NEWS
WHAT CAN THE VAPING
WORLD LEARN FROM SNUS?
By Marina Murphy, BAT
MANY OF YOU MAY BE FAMILIAR WITH
THE GENERAL EU BAN ON SNUS, A BAN
ENACTED IN 1992 THAT STILL PERSISTS
TODAY. SNUS THE ONLY TOBACCO
PRODUCT BANNED IN THE EU, DESPITE
DECADES OF RESEARCH DEMONSTRATING
THAT ‘SNUSING’ IS SUBSTANTIALLY SAFER
THAN SMOKING. ONE OF THE ARGUMENTS
FOR RETAINING THE BAN IS THAT SNUS
IS A GATEWAY TO SMOKING – SOUND
FAMILIAR?
However, let’s take a look at the one
country in the EU where snus is not
banned – Sweden. Sweden has the
lowest smoking rates and the lowest
lung cancer rates in Europe - only 8%
of men smoke every day, compared to a
25% EU average - and many authorities
have cited the widespread availability
of snus as a key factor in Sweden’s low
smoking levels.
Meanwhile in the world of e-cigarettes,
we constantly hear that like snus,
e-cigarettes are a gateway device.
And much like in the case of snus,
more and more evidence is emerging
that this hypothesis is weak. A team of
US researchers recently analysed the
findings of several previous studies and
have found the evidence suggesting a
link between vaping and future smoking
is weak at best. And in another study
conducted by our scientists at British
American Tobacco, a computer model
designed to predict future trends showed
that when e-cigarettes are available,
by 2050 the 32% of smokers in the UK
that otherwise would have continued
smoking had switched to e-cigarettes.
The possibility that e-cigarettes are a
way out of—not a way into—smoking
should come as no surprise given the
Swedish snus story. And the snus story
promises to get even more interesting.
“Brexit offers the UK hope of sane
harm reduction strategy in which snus
is relegalised”, according to Chris
Snowdon of the Institute of Economic
Affairs in London, which is why the New
Nicotine Alliance (NNA) in the UK went
to the European High Court in January to
try to overturn the ban. Professor Gerry
Stimson, chair of the NNA, says ‘We want
snus to be legalised because snus saves
lives. The human cost of the European
Union ban on snus is millions of lives lost
prematurely across Europe.’ The NNA
case will be discussed at the upcoming
Global Forum on Nicotine, Warsaw
15-17th June along with the latest
scientific assessments of the impact of
snus. Watch this space!
WHAT IS SNUS?
So what is snus? It is very different to e-cigarettes! It’s oral tobacco that can come
loose or in a pouch and it releases nicotine when tucked under the lip or cheek.
It’s been banned generally across the EU since 1992, but the availability and
acceptance of this product in Sweden helped drive down smoking there to the
lowest levels by far in Europe.
In fact, the proportion of Swedish men aged between 30 and 44 who smoke fell to
just 5% in 2016, partly because many have switched to snus. Overall just 8% of
Swedish men (and 10% of women) smoke daily, compared with the EU average
of just over 25%. According to an article in the Scandinavian Journal of Public
Health if snus was not available many more people might have continued to be
cigarette smokers. The authors estimated if the Swedish smoking prevalence
was extrapolated to the rest of the EU, there would be a 54% reduction of male
mortality from lung cancer.
Researchers in Norway, too, have shown that snus there is used to stop smoking,
reduce smoking, and avoid starting in the first place. E-cigarettes, they say, could
have the same effects, depending on how they are regulated. Snus is surely a
prime example of how providing safer, socially acceptable alternatives to smoking
can encourage quitting.
According to one study, switching from smoking to snus may offer reduced
health risk similar to quitting smoking. E-cigarettes, like snus, may offer equally
encouraging harm reduction potential. For example, Public Health England, an
executive body of the UK Department of Health, estimates that e-cigarettes are
around 95% safer than cigarettes, and the Royal College of Physicians in England
has proposed that e-cigarettes be widely promoted as an alternative to cigarettes.
32 ISSUE 11 VAPOUROUND MAGAZINE