Israel Sues: Maccabi sues Dubek for 1.75 billion shekels (fwd)

[Robert Weissman <rob@essential.org>]

>From Stan Glantz's listserve:

Robert Weissman
Essential Information			|   Internet:	rob@essential.org

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 17 Jun 1998 08:08:18 -0700
From: Stan Glantz <glantz@cardio.ucsf.EDU>
To: StanGlantz-L@smokescreen.org, tob-info@uicc.ch
Subject: Israel Sues: Maccabi sues Dubek for 1.75 billion shekels

The move to sue tobacco companies continues to spread worldwide.  This fact
makes it doubly important that the US take no action that will end up
giving the tobacco companies any form of legal protection.  The stakes now
go well beyond the issue of youth smoking in the just the USA


http://www.jpost.co.il/News/Article-6.html
       

        Maccabi health fund sues Dubek tobacco for NIS 1.75b.

                  By JUDY SIEGEL

                  TEL AVIV (June 16) - Kupat Holim Maccabi yesterday filed
                  a NIS 1.75 billion suit against the Dubek tobacco company
                  to cover its costs in treating members' smoking-related
                  illnesses.

                  The insurer is demanding NIS 250 million for its expenses
                  for each year since 1991, the last year before the
                  statute of limitations.

                  The suit, filed in the Tel Aviv District Court, is
                  separate from a class-action suit filed last fall on
                  behalf of 15 former smokers, or families of deceased
                  smokers. They claimed they were not aware of nicotine
                  being "added to make cigarettes more addictive and the
                  health dangers posed by smoking, which were not mentioned
                  for decades in Dubek's advertising."

                  Health Minister Yehoshua Matza "congratulated" Maccabi on
                  the suit, according to a ministry statement.

                  Ran Rahav, spokesman for the government-recognized
                  monopoly that sells most of the cigarettes smoked by
                  Israelis said Dubek "had not yet received" the documents.
                  "When we receive them, we will comment," he said.

                  Dubek has a battery of the country's leading lawyers from
                  the S. Hurwitz law office working on the case.

                  Kupat Holim Clalit, which has three times as many members
                  - many of them chronically ill and elderly - is now
                  seriously considering the possibility of joining the
                  suit. Kupat Holim Leumit's spokesman said that health
                  fund has decided "definitely not" to take part in the
                  legal action, but did not offer any reasons. Kupat Holim
                  Meuhedet declined to comment.

                  "Whoever sells products that cause serious harm to health
                  must bear the consequences," Prof. Eliezer Kaplinsky,
                  chief of cardiology at Sheba Hospital, said on Army Radio
                  yesterday. Kaplinsky will be a witness for Maccabi in
                  court.

                  Lawyer Gidi Frishtik and Alon Gellert, who are
                  representing the 15 families as well as Maccabi, said the
                  health fund's suit could take years before a decision is
                  reached.

                  Maccabi argues that it is "unjustified" for Dubek to
                  enjoy profitable sales of cigarettes while the health
                  fund has to pay for the treatment of patients suffering
                  from lung cancer, heart disease, strokes and other
                  disorders.

                  Maccabi maintains that "Dubek manufactured and marketed a
                  dangerous product knowing that its use would cause them
                  harm."

                  Although the smoking rate has decreased in recent years,
                  28% of the population over 18 light up, and 6,000 people
                  die each year from smoking or inhaling passive smoke,
                  according to Health Ministry statistics.

                  Over a year ago, Deputy Health Minister Shlomo Benizri
                  asked the State Attorney's Office to look into the
                  possibility of suing Dubek and US tobacco companies for
                  compensation for the health costs of treating smokers.
                  This, in accordance with the model of state suits against
                  tobacco manufacturers in the US.

                  However, the idea has become bogged down in the Justice
                  Ministry, whose spokeswoman, Etti Eshed, said it is
                  "still being examined."

                  






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