When doctors began to link smoking and lung cancer ten years ago, the U.S. tobacco industry deftly headed off catastrophe by switching to filter brands, which seemed to allay the public's fears. Since then U.S. cigarette consumption has puffed merrily on to new highs year after year (24 billion packs last year), and most of the major manufacturers have reaped a harvest of profit records. Suddenly last week the cancer scare rose up again, setting off a flurry of selling on the New York Stock Exchange that tumbled every major U.S. cigarette...
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