21.   Alameda County last year joined a lawsuit filed by San Francisco County that sought to recover the costs of treating tobacco-related illnesses.

22.   All of those companies are locked in fierce competition to fill their networks and recover their costs, in one sense putting Cable and Wireless in the catbird seat.

23.   Businesses facing huge premium increases could try to recover those costs by raising prices on everything from restaurant meals to apartment rents, insurance industry observers said.

24.   But Richards said the cabbies can recover that cost because they get more trips per shift.

25.   But Los Angeles County supervisors said they will pursue state legislation to recover costs incurred by high-profile cases.

26.   But once such costs were recovered, consumer rates would be expected to fall.

27.   But that means that it can take too long for a company to recover its costs.

28.   But tough price competition kept the company from recovering the costs of developing these new products, then marketing them through more retailers with especially flashy advertising.

29.   Central elements of that pressure were the lawsuits brought by more than three dozen states in an effort to recover Medicaid costs of smoking-related illnesses.

30.   Cingular spokeswoman Becky Vieira said it had to charge the fee to recover its costs.