Several major tobacco companies have reached an agreement with New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer to stop advertising in the school editions of three news magazines, Spitzer’s office said Monday.
PHILIP MORRIS USA, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Holdings Inc. and U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Co. will remove all tobacco advertising from the school editions of Time, Newsweek and U.S. News & World Report, a press release from Spitzer’s office said.
Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp., which doesn’t advertise in U.S. News & World Report, also agreed to remove ads from the school editions of Time and Newsweek.
From January 2002 to June of this year, the four tobacco companies together had placed about 120 ads for cigarettes and smokeless tobacco in the three magazines, which all provide free or low-cost copies to school social studies classes and libraries.
Spitzer said magazine publishers use a process called “selective binding” which allows advertisers to place ads in certain copies of magazines and not others.
The pact comes as part of the national tobacco settlement agreement, which prohibits tobacco marketing that targets youth.
Spitzer said in the release he will file lawsuits against any tobacco companies that continue to place ads in school editions of magazines in the future.
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