Andrew McGuire

Andrew McGuire (born in 1945 Oakland, California) is an American trauma prevention specialist and grassroots campaigner. He was the first Executive Director of Action Against Burns (Boston, 1974–75), founder and Executive Director of the Burn Council (San Francisco General Hospital, 1975–1981), which was renamed the Trauma Foundation, in 1981.

Life
He was severely burned as a seven-year-old child when his pajamas ignited while standing next to a kitchen stove. He began his injury prevention work in 1974, where he developed and directed Action Against Burns, which helped establish a state fire resistance standard for pajamas (sizes 7-14) that helped eliminate pajama-related burn injuries to children. The Massachusetts state standard was adopted by the Consumer Product Safety Commission as a federal standard in mid-1975. After he returned to California in 1975, and established the Burn Council, he initiated an international campaign for self-extinguishing cigarettes (also known as Fire Safe Cigarettes). The Campaign for Fire Safe Cigarettes was officially launched on May 24, 1979. As of April, 2010, all 50 states in the U.S. have passed identical laws mandating Fire Safe Cigarettes. The exact same mandating regulations are in effect in Canada, Finland, South Africa, Australia, and, soon, in all 27 countries of the European Union, among other countries.

Andrew provided the "Project Hamlet" documents, which detailed nearly a decade of secret research within Philip Morris's research labs developing Fire Safe Cigarettes, to Lowell Bergman at CBS's 60 Minutes. These documents were exposed during a Bergman produced 60 Minutes episode in March, 1994, by host Mike Wallace. This was the first "proof" from within the tobacco industry that it was possible to produce a commercially viable Fire Safe Cigarette.

As a footnote to his work campaigning for Fire Safe Cigarettes, Andrew introduced Jeff Wigand (the whistleblower and former head of Research and Development for Brown & Williamson Tobacco. Co.) to Lowell Bergman. The relationship between Wigand and Bergman was the subject of the film, The Insider, starring Russell Crowe (playing Wigand) and Al Pacino (playing Bergman). Andrew also introduced Wigand to Dr. David Kessler's staff at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Andrew was a Board member (and, in 1983, Acting Executive Director) of Mothers Against Drunk Drivers (MADD), Executive Director of the Million Mom March (for sensible gun laws), led the campaign to ban cheap handguns (Saturday Night Specials) in California, and currently is Executive Director of Health Care for All-California and CaliforniaOneCare (a campaign for single payer health care in California).

Awards/Honors

 * 1996 Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters, California State University
 * 1989 Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters, University of New England
 * 1985-1990 MacArthur Fellows Program
 * 1982-1985 Kellogg National Leadership Fellowship
 * 1982 Emmy Award for film, "Here's Looking At You, Kid" which aired on NOVA, PBS

Works

 * "How the tobacco industry continues to keep the home fires burning", Tobacco Control, 1999, ISSN 14683318