Months after slower-burning cigarettes began appearing on store shelves, the impact they have on the smoker depends largely on who you ask.

In local stores, most smokers said they were not aware of any changes to their cigarettes at all. Others said they noticed the cigarettes had a tendancy to go out if left alone too long, which is exactly what the new cigarettes are designed to do.

A few reported that the new cigarettes taste nastier than the smokes they are accustomed to.

“It leaves a funny taste,” said Debie Thalheiner, owner of Bill Davis Tobacconists on Lisbon Street in Lewiston. “I’ve had people come in and complain that it makes them ill.”

At Victor News on Park Street, a clerk said the new “fire-safe” cigarettes have been on the market for months. Most people either didn’t pay attention or just noticed that their cigarettes burn differently.

With a new law that took effect on Jan. 1, Maine has become one of a growing number of states where it’s illegal to sell cigarettes that aren’t certified “fire-safe.”

Passed during the last legislative session, the measure has the endorsement of the state fire marshal and public health officials, but according to retailers, some smokers complain the self-extinguishing paper used to make the cigarettes alters the taste of their favorite brands.

“Reduced ignition propensity” cigarettes, as the tobacco industry prefers to call them, are made with narrow bands of thicker paper that act like speed bumps to slow the burn. In the absence of fairly steady puffing, the cigarette will extinguish itself, decreasing the likelihood that a neglected cigarette will ignite a fire in a sofa, bed or other flammable object.

From 1992 to 2005, at least 77 Mainers died in fires started by smoking materials, according to State Fire Marshal John C. Dean. That’s 28 percent of overall fire deaths, he said Wednesday – and probably a conservative estimate, since the cause of many fatal fires is never determined.

In 2000, the state of New York passed first-in-the-nation legislation to prohibit the sale of cigarettes not made with the specialized paper. New York’s law didn’t take effect until 2004, though, while scientists and lawmakers worked with the industry to establish a uniform standard for certification.

Maine lawmakers first considered a fire-safe cigarette mandate in 2003, making it the first state to follow New York’s lead. The certification problem was still being debated then and the measure, which faced stiff opposition from the tobacco industry, failed. But last year, with the New York standards setting the bar and every other New England state already on board, it was smooth sailing for Maine’s new law, Dean said.

Regional distributors who had opposed the initial measure because it would have required them to maintain a separate inventory of fire-safe cigarettes just for Maine were now eager to bring Maine into the fire-safe fold, he said.

Dr. Dora Anne Mills, director of the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said the measure had strong support from the public health community.

“It’ll be nice when we hit the day that we don’t have to worry whether cigarettes are fire-safe or not fire-safe, because they’ll be history,” she said Wednesday. “But for now, this is an improvement.”

Ed Miller of the Maine chapter of the American Lung Association noted Wednesday that the new fire-safe cigarettes are neither safe nor healthful to smoke, but he said they represent a significant public safety improvement.

“Too often when you fall asleep with a cigarette and burn down a home or a mobile home or an apartment complex, many others are affected,” he said. “We have the technology to do something (to prevent such fires), so why not do it?”

Rep. Peter Rines, D-Wiscasset, the primary sponsor of the bill, is a career firefighter and a trainer of firefighters.

“I’ve seen too many times the results of improperly disposed of smoking materials,” he said Wednesday. Reducing the number of fires caused by cigarettes improves the safety of firefighters, he said.

At Philip Morris USA in Richmond, Va., spokesman Bill Phelps said the industry doesn’t oppose state-level fire-safe mandates, although it would prefer to see national legislation that sets a uniform standard. The fire-safe designation has not caused a price increase to wholesalers, he said.

Even so, at Bill Davis Tobacconists in Lewiston, Thalheiner predicts the introduction of the slow-burning cigarettes has likely prompted some smokers to find alternatives. They might start rolling their own, they might switch to natural blends or they might start getting their smokes illegally – importing them from other states or shopping on the Internet.

The new cigarettes appear to have the endorsement of nearly everyone – except some of the people who smoke them. According to Chris Beaulier, operations director at the Brewer-based Cigaret Shopper, some customers complain that the fire-safe cigarettes, which have been on store shelves now for several weeks, taste different. And smokers don’t necessarily appreciate finding that their cigarette has unexpectedly self-extinguished because of brief inattention, he added.

Because stores are allowed to sell off any non-fire-safe inventory they purchased before Jan. 1, some consumers are going out of their way to request supplies from the stores’ older stocks. “It’s been kind of a boon, helping us turn over some dated inventory,” Beaulier said.

With laws in Maine and Massachusetts both taking effect Jan. 1, there are now 22 states with fire-safe cigarette laws on the books.

Information is available online at www.firesafecigarettes.org