Media Release

FOR: Immediate Release
DATE: April 15, 1999
CONTACT: Carol Hall-Walker, MPA 401-222-1394, ext. 145

Tobacco Settlement Removes Blight on Rhode Island Landscape
Tobacco Billboards Replaced with Pro-health Messages

On April 23, 1999 the landscape will get a public health facelift. On that day, tobacco industry billboards – those persuasive images of happy, healthy-looking young people (and camels) pursuing a deadly and addictive habit – will come down all across the country. They will be replaced by pro-health messages speaking the truth about the nation’s number one preventable killer.

As part of the tobacco settlement signed by 46 State Attorneys General and four Tobacco companies on November 23, 1998, the companies agreed to remove all billboard and transit advertising and to turn over the remaining time on the leases for this space to the State Attorneys General.

"Our intention is to use the space for pro-health, tobacco use prevention messages," said Attorney General Sheldon Whitehouse. "This change will not solve the problems that tobacco has created for our State, but it is an important symbol of our continuing effort to promote health by attacking the biggest preventable killer in Rhode Island and in our nation."

"The effect will be dramatic," said Patricia Nolan, MD, MPH, Director of the Rhode Island Department of Health. "Where the Marlboro Man and Joe Camel have preyed on our communities for decades, we now have any opportunity to give people some truthful information they can use to increase the quality and the longevity of their lives."

Providence residents might first notice the elimination of the Newport ad at Valley Street. "That billboard has bothered me for years," says Phyllis Johnson of the Youth Taking A Stand. "Every time I drive past it I want to cover my grandchildren’s eyes. The permanence of that billboard has helped to delude the neighborhood residents into thinking that smoking was ‘normal,’ that everyone did it."

Until now, the tobacco industry has spent about $300 million a year on outdoor advertising. While this made tobacco a major outdoor advertiser, the amount represents just a fraction of the more than $5 billion spent in total each year to advertise and promote tobacco products in this country. "We hail the removal of tobacco billboards, of course, but we are under no illusions that this will solve the problem of smoking, especially by the young people in Rhode Island, " said Dr. Nolan. "We will use this billboard space, and every other opportunity, to enhance our ongoing efforts at preventing this deadly addiction."

All together, five Philip Morris, three Brown & Williamson and one Lorillard billboard will have anti-tobacco ads on them on the highways until December 31, 1999. Phillip Morris makes Marlboro cigarettes, Brown & Williamson makes Kools, and Lorillard produces the Newport brand. R.J. Reynolds, the nation’s second largest tobacco Company and maker of Winston, Camel and Salem cigarettes, says it does not have any billboard leases that extend beyond April.

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Department of Health Website: www.health.state.ri.us