A federal judge has turned down a request by the nation’s No. 2 cigarette-maker and others to immediately halt enforcement of new federal regulations on tobacco products. Their challenge to new U.S. Food and Drug Administration powers to regulate what tobacco firms say about their products has little likelihood of success, except on one point, Judge Joseph H. McKinley Jr. of the U.S. District Court in Bowling Green, Ky., ruled yesterday.

The nation’s two top cigarette-makers are boosting per-pack prices by 6 cents to 8 cents. Though the companies won’t say why, analysts believe it is to cover new user fees charged by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to pay for the costs of its new assignment to regulate tobacco. The increase on what manufacturers charge wholesalers seems unlikely to have a big effect on smoking, as this spring’s 61.66-cent-a-pack increase in federal excise taxes did.

No. 1 cigarette-maker Altria Group Inc. shook off the effect of a nearly 62-cents-a-pack federal tax increase in April to report higher third-quarter profits yesterday. Continuing cuts in the cost of making its cigarettes, cigars and smokeless tobacco for the quarter helped the Henrico County-based company deal with its quarterly federal excise tax bill more than doubling.

Cigarette maker Philip Morris USA might have to pay for chest scans so longtime smokers can get early warnings of lung cancer, the highest court in Massachusetts ruled yesterday. The Supreme Judicial Court ruled unanimously that under some circumstances, Massachusetts law recognizes a claim by individual smokers for medical monitoring even without the presence of an actual injury.

About half of the millions of dollars in fees that will pay for the Food and Drug Administration’s regulation of tobacco products will come from Henrico County-based Altria Group Inc. The FDA this week started collecting fees from the nation’s tobacco companies to fund the agency’s newly created Center for Tobacco Products. The user fees, which will be collected quarterly, are based on each company’s share of the U.S. tobacco market.

David Ferrell, 20, says he sees a good future in farming, even for tobacco, a crop that has sustained his family’s farm in Charlotte County for several generations.

Adrip-irrigation line coursing through a field of tobacco on Steve Hudson’s Halifax County farm represents an investment in efficiency. It also represents a link to cigarette maker Philip Morris USA, which is reaching out to young farmers such as Hudson, 31, to try to keep them in the tobacco-growing business. The Henrico County-based cigarette company provided Hudson with a $5,000 grant to cover part of the costs for the drip-irrigation system, designed to water the crop more efficiently than an older, overhead irrigation system.

The federal ban on flavored cigarettes took effect yesterday, marking one of the first visible signs of the Food and Drug Administration’s new authority to regulate tobacco. The ban on manufacturing, importing, marketing and distribution includes candy-, fruitand clove-flavored cigarettes, which health and federal authorities say are more appealing to youth. It does not include a ban on menthol or other flavored tobacco products such as cigars—issues that the FDA is studying.

Star Scientific Inc. wants to be the first company seeking approval from federal regulators to sell so-called “modified-risk” tobacco products with reduced toxins. The Petersburg-based company, which makes smokeless tobacco products, said yesterday that it plans to ask the Food and Drug Administration next year for approval to market its products as potentially less risky to consumers’ health.

Sharing a ride with a smoker will give you a much heftier dose of nicotine than having a meal in a restaurant that allows smoking or hanging out at a smoky bar, according to new research.

Philip Morris USA plans to make a bigger push into the still-uncertain market for snus, a Swedish-style oral tobacco, expanding an experiment it is now running in three cities. The nation’s No. 1 cigarette-maker will market snus, using its flagship Marlboro brand name, more broadly this fall, said Michael E. Szymanczyk, chairman and chief executive of Philip Morris’ parent, Henrico County-based Altria Group.

The federal government’s new authority to regulate tobacco products is facing its first major legal challenge. Several tobacco companies filed a lawsuit yesterday claiming that a host of new advertising restrictions—including a requirement that tobacco products must have larger, graphic warning labels covering half of the packaging—violates constitutional rights of commercial free speech.

requiring all tobacco products, including cigars, be stored behind sales counters;
banning the terms “lights” or “mild” for newly introduced cigarettes and in advertising, beginning next year;
eventually requiring larger, stronger graphic warning labels for cigarettes;
requiring stronger warnings for smokeless tobacco;
requiring tobacco companies to report all ingredients used; and

No. 1—biggest U.S. cigarette company and smokeless tobacco company
50.2% share of U.S. cigarette market
56.1% share of moist snuff market
29.8% share of U.S. cigar market
$9.9 billion in cigarette sales
$671 million in smokeless tobacco sales
$233 million in cigar sales
75 billion cigarettes sold, including 63.7 billion Marlboros

Every six weeks or so, the guy from Philip Morris, as his customers still think of him, swings by for a chat. But this summer, salespeople like Winfred Hayes are changing hats. He now works for Philip Morris USA’s parent, Altria Group.