CIGARETTE COMPANIES FEEL HEAT\3 from industry contradict bosses.

Byline: Barnaby J. Feder The New York Times

New evidence that tobacco companies regard cigarettes as nicotine delivery devices - which they long have denied - was made public Monday by the Food and Drug Administration.

The agency released affidavits from two former Philip Morris research scientists this month that detail the giant company's efforts over decades to understand nicotine and its appeal to smokers. And a former Philip Morris manufacturing executive testified to the agency March 7 that the company took hourly measurements to track the level of nicotine during production and added byproducts from tobacco with higher than average nicotine content to raise the level of the drug when it fell below specifications.

The testimony reinforces written records and claims by other former industry officials that are being used as ammunition in damage suits against the industry and as justification for the FDA's proposals to regulate the sale and marketing of tobacco.

The affidavits also are hard to square with tobacco industry statements denying that nicotine is either addictive or a controlling factor in cigarette manufacturing, as William I. Campbell, a former president of Philip Morris USA, did when he and other top industry executives testified to the House subcommittee on health and the environment in 1994.

"These affidavits clearly contradict statements William Campbell gave us under oath," said Henry Waxman, D-Calif., the former head of the subcommittee.

Campbell, now an executive with Citibank, could not be reached for comment.

The affidavits released Monday were from Ian L. Uydess and William A. Farone, both former scientists at Philip Morris' research complex in Richmond, Va., and Jerome Rivers, who ran a company production line in Richmond that converted tobacco stems, leaf fragments and other byproducts into a paperlike sheet that is later chopped up and blended with tobacco leaf in the manufacturing process.

Philip Morris declined to comment on the affidavits. But it asserted that the documents' highly publicized release, complete with the advance leaking of Uydess' testimony over the weekend to The Wall Street Journal, was part of a campaign to demonize the industry.

"Obviously, this is a well-orchestrated public relations gambit involving the FDA and the plaintiffs' attorneys," said Ellis Woodward, a company spokesman. He noted that Ronald Motley, a member of the team of lawyers suing Philip Morris and other companies in a class action in Mississippi, said Friday in San Francisco that testimony from Philip Morris scientists would become public this week.

"This is information we believe the public should know," said Dr. David A. Kessler, commissioner of the FDA, in a written statement Monday. The agency announced that the affidavits were being published because it may rely on them in issuing its rules. It said the public will be given 30 days to comment.

The affidavits were the latest in a string of blows that have undercut the air of invincibility that once cloaked the $45 billion industry, which faces a deluge of lawsuits from states and individuals, five federal grand jury investigations, increasing state taxes and regulation and the threat of FDA oversight.