GROUPS: TOBACCO ACCORD IS FLAWED

NEW YORK -- Public health advocates said yesterday that the proposed $206
billion tobacco settlement being reviewed by the states falls short of
delivering a comprehensive approach to discourage smoking. But they
declined to recommend whether the states should embrace the settlement. In
anticipation that the deal would be endorsed, they were mobilizing to make
sure states used the money to discourage tobacco use.

If the states approve the proposed settlement, Pennsylvania would receive
$10 billion over the next 25 years, a spokesman for the Pennsylvania
Attorney General's Office said yesterday.

The settlement is the result of five months of negotiations between
attorneys general from eight states and the nation's four biggest tobacco
companies.

Today, the settlement proposal will be released to attorneys general of 36
states that have pending antitobacco lawsuits, 10 others that have not yet
filed, as well as to the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. They will
have one week to decide whether to accept it.

Four states -- Mississippi, Florida, Texas and Minnesota -- have already
settled with the industry for a total of $40 billion.

In Pennsylvania, the $10 billion probably would be spent on health care,
said Tim Reeves, spokesman for Gov. Ridge.

"Gov. Ridge has said the money should be focused on health care, given its
source and the number of Pennsylvanians who have been affected" by
smoking-related diseases, Reeves said.

The settlement would require Philip Morris, R.J. Reynolds, Brown &
Williamson and Lorillard Tobacco to remove cigarette billboards, stop
selling merchandise with cigarette logos, and foot the bill for ads
discouraging youth smoking.

"We think it's a positive step forward in the war on tobacco, but it's not
the answer and doesn't itself provide a national tobacco-control policy,"
said Diane Canova, speaking for the American Heart Association.

She said federal legislation was still needed to give the Food and Drug
Administration authority over tobacco products.

Antismoking activist Bill Novelli of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids
said local public health officials were being alerted to make sure the
money that would go to the states "isn't diverted to non-public health
areas."

"There is going to a huge food fight over these dollars," he said.

A formal announcement of the agreement is expected today in Washington.

Several state attorneys general said they would not know until reviewing
the details whether they would sign.

Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal told the Hartford Courant
the agreement appears to have several good features, although it was far
short of the failed $368.5 billion settlement that he helped negotiate in
1997.

"It may be the best we can achieve now," Blumenthal said. "In any event,
whether we can settle it or not, the war against Big Tobacco will continue
and the settlement will only close a chapter."

Some public-health advocates are unhappy that they did not get a chance to
comment as the settlement was crafted in private meetings between the
states and the industry over the last five months.

Mohammad N. Akhter, executive director of the 55,000-member American Public
Health Association, said the states should be given another two to three
weeks to decide so they can consult with public health experts.

He said the five-day deadline was "absolutely inappropriate. It is enticing
people into taking action they haven't thought through."

A separate deal was struck Saturday with U.S. Tobacco Co., the leading
maker of chewing tobacco. It would pay about $100 million over 10 years for
education on the dangers of tobacco in exchange for state claims
settlements.