobacco companies. 

 “The realization that I owned stock in the world’s biggest tobacco companies really rattled me,” said Bronwyn. “And not only did I hold stock in tobacco, all of the staff at the hospital did too.”

Bronwyn immediately raised the issue with the CEO of Peter Mac, who agreed that investing in tobacco companies was poorly aligned with the hospital’s vision of eradicating cancer. Within 24 hours, Bronwyn found herself booked in to present to the CEO and investment team of the hospital pension plan. She explained to them why they should reconsider the issue of tobacco and implement a tobacco-free investment policy.

“In 2010 it was unusual for members to ask pension funds to rethink where money was being invested,” explained Bronwyn. “They took some time to warm to the idea, but they eventually agreed to exclude tobacco companies from all of their investments. In 2012, this pension fund went tobacco-free, and the CEO of the pension fund has been supporting me in this cause ever since.”

This meeting was the start of thousands of meetings in boardrooms and cafes with finance leaders, bankers, insurers and investors in Australia and now around the world. Bronwyn has been quietly engaging with finance leaders; partnering with them to address this issue and working with them to develop a framework that suits the goals of the finance sector and enabling them to move their funds away from the tobacco industry.

With her direct approach and willingness to work with the finance sector, Bronwyn has managed to convince investors around the world to redirect $8 billion AUD away from tobacco companies. To date, investors in Australia, France, United Kingdom, United States of America, New Zealand, Denmark, Sweden, Ireland and the Netherlands have shifted their funds to alternative industries. “But this is not enough,” said Bronwyn. “Tobacco kills 7 million people each year and that is 7 million too many.”

“The realization that I owned stock in the world’s biggest tobacco companies really rattled me. And not only did I hold stock in tobacco, all of the staff at the hospital did too.”

In 2010, Bronwyn started engaging with the finance sector. Five years later, almost half of Australia’s pension funds were tobacco-free. In 2015, Union for International Cancer Control kindly provided seed funding which allowed the work to expand globally.  Bronwyn now works with a team of three covering a dozen countries. 

Bronwyn now juggles her clinical duties with running Tobacco Free Portfolios, which required her to learn a new language – the language of the finance sector – in order to connect with finance leaders and help them to defend taking a strong position on tobacco. “The health sector is already united against tobacco, and now the finance sector has to come on board so we can tackle this problem together.”

While this newfound financial knowledge has made her credible to investors, Bronwyn’s radiation oncology background has shaped her to take on Big Tobacco. “It’s an advantage to be able to tell the story of tobacco from the front lines,” she said. “I understand what tobacco does to people. And I realize that those who suffer from tobacco-related illnesses cannot champion this cause because they are too sick or have passed away. I feel compelled to try to change things on their behalf.”

Bronwyn is in talks with dozens of investors and finance leaders to bring them along the tobacco–free journey. Tobacco Free Portfolios is currently seeking funding to be able to operate in other countries, including Canada. 

“I miss my time in Canada,” she noted. “My husband and I did our fellowships together at UTDRO. He specialized in genitourinary cancers and I specialized in gynecologic and breast cancers. We learned a lot from great teachers and enjoyed our time in that beautiful city. Toronto will be a year of our lives that we’ll never forget.”

Below, you can watch Bronwyn's TED Talk on this topic.

IMAGE CREDIT: bronwyn king