NCI Smoking Study "Failure" May Boost Smokers' Suits

Massive Quit-Smoking Programs Cause No Drop Among Heavy Smokers

Inability of Heavy Smokers to Quit Helps Prove Addictiveness of Nicotine

A massive $45 million National Cancer Institute (NCI) program designed to help smokers quit has been a massive failure among heavy smokers those who smoked more than 25 cigarettes a day since it produced no significant declines in smoking rates. NCI and other knowledgeable observers suggest that the reason is the tremendous strength of the addiction to nicotine which makes it very difficult for most heavy smokers to quit.

"Ironically, NCI's failure among heavy smokers may help plaintiffs to win in class action suits now being brought on behalf of smokers," says law professor John Banzhaf, Executive Director of Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), a national legal-action antismoking organization. "Nicotine addiction is a key issue both offensively and defensively," he explains.

In the class-action law suit by an estimated 50 million smokers which was recently upheld by a federal judge in New Orleans, and in the other mass class-action smokers suit now pending in Florida, plaintiffs claim that the tobacco industry knew about the addictive nature of smoking but deliberately hid it from the public and actually misrepresented it." They also note that the tobacco industry's traditional argument that smokers should not be able to recover because they voluntarily chose to smoke would go up in smoke if it can be shown that addiction robbed them of the will to quit.

This new demonstration of the power of nicotine addiction will also help in the law suits just filed by the states of Florida, Mississippi, Minnesota, and West Virginia, says Banzhaf. ASH encourages and assists in the prosecution of these legal actions but is not a party to any.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Monday, February 27, 1995

FOR MORE INFORMATION, CALL: John Banzhaf (202) 659-4310

Return to PR List