The Tobacco Industry

The tobacco industry is one of the oldest and most profitable of U.S.
industries. There are 5 or 6 major American cigarette companies. The biggest is
Phillip Morris with about 45% market share. (They make Marlboro, the world’s best-
selling brand).
The tobacco companies all pay very heavy taxes: the U.S. government
makes about 7 times more money on pack of cigarettes than the tobacco company
does! Recently tobacco use in America has been declining, so the companies are
targeting developing countries much more.
Tobacco Use:
There are about 430,000 deaths a year due to smoking cigarettes (about 1 in
every 5 deaths). It is well proven that cigarette smoking causes many different kinds
of cancer as well as other diseases. Women who smoke during pregnancy are more
likely to have poorer birth outcomes, including lower birth weight babies. There is
evidence that nonsmokers also affected by “environmental tobacco smoke” (ETS).

“Product
Liability”

Legal Action against Tobacco Companies: civil law (民法) It may be difficult for Japanese
people to understand why the big tobacco companies had to pay millions of dollars to sick
people and to state governments for health care costs. …because of product
liability (生産物責任)……… In America, if you are injured by a product, you may
sue 訴える the company which made it, and get money compensation. Also, if a business
gives false information about their product, they are guilty of fraud (詐欺). Tobacco
companies lied for many years lied about the effects of cigarettes. They lied so now they have
to pay people who got sick using their products.
The year 1994 was the big turning point in cases against the tobacco industry.
A woman whose husband died of lung cancer sued and was successful. In the same
year, the State of Mississippi was the first state to sue a tobacco company for
medical health care costs. They won.
On November 23, 1998, the tobacco industry got together and agreed to pay
$206 billion to reimburse 46 state governments for medical costs related to tobacco.
The story of Dr. Geoffrey Wigand who was a scientist at Brown & Williamson was
very important in this story- legal action against big tobacco.