By Ishani Ganguli

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Cigarette warning labels should cover at least half of the package’s front and back and use graphic color photos of cancer and other health effects to deter smokers, U.S. Senators said on Wednesday.

The effort was part of ongoing debate on a bill that would allow Food and Drug Administration to regulate but not ban tobacco products, a proposal supported by public health groups and the nation’s largest cigarette maker.

“Shocking messages convey the truth in no uncertain terms and have been known to have an impact,” said Wyoming Republican Sen. Mike Enzi. He put forward the amendment creating a minimum standard for regulation of the labels.

Under the original bill, the proposed FDA regulatory committee would have authority to decide what the labels say and show, and how they are placed, modifying them over time as research findings change, according to Sen. Edward Kennedy, the Massachusetts Democrat who sponsored the bill.

Kennedy chairs the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, which is expected to vote on the tobacco bill on Thursday.

Enzi’s amendment, which Kennedy said he accepted, would require the agency to mandate warning labels covering at least 50 percent of the front and rear panels of the package. The labels would also have to include color images of the health consequences of smoking — including oral cancer and gangrene.

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