Source: The Wall Street Journal Interactive Edition
Date: 2010-02-02
Author: JEANNE WHALEN
Tobacco companies are digging in to fight a possible U.K. ban on
one of their last marketing tools: cigarette packaging.

The U.K.\'s Department of Health said Monday that it would
consider mandating generic packaging for all cigarettes as part
of an aggressive campaign to halve smoking rates by 2020.

Such packs would be white or brown with the brand name written
in simple type and no logos or colors allowed. The packs would
continue to carry large health warnings.

In a report, health officials called colorful packaging the
"silent salesman" for tobacco brands and said evidence suggests
that without it, consumers could be more likely to note the
health warnings and less likely to wrongly believe that some
cigarettes are less harmful than others.

Other countries, including Canada, have considered mandating
plain packaging, but, amid heavy resistance from the tobacco
industry, none has yet done so.