Tobacco.org

• Tobacco giant breathes easy as widow's case fails 

A SCOTTISH judge yesterday dealt a devastating blow to the anti-smoking movement after dismissing a widow’s claim that a cigarette company was responsible for her husband’s death from lung cancer.

In a test case that could have opened up the floodgates for hundreds of similar claims, Margaret McTear had sued Imperial Tobacco for £500,000.

But yesterday’s ruling against Mrs McTear was so comprehensive that it raised doubts about whether an action against the tobacco industry could ever be successfully pursued in Scotland.

Cameron Fyfe, the lawyer who brought Mrs McTear’s case to court on a no win, no fee basis, immediately dropped 120 similar cases he had prepared.

Doctors’ leaders and anti-smoking groups condemned the decision, but Imperial Tobacco said it hoped it would dissuade other people from bringing similar claims. . . .

Lord Nimmo Smith said there was no evidence that Imperial had ever accepted a causal connection between smoking and disease, and the fact that it had never sought to challenge the public health message that cigarette smoking did cause lung cancer did not constitute such an admission. . . .

THE cigarette giant Imperial Tobacco yesterday warned it may force Margaret McTear to sell her home to pay part of its legal costs

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Given that there are possible causes of lung cancer other than cigarette smoking, and given that lung cancer can occur in a non-smoker, it is not possible to determine in any individual case whether, but for an individual’s cigarette smoking, he probably would not have contracted lung cancer.
Lord Nimmo Smith, in his McTear decision.

There is no breach of a duty of care on the part of a manufacturer if a consumer of the manufacturer’s product is harmed by the product, but the consumer knew of the product’s potential for causing harm prior to consumption of it. The individual is well enough served if he is given such information as a normally intelligent person would include in his assessment of how he wishes to conduct his life, thus putting him in the position of making an informed choice.