Italy: BAT Beats the Codacons 2 to 0

BAT batte Codacons 2 a 0

On April 13th 2011, the Civil Court of Rome declared inadmissible the class action submitted by the Codacons, Italy’s main consumer association, against British American Tobacco Italia, in favor of the smokers of BAT’s MS, Pall Mall and Lucky Strike cigarettes. On the 30th of January 2012 the Court of Appeals also turned down the petition.

According to the Codacons, BAT was using chemical cocktails to increase the nicotine addiction effects of its products. Therefore, 3.5 million hypothetical smokers of its brands should be awarded 3,000 euro each, for a total of 10.5 billion euro.

The class action of the Codacons was, no doubt, just an awkward show whose outcome was a foregone conclusion (just consider the fact that the smokers are not identifiable). But the move did point out a real problem: no one is allowed to know the characteristics or the dosages of the substances added to the cigarettes sold in tobacco shops, and the Italian Justice system hasn’t the guts to do anything about it. Read more »

USA: Camels and Winstons Fight the New Health Warnings

Warning: cigarettes are addictive

Five American manufacturers: RJ Reynolds Tobacco that produces Camels and Winstons in the US, Lorillard Tobacco that makes Trues and Newports, the most popular cigarette among Afro-Americans, Commonwealth Brands, Liggett Group and Santa Fe Natural Tobacco, are actively opposing the obligation, scheduled to come into effect next year in September, to print on their cigarette packs shock pictures depicting the damage of smoking.

In June, the Food and Drug Administration, the government body that handles the regulation of food and pharmaceutical products, disclosed the pictures, among which a lifeless corpse, a disfigured mouth and a blackened lung. These will have to take up 50% of the front and rear faces of all the cigarette packs sold in the United States as well as 20% of the advertising messages. Read more »

Iceland – Cigarettes Are to Be Sold only in Pharmacies

Tobacco pharmacyAfter the bans on smoking in the open air already introduced in many countries, it is Iceland’s turn. The Reykjavik Parliament is considering banning cigarettes from shops and allowing their sale only in pharmacies. People over 20 years old could soon be the only persons authorized to buy a packet of cigarettes, but only if they have a doctor’s prescription. Read more »

Italy: The Class Action against Big Tobacco Rejected

Game Over - Try Again

About 3.5 million citizens should have been awarded 3,000.00 euro each, for a total of 10.5 billion euro.

But on April 13th 2011, the XIII Section of the Civil Court of Rome declared inadmissible the class action proposed by the Codacons* against British American Tobacco Italia, in favor of the smokers of the cigarettes produced by that company.

This outcome was perfectly foreseeable; no bookmaker would have accepted bets on it. In fact, no one could imagine that in a country where the multinationals custom-make their own laws and are “exonerated” from paying taxes and couldn’t care less about court sentences, judges might have allowed a “class action” like this, as though we were in America… Read more »

Yesmoke Quality – Fully Certified

ISO 9001 Bureau Veritas certification logo

Yesmoke Tobacco S.p.A. has obtained certification for the ISO 9001:2008 Standard through the Bureau Veritas.

The Bureau Veritas is an International group specialized in the inspection, analysis, assessment and certification of products, infrastructures and management systems in relation legal and voluntary standards. Read more »

Philip Morris’s Latest Prank: Cigarettes & Gambling

La Marlboro slot machinePhilip Morris is actively promoting its products in tobacco shops by giving away a “gratta e vinci” - a scratchcard lottery ticket -  worth 5.00 euro to everyone who buys a carton of Marlboros “Gold Touch” for 41.00 euro.

At the same time, Italy’s Democratic Party is presenting a bill that would make it obligatory to include health warnings, like those printed on cigarette packs, on all «gratta e vinci» cards to warn consumers on the risks they run with gambling.

Here are a few examples: “Gambling creates strong dependency”, “Excessive gambling can lead to poverty”, “This game can damage your health”, “Protect your family, do not play excessively”, “Your doctor can help you stop gambling”…. Read more »

Yesmoke's Toll-Free number – Calling a thief a thief!

In this sheeplike gathering of consumers called Italy, counter-information is the only way to  let the public know what would otherwise remain hushed up forever.

Numero Verde di controinformazione

*Yesmoke’s toll-free number (Numero Verde), which can be used only on the land telephone network

Benito Mussolini once said, “with freedom of the press, newspapers publish only what the big industries and banks want to see printed, those who are funding the newspaper.”  The Duce was right, at least when it came to  the mass media.

Today anyone who presents his work as “counter-information“ implies that the media are, partly or totally obsequious to political and, above all, economic interests and therefore, they are not  in a position to present reality objectively. Read more »

What is there in American Cigarettes?

Aside from the lawsuits of relatives of smokers who died prematurely, Big Tobacco is not having a bad time in the States, where it is freer than in Europe.

Chemical formula of the "Crack nicotina"

Chemical formula of the "Crack nicotina"

Based on its top-secret criteria, Philip Morris decides on the doses of chemical additives most suitable for each country, to be used in its cigarettes. But which are the worst cigarettes, those sold in the third world or those smoked in the streets of New York?

Tobacco imported into the USA is not subjected any inspections. Nitrosamine, ammonia, pesticides, nicotine… . The cigarettes smoked in America repeatedly record the highest values. Read more »

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