No Graphic Photo Warnings on Cigarette Packs, For Now
8/24/2012
A proposed graphic health warning for cigarette packages. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services(NEW YORK) -- A U.S. Appeals Court ruled Friday to uphold a decision that bars the federal government from requiring tobacco companies to label cigarette packaging with graphic anti-smoking images.
The U.S. Federal Circuit Court of Appeals said federal regulators failed to meet constitutional requirements for justifying the labeling rules in a 2-1 decision. Some legal spectators predict that the trial will make its way to the U.S. Supreme Court. In March, another appeals court largely upheld the government's authority to require tobacco companies to include graphic labels on tobacco products, the paper says.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration had proposed requiring the companies to label cigarette packages with graphic immages, such as diseased lungs, a body on top of an autopsy table and a man blowing smoke out of a tracheostomy hole in his neck.
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