When you get knocked on your rear, get back up and try again. That’s the goal of five big tobacco companies who are suing over the FDA’s power to put nine graphic warning labels on cigarette packaging by fall 2012.
Do you like "hole in throat" or "baby bathed in smoke"? Click this image to see the nine FDA warnings.
As The New York Times reports, the five companies lost a similar complaint last year in U.S. District Court in Kentucky. That case is under appeal.
The companies are R.J. Reynolds, the nation’s second-largest tobacco producer; Lorillard, the third-largest; and three smaller companies. Altria, the parent company of Phillip Morris (maker of Marlboro) supports the 2009 law that imposes regulations on the tobacco companies.
Big Tobacco is essentially making this into a First Amendment issue, which is strange — complaining about a regulatory agency’s speech, while not exactly challenging the accuracy of that speech. Say what you will about the FDA images that will cover the top half of packs. For instance, you could argue that they’re kind of amateurish and over-the-top. You could also argue that hardcore smokers won’t even notice them after a while. But you can’t say they don’t represent what reality is like for a lot of smokers who develop lung cancer. And that secondhand smoke is dangerous in ways we’re only just grasping.
Anyway, here’s the money quote from the Lorillard lawyer about how the tobacco manufacturers are fighting for our right to free speech:
“The government can require warnings which are straightforward and essentially uncontroversial, but they can’t require a cigarette pack to serve as a mini-billboard for the government’s anti-smoking campaign.”
Big Tobacco is terrified that these mini-billboards will have more impact than their omnipresent advertising.
More on smoking:
Tobacco companies sue over graphic warnings is a post from: Healthy Living - The Orange County Register
