• DPMC Moderators: thegreenhand | tryptakid
  • Drug Policy & Media Coverage Welcome Guest
    View threads about
    Posting Rules Bluelight Rules
    Drug Busts Megathread Video Megathread

Op-Ed The End of the Illusion That Smoking Is a Choice

thegreenhand

thegreenhand

Administrator
Staff member
Joined
Aug 16, 2019
Messages
4,688

The End of the Illusion That Smoking Is a Choice​

Sarah Milov
New York Times
6 Jul 2022

Excerpt:
The Food and Drug Administration recently proposed lowering the nicotine content in cigarettes to less addictive levels. If adopted, this regulation would finally test one of the tobacco industry’s favorite claims: that smoking is a choice. Portraying smoking as a willful, personal decision has long allowed tobacco companies to promote cigarettes even while acknowledging their deadly risks. But the paradigm of individual choice has also guided cigarette regulation, ironically strengthening the industry’s key talking point — until now.

Nicotine is the addictive element in a cigarette. By reducing nicotine levels in cigarettes, federal regulations will, for the first time, address the key driver of cigarette consumption, which claims 480,000 American lives each year. Nicotine’s effects are particularly acute in adolescence, which is when most smokers start.

Tobacco companies have long understood that physiological dependence on nicotine — or what executives preferred to call nicotine satisfaction — was central to their business. Since the 1960s, the tobacco industry has manipulated ammonia levels in cigarettes to enhance nicotine’s effects. As one cigarette company research director commented in 1954, “It’s fortunate for us that cigarettes are a habit they can’t break.”
Click to expand...
 
Tobacco is yummy as long as you don't abuse em. if you're an ocassional smoker actually it's a fking beautiful drug that enhances life man. Drinking and smoking go hand in hand aswell, the trick in life for everything is very simple: "nothing in excess".
Well it sounds but it's quite hard to apply, nevertheless once u get how to control urself. U can live a pretty lovely life enjoying everything and pretty much getting out without almost 0 risks.
P.S I don't recommend to attempt this with heroin, cocaine, crack or meth. Those drugs are far too addictive and it's easy to ruin your life with em. The only exceptions xddd
 
Hmmm, did they mention vapes, that can have a nicotine content that eclipses cigarettes by a wide margin?

I smoke occasionally, probably 1-3 cigs every two weeks on average, sometimes I don't smoke for weeks or months. It seems cigarettes are already falling out of favor and the tobacco companies are probably about to double down on the vape market. I wouldn't be surprised if this was a move to pull attention away from vapes, but that's very conspiratorial and not based on evidence.
 
I just skimmed through the study they cited:

Potential Public Health Effects of Reducing Nicotine Levels in Cigarettes in the United States

I think it’s important to note that their estimates for reduced tobacco related mortality use projections based on estimates for smoking cessation provided by “eight experts”:

Eight experts were asked to provide estimates of the anticipated effects of a hypothetical policy that would require the reduction of nicotine in cigarettes to minimally addictive levels. This reduction would be achieved through setting a maximum limit on the amount of nicotine in cigarette tobacco filler and, therefore, the amount that could be extracted by the user.
Click to expand...

The authors also note in the conclusion that “Since such a policy has never been enacted, reactions to the policy are difficult to predict.

So yeah… I’m not sure how fairly the NYT author represented the study they cited

Tbh I can (maybe) believe that reducing nicotine levels so low as to make cigarettes undesirable (enough to negate compensatory smoking) may lead to more people quitting cigs. But I find it hard to believe that compensatory nicotine consumption won’t take on other forms besides smoking, most likely via high nicotine level vapes.

Not to mention the fact that some people will simply smuggle in non nicotine reduced tobacco…
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top