A smokeless tobacco product, known as snus, is touted as being 90% less harmful than cigarettes, says a tobacco company, but anti-smoking activists aren’t convinced.
Snus is finely ground moist tobacco, usually sold in small teabag-like sachets, that are placed under the upper lip against the gum. In South Africa it is sold under the Peter Stuyvesant and Lucky Strike brands by British American Tobacco (BAT) and under the Swedish Snus brand by tobacco company Swedish Match. Although it has been available locally for a few years, restrictions on tobacco advertising and a limited number of retail outlets have meant that most people are unaware of the product still.
But, despite its small scale, there has been no shortage of controversy. Swedish Match lobbied for snus to be excluded from tightened tobacco control legislation this year, arguing that the product carried far less harm than smoking tobacco. Although the company’s argument was rejected, snus tins now carry milder warnings than cigarettes. BAT said the health department has allowed a change of warning labels from “causes cancer” to “tobacco is addictive”.
The European Union banned smokeless tobacco products, including snus, in 1992, on the grounds that they might appeal to consumers who were too young to be sold tobacco legally, thereby posing a health risk. Sweden, a traditional producer and consumer of snus, scored an exemption when it joined the EU in 1995. Tobacco companies say snus offers a way for smokers to get their nicotine hit without the risks associated with smoking and that the product offers a path away from smoking.
“Saying that snus is safer than tobacco is like saying that being hit by a car is safer than being hit by a truck,” said Yusuf Salojee of the National Council Against Smoking. Salojee said that while snus might be safer than cigarettes, “safer is not safe”. “Our best advice is to stop smoking. Snus is a way for people to get their nicotine fix when they can’t smoke.”
In Sweden, which has the highest consumption of smokeless tobacco in the world, cigarette consumption has fallen. More than 23% of Swedish men use snus regularly and fewer than 13% smoke. “Long-term studies have shown that Swedish men now have among the lowest lung cancer rates in the world and Sweden’s mouth cancer rate is among the lowest in the world,” BAT said.
However, snus does carry an increased risk for pancreatic cancer and provides a way for smokers to prolong their addiction, Salojee said. Products touted as being less harmful don’t solve the problem. In the 1970s the British government recommended that smokers switch to lower-tar products and even published tar tables for various cigarette brands. “Large numbers of people switched and there was no reduction in harm. Instead, the kind of cancers changed,” he said, explaining that lighter cigarettes meant consumers inhaled smoke deeper into the lungs.
In 2005 South Africa became a snus test market for BAT, which announced last year that it would extend the 240 retail outlets to 700. The tobacco company said few consumers saw snus as less harmful than smoking and many believed it to be more harmful. “We believe the lack of understanding poses serious questions about how information can be provided to consumers about less harmful products, which we are keen to discuss with regulators and members of the public health community,” the company said in a press release at the time.