– Cancer, mergers and e-cigarettes –
Smoking remains the leading preventable cause of premature death in the United States, killing nearly half a million Americans each year, health experts say.
Some 18 percent of Americans now smoke, down from 42 percent in the 1960s.
The RJ Reynolds court verdict comes only days after its parent company, Reynolds American, announced it would acquire rival Lorillard to create a behemoth aimed at conquering the growing e-cigarette market.
Recent growth in e-cigarettes, which deliver nicotine in a vapour rather than smoke, comes as conventional cigarette sales drop amid tight consumer spending and health concerns.
The deal could remake the US tobacco market, one of the world’s most important with annual sales of more than $90 billion in 2013, according to research house Euromonitor.
With tobacco smoke claiming a life every six seconds, the tar-free, electronic alternative could help prevent much of the cancer, heart and lung disease and strokes caused by the toxins in traditional cigarettes, a group of 50 doctors and policy experts told the World Health Organization in May.
In January the United States marked the 50th anniversary of the first surgeon general’s report warning that smoking caused lung cancer.
Since then, the habit has been attributed to 13 kinds of cancer and a host of other diseases, including liver and colon cancer, blindness and diabetes.
About The Author
