NEW YORK — Philip Morris has developed a slower-burning paper that may lower the chance that a discarded or dropped cigarette will start a fire.
But before it markets the cigarettes, the nation's biggest cigarette company wants to know if consumers will put up with a smoke that might go out if they fail to take a puff often enough.
The maker of the top-selling Marlboro brand announced Tuesday that it expects to start consumer tests of the paper with its Merit cigarettes within six months. It has yet to select the test markets.
"Our goal is to manufacture and market cigarettes that are less likely to cause fires when carelessly handled and that are acceptable to consumers," said John Nelson, senior vice president of operations for Philip Morris USA.
Federal officials say cigarettes account for more fatal home fires than any other single consumer product. About 900 people, including 140 children, were killed in home fires started by cigarettes in 1997, the most recent year for which the Consumer Product Safety Commission had figures.
The announcement was called long overdue by safety groups. Critics said experts concluded years ago that it was technically feasible to make such cigarettes.
"It is tragic that it has taken so long," said Andrew McGuire, executive director of the Trauma Foundation, a San Francisco-based group that has pushed for development of cigarettes less likely to start fires.
But Philip Morris officials said it has been hard to find a solution that can work on the fast-moving machinery for making cigarettes and be accepted by consumers.
The new smoke includes two slim bands of paper attached to the inner surface of the regular paper that wraps a cigarette.
Mary Carnovale, a spokeswoman for Philip Morris USA, said the bands slow the rate at which the cigarette burns when the lit portion passes over the bands. Under test conditions, she said, that has made it less likely that the cigarette would ignite certain types of fabrics.
She said smokers usually can't see the bands and find no difference in the taste or effort required to inhale.