Tobacco companies that reached a health-care settlement with Delaware in 1998 dropped a lawsuit over the state’s enforcement of the agreement, state Attorney General Beau Biden said.
The companies had claimed Delaware didn’t meet its obligation to regulate smaller tobacco firms that aren’t part of the settlement, according to Biden.
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U.S. District Judge Richard Leon gave cigarette manufacturers contesting the Food and Drug Administration’s new graphic warning labels a win Monday morning, finding that they were likely to succeed and granting their request for a preliminary injunction to delay enforcement.
Leon hasn’t ruled on a pending motion for summary judgment, but said in a Nov. 7 opinion that the companies had “demonstrated a substantial likelihood that they will prevail on the merits of their position.”
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The reply to a recent RTI filed by NGO Voices of Tobacco Victims (VoTV) has brought to fore the large share of investments made by the Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) in tobacco companies such as Indian Tobacco Company (ITC), VST Industries and Dharampal Satyapal Ltd (DS Ltd).
As per the reply, LIC held 99,58,91,658 equity shares in ITC as of March 31, 2011, which has almost doubled from 51,11,04,115 shares in March 2009. The current book value of these shares is around Rs 3,500 crore.
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Smoking bins being installed at the Greymouth railway station are being partly funded by British American Tobacco.
The West Coast Tobacco Coalition, which was made aware of the link, has written to KiwiRail asking it to reconsider the deal and the Grey District Council has cancelled an order. Keep New Zealand Beautiful announced the bin deal on on September 30. The press release did not mention the link with the international tobacco giant.
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Should government-run companies invest in tobacco firms? This is the question that Voices of Tobacco Victims (VoTV), an NGO working for cancer patients, has raised after its recent query under the RTI Act revealed that the Life Insurance Corporation of India has invested up to Rs 3,500 crore in various tobacco companies.
“It’s the greatest irony that the government spends Rs 10,000 crore on treatment of tobacco-related illnesses while investing Rs 3,500 crore in the industry causing it,” said Dr Pankaj Chaturvedi, a senior cancer surgeon with Tata Memorial Hospital who is associated with VoTV. Ream more »
The University of Oregon is launching an education campaign to prepare students, faculty, staff and visitors for a significant change in Fall 2012, when the UO will become a smoke and tobacco-free university.
In November 2010, UO President Richard Lariviere made the announcement and committed to helping tobacco users in the campus community with support and assistance to kick their habits.
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John Szymanski was 11 the first time he smoked a cigarette – a filter Chesterfield Red – at the kitchen table in his childhood home in New Jersey.
His father, a butcher, and mother, a school nurse, were there, too. Neither was alarmed. But that grownup feeling he got from lighting up evolved into a two-pack-a-day habit that’s aged the Fort Myers resident beyond his 72 years. He has battled several bouts of cancer – his larynx in 1993, neck in 1999, and this year, his tongue. Ream more »
A Kanawha judge has ordered a Moundsville cigarette company to comply with state laws and pay at least $82,500 in annual state taxes it was fighting.
Compton Point, a store in Moundsville, sells empty paper cigarette tubes and loose tobacco and allows consumers to place the materials in a machine that rolls them into a product that can be smoked. Consumers save about $7 per carton in the process.
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Imperial Tobacco Group Plc (IMT), the maker of West and Davidoff cigarettes, forecast higher full-year sales, led by growth in eastern Europe and Asia.
Net revenue from tobacco will probably increase 2 percent excluding currency shifts in the 12 months through September, the Bristol, England-based company said today in a statement. That matched the median of three estimates in a Bloomberg News survey. Results will be “in line” with the company’s expectations, the Davidoff maker said. Ream more »
Last week, the board of directors of tobacco giant Philip Morris International (NYSE:PM) approved a 20.3% increase in its quarterly dividend to 77 cents per share. This was the fourth consecutive annual dividend increase for the company since it was spun off from Altria Group (NYSE:MO) in 2008.
In a previous article, I outlined a few reasons why I am buying Philip Morris International now. The company is well positioned to capitalize on its strong brand in emerging economies, Ream more »