People Have Mixed Emotions About New Cigarettes

BARDSTOWN, Ky. (AP) - Bardstown resident Debbie Coulter says she supports the right to smoke at her restaurant, but the 52-year-old shudders when she recalls a recent incident in which she fell asleep smoking and her nightgown caught fire.

Investigators say a lit cigarette, dropped in a chair, led to a fire in the Nelson County city that claimed ten lives.

That fire has sparked calls from fire prevention advocates to require all cigarettes sold in the state to be "fire safe," or made to extinguish when dropped or not inhaled for a period.

Lorraine Carli of the National Fire Protection Association says action should be taken quickly to make sure there aren't more of those kinds of tragedies in the future. She's supporting measures in the state House of Representatives and Senate. Her group says lawmakers in at least 19 other states are considering similar legislation.

The state Senate passed a measure this week that would require the conversion to fire-safe cigarettes and a similar one has cleared a state House of Representatives committee.

How do you feel out the fire safe cigarette?

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