Tobacco.org

• Fire-safe cigarettes have smokers doing a slow burn  

And with little hoopla, every state but Wyoming has passed laws that mandate fire-safe cigarettes.

In Kansas, fire-safe cigarettes have been the law since July 1. In Missouri, the most recent state to adopt the standard, the law takes effect in September 2010.

Fire-safe cigarettes are sold on both sides of the state line. They can be identified by the small initials "FSC" on the packs.

But as fire-safe cigarettes have spread nationwide, complaints from smokers have followed. An online petition calling for the repeal of fire-safe cigarette laws now has more than 7,000 signatures.

Smokers from across the country fill Internet sites with complaints about headaches, coughing fits, nausea and other maladies they attribute to the new cigarettes.

They point to a 2005 study from the Harvard School of Public Health that found the smoke from fire-safe cigarettes contained on average 11 percent more carbon monoxide and 14 percent more naphthalene -- the ingredient in mothballs -- than conventional cigarettes. The Harvard researchers consider the differences negligible, however.

Discontented smokers also claim the new cigarettes are laced with more chemical additives, most notably ethylene vinyl acetate, an adhesive used to glue cigarettes together.

"They're horrible. I've been waking up with headaches, body aches, coughing like I'm hacking up a lung," said Jamie Bartlett, 21, of Grandview. "I just thought I was getting sick until someone pointed (the fire-safe cigarettes) out to me."

The new cigarettes have no additional ethylene vinyl acetate or other chemicals, said David Sutton, a spokesman for Philip Morris USA.

"We don't add any other ingredients not found in traditional cigarette manufacturing," Sutton said. "They're just like traditional cigarettes." . . .

Philip Morris plans to phase out conventional cigarettes by the first half of next year. R.J. Reynolds cigarettes could all be fire-safe by the end of this year.

But it may take years before we see the full effect of the new cigarettes on fire deaths.

Jump to full article »