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The tobacco industry would like you to believe that all it 

 is doing is returning the nicotine that is removed during the 

 process of producing reconstituted tobacco. It should be clear 

 from what I have described thus far that the technology the 

 industry may have available goes beyond such modest efforts. 



The industry may also tell you that it is adjusting nicotine 

 levels to be consistent with established "FTC yields" -- these 

 are the amounts of tar, nicotine, and carbon monoxide that are 

 measured for each cigarette product by smoking machines, and 

 disclosed under a voluntary agreement with the Federal Trade 

 Commission. In fact, the control of nicotine levels in 

 cigarettes, dating back at least to patents granted in 1966 for 

 adjusting nicotine levels, preceded the first rules adopted by 

 the FTC on disclosing tar and nicotine yields. Moreover, there 

 is nothing about the FTC yields that would require tobacco 

 companies to increase nicotine in low tar cigarettes, as the 

 industry patents suggest they do. There are no FTC restrictions 

 on nicotine levels, and the FTC guidelines take into account crop 

 variability by sampling completed cigarettes from 50 retail 

 outlets across the country. Indeed, there is no FTC restriction 

 that would prevent the industry from reducing nicotine below 

 addicting levels or eliminating it altogether. 



In fact, the technology reflected in the cigarette 

 industry's patents appears to be intended to allow the industry 

 to set the nicotine content of tobacco products at defined levels 

 that have little to do with either the amount of nicotine that 



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