Medical specialists can precisely identify the cause of your lung or respiratory disease
Because diseases such as lung cancer, emphysema, pulmonary fibrosis, and chronic bronchitis can be caused by asbestos exposure and tobacco use, many people who have both risk factors in their lives and struggle with one of these diagnoses are reluctant to even think about filing a claim.
Since most cases of pulmonary disease are the consequence of cigarette smoking, they falsely believe that this must also be their situation, so they do not undergo screening for asbestos.
However, medical specialists who focus on occupational diseases can tell the difference between, for instance, lung cancer caused by smoking and lung cancer caused by asbestos exposure. This is because asbestos fibers will show up on X-rays or more sensitive imaging tests in the lungs of a person with a history of asbestos exposure. Consequently, if you were exposed to asbestos and used tobacco too and now suffer from a disease that can stem from the former, we encourage you to undergo more in-depth testing.
Once asbestos fibers are found in your lungs or along your esophagus or larynx, the medical specialist will have evidence that your disease is the result of asbestos exposure and not tobacco use. Nevertheless, it is important to be aware of the fact that if you are exposed to asbestos and smoke cigarettes or chew tobacco, your risk of developing a disease is up to 50 times greater. But this does not mean you are not eligible for the financial compensation you deserve for having been exposed to asbestos, which is a toxic and carcinogenic mineral.
Eligibility criteria for victims of asbestos exposure who also used tobacco
We strongly encourage victims of asbestos exposure to file a claim with their former employer or with the companies whose products they handled in the military, as they deserve financial compensation for their unjust suffering.
If you smoked cigarettes or chewed tobacco, but this has not been determined as the cause of your respiratory disease, you are most likely eligible to file a claim.
Nevertheless, you will also have to meet the following eligibility criteria:
- you must have a letter from a medical specialist stating that your disease is solely the consequence of asbestos exposure and not tobacco use, more specifically, that there are asbestos fibers in your lungs or in your resected malignant tumors if you underwent surgery
- your disease must have developed within 20 to 50 years from your first instance of asbestos exposure, as this is the telltale sign that it was caused by asbestos fibers embedded in tissue and not tobacco use
If you have a history of asbestos exposure but still have doubts regarding whether you qualify for compensation, give us a call, and we will figure out your situation within roughly 20 minutes. Furthermore, we offer victims of asbestos exposure who do not have a diagnosis of cancer, a free of charge medical screening in Birmingham, Alabama, so if you live in close proximity, we invite you to come and have your lungs examined by the medical experts we collaborate with.
How asbestos exposure can impact your lungs and respiratory system
Asbestos exposure is notorious for taking a heavy toll on the health of the lungs and the respiratory system, just like tobacco use. Once asbestos fibers, which are very tiny, reach the internal tissue of the body, such as the inside of the lungs, they attach themselves to it.
Within 20 to 50 years, the person who inhaled asbestos fibers can develop a disease affecting the lungs or the respiratory system due to the inflammation and tissue scarring asbestos fibers have gradually caused.
To make matters worse, if the person with a history of asbestos exposure is or was also a tobacco user, their chances of developing a serious disease increase substantially. When it comes to tobacco use, people generally smoke tobacco cigarettes or chew tobacco, both of which are habits that can worsen the effects of asbestos exposure on the respiratory system. However, cigarette smoking is considerably worse for the lungs than tobacco chewing. On the other hand, tobacco chewing is often associated with esophageal cancer, a disease that can also be the consequence of asbestos exposure alone.
The following are the diseases that make you eligible to file a claim for asbestos exposure if asbestos fibers are found inside your body, whether you are a tobacco user or not:
If you doubt what the cause of your lung cancer is in the event that it could be the result of both asbestos exposure and tobacco use, we highly suggest you visit a specialist who will order chest X-rays for you. Subsequently, your chest X-rays must be examined by a B-reader, who is a medical specialist that can distinguish lungs affected by cigarette smoking from lungs affected by asbestos exposure. As for the other diseases that can be caused by both asbestos exposure and tobacco use, you will also have to visit a specialist or even more than one, as misdiagnosis is very common in the case of asbestos exposure.
Common misdiagnoses tobacco users exposed to asbestos can receive
Because only victims of asbestos exposure who are also tobacco users with one of the diseases above are eligible for compensation, having the right diagnosis is essential. Not only will it qualify you for compensation, but it will also help you receive suitable treatment for your disease.
If you have a history of asbestos exposure and smoke cigarettes or chew tobacco but have not received one of the previous diagnoses upon your first medical appointment, we strongly encourage you to seek a second and even a third opinion.
Misdiagnosis is unfortunately very common among victims of asbestos exposure. The following are the most common misdiagnoses in people exposed to asbestos who also use or used tobacco:
- pneumonia
- asthma
- acid reflux
- encysted lung effusion
- lung abscesses
- lung nodules
- thoracic Hodgkin's disease
- pulmonary embolism
- tuberculosis
- esophageal varices
- achalasia
- reflux esophagitis
- caustic esophagitis
- infectious esophagitis
- esophageal ulcer
- esophageal diverticulum
- Boerhaave syndrome
- acute tonsillitis
A timeline of studies, events, and lawsuits concerning tobacco
Attorney General Daniel Cameron made a public announcement that Kentucky has received over $129 million for the annual payment from the Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement. "Since 1998, Kentucky has received over $2.5 billion from tobacco manufacturers under the Master Settlement Agreement, which our office administers," said Attorney General Cameron. "These funds provide essential support to agricultural diversification initiatives, as well as childhood development and health and wellness programs across the Commonwealth," he added.
A Florida jury awarded a woman's family $9.75 million after she passed away due to a respiratory disease caused by smoking. Carolyn Long was a regular smoker for many decades before finally quitting in 2002. In the 1990s, she was diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, which eventually caused her death in 2020 at age 80. The attorneys representing Long's husband, John, said that the woman had a very difficult time trying to quit tobacco smoking throughout her life. "Despite trying literally everything she just couldn't quit," one of the lawyers said.
"As we know now, nicotine rewires the brain in powerful ways when you start that young. The tobacco companies knew this long before the public did and engineered cigarettes to be as addictive as possible," added the attorney. The husband claimed that her illness and subsequent death were caused by R.J. Reynolds's conspiracy to hide the truth about the dangers of smoking.
In a 2014 wrongful death lawsuit against R.J. Reynolds, a Florida jury awarded over $23 billion in punitive damages to a former smoker's widow who died of lung cancer. However, in 2015, a Florida appeals court shrank that award to just under $17 million. Cynthia Robinson of the Florida Panhandle city of Pensacola sued the cigarette manufacturer in 2008 over the death of her husband, Michael Johnson. The man, a hotel shuttle bus driver, died in 1996 at age 36 and would smoke 1 to 3 packs a day for over 20 years, starting at age 13, according to the widow's lawyer.
The U.S. Supreme Court dismissed the tobacco companies' preemption arguments in a light cigarette lawsuit filed in Maine in December 2008. The Supreme Court agreed that federal legislation does not prevent plaintiffs from suing under certain state unfair business practice laws. This would pave the way for similar lawsuits against tobacco companies. The Supreme Court, however, did not rule on any of the underlying claims, so the plaintiffs would still have to prove that tobacco companies violated Maine's consumer protection laws.
The Florida Supreme Court threw out a class-action lawsuit brought on behalf of 700,000 smokers and their families against tobacco manufacturers in 2006. The court found that tobacco manufacturers knowingly sold dangerous products and kept smoking health risks hidden but claimed that the lawsuit could not proceed as a class action. Instead, the court concluded that each case must be proven individually. This ruling encouraged over 8,000 smokers and their families to bring individual lawsuits against tobacco companies.
Despite the explicit ban on directing cigarette advertising at children, all three major American tobacco companies increased youth targeting after the ban was put in place in the 1998 report of the researchers from the University of Chicago in the March/April issue of Health Affairs. This is because tobacco companies exploited the inconsistencies between the ban and the government's definition of youth magazines so that they enabled the industry to reach as many young readers as ever, according to researchers.
"What we found was a violation of the spirit and the letter of the 1998 settlement," said Paul Chung, MD, a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar at the University of Chicago and co-first author of the paper. "Cigarette companies had to become slightly more subtle about it, but they continue to aim their advertising at people under 18," he added. 4 out of 5 adult smokers began engaging in this habit before the age of 18, and in 2002, approximately 28% of high school students smoked.
A state jury in San Francisco ordered Philip Morris to pay $51.5 million to Patricia Henley, a woman who alleged her inoperable lung cancer was the consequence of over 35 years of smoking cigarettes, primarily Philip Morris's Marlboro brand. The judgment was by far the largest ever reached in a smoking-related lawsuit at the time. She received $1.5 million in compensatory damages and $50 million in punitive damages.
1998 – 52 state and territory attorneys general sign the Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement
In 1998, 52 state and territory attorneys general signed the Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement with the 4 largest tobacco companies in America to settle dozens of state lawsuits filed to recover billions in health care costs linked to treating smoking-related diseases. Eventually, over 45 tobacco companies settled with the Settling States under the Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement. Even though Mississippi, Florida, Minnesota, and Texas are not signatories, they have their own tobacco settlements, which occurred before the Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement.
The purpose of the Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement is to reduce smoking in the country, particularly among youth, which is achieved through raising the cost of cigarettes by imposing payment obligations on the tobacco companies party to the Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement and restricting tobacco advertising and marketing, including:
- prohibiting tobacco companies from targeting youth in the advertising, promotion, or marketing of cigarettes
- banning the use of cartoons in advertising, promotions, or labeling of tobacco products
- prohibiting tobacco companies from distributing merchandise bearing the brand name of cigarettes
- banning payments to promote tobacco products in the media, such as movies, TV shows, music, and video games
- prohibiting tobacco brand name sponsorship of events with a large youth audience
- eliminating tobacco company practices that conceal tobacco's health risks
- providing money for the Settling States that some states choose to use to fund smoking prevention programs
- establishing and funding the Truth Initiative, the organization "dedicated to achieving a culture where all youth and young adults reject tobacco"
The 1980s – the second wave of tobacco litigation emerges, and addiction is introduced as a factor
In the 1980s, there was a new wave of lawsuits. In the most famous case of that time, Cipollone v. Liggett, the plaintiff, and her family alleged that tobacco companies knew but did not warn consumers that smoking caused lung cancer and that cigarettes were addictive. Even though Rose Cipollone's husband was awarded $400,000, the decision was reversed. Other plaintiffs also sued, alleging that cigarette manufacturers knew the products were addictive and caused cancer.
1969 – the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act of 1969 enters law
Congress passed the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act in 1969. This banned cigarette advertising from radio and television. The Surgeon General published the most comprehensive volume on smoking ever issued in the United States in 1979, the 15th anniversary of the first report. Furthermore, the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act entailed the following:
- package warning label – "Warning: The Surgeon General Has Determined that Cigarette Smoking Is Dangerous to Your Health" temporarily preempted the Federal Trade Commission requirement of health labels on advertisements
- prevented states or localities from regulating or prohibiting cigarette advertising or promotion for health-related reasons
1965 – Congress passes the Federal Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act
One year after the report's initial release, Congress passed the Federal Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act of 1965, requiring the first warning labels on cigarette packages. More specifically, it made it mandatory for tobacco companies to display the warning "Caution: Cigarette Smoking May Be Hazardous to Your Health" on the label of each of their products. No other warning was allowed. Furthermore, the law:
- required no labels on cigarette advertisements – in fact, implemented a 3-year prohibition of any such labels
- required the Federal Trade Commission to report to Congress every year on the effectiveness of cigarette labeling, current cigarette advertising, and promotion practices, as well as to make recommendations for legislation
- required Department of Health, Education, and Welfare to report annually to Congress on the health consequences of smoking
1964 – the U.S. Surgeon General's first Smoking and Health report is made public
In January 1964, Dr. Luther Terry, Surgeon General of the U.S. Public Health Service, made public the first report of the Surgeon General's Advisory Committee on Smoking and Health. On the basis of over 7,000 articles concerning smoking and disease already available at the time in the medical literature, the Advisory Committee concluded that cigarette smoking:
- causes lung cancer and laryngeal cancer in men
- is a probable cause of lung cancer in women
- is the most important cause of chronic bronchitis
The report also linked tobacco use with heart disease. For a few days, the report furnished newspaper headlines across the country and lead stories on television newscasts. Subsequently, it was ranked among the top news stories of 1964.
The 1950s – the first reports linking smoking to cancer emerge, and people begin suing
In these early lawsuits, plaintiffs, who were usually smokers with lung cancer, typically used several legal theories in their lawsuits, such as:
- negligent manufacturing – the tobacco companies failed to act with reasonable care in manufacturing and marketing cigarettes
- product liability – tobacco companies manufactured and marketed a product that was unfit to use
- negligent advertising – tobacco companies failed to warn consumers of the risks of smoking
- fraud
- violation of state consumer protection laws, most of which prohibit deceptive business practices
Tobacco companies responded immediately, fighting each lawsuit and outright refusing to settle out of court. They relied on multiple defense strategies, arguing that:
- tobacco was not harmful to consumers
- smokers' cancer was caused by other factors
- smokers assumed the risk of cancer when they decided to use tobacco
1901 – a whopping 3.5 billion cigarettes are sold in America, which was a record
In 1901, roughly 3.5 billion cigarettes were sold in America, and increasingly more tobacco companies were established, creating a whole industry that began gaining a lot of power. Tobacco companies such as Altria Group and Imperial Brands were becoming more and more popular, selling more and more tobacco products, and earning whacking amounts of money.
1864 – federal tax is imposed on cigarettes
Although cigarettes were introduced in the United States at the beginning of the 19th century, it was not until 1984 that federal tax was imposed on cigarettes and other tobacco products. Before the 19th century, tobacco would be used mostly in pipes and cigars, by chewing, and in snuff.
1760 – Lorillard Company, the first company that made cigars and snuff, is founded in the U.S.
Dating to 1760, when a French immigrant, Pierre Lorillard, opened a "manufactory" in New York City, Lorillard Company is now the oldest tobacco company in the United States. It was created 200 years ago, yet it still has a $6.46 billion revenue annually or even more.
