The new initiative was launched as part of what is called the “consolidated agenda” of the administration. Released twice a year, this is a set of planned federal regulatory actions.
The rule says that trying to reduce nicotine in tobacco products would reduce people’s smoking addiction and give people a better chance of quitting. Reducing the amount of nicotine in these products could also prevent people from starting to smoke. “Nicotine addiction in burnt products is the main driver of prolonged use of these products. In fact, more than half of all adult smokers make a serious effort to quit smoking each year (quitting for at least a day), but most do not. “Such a product model, if proposed and then finalized after a thorough process, will make these products minimal or non-addictive,” the US Food and Drug Administration said in a statement on Tuesday. “Nicotine is highly addictive,” said FDA Commissioner Dr. Robert Calif. “Reducing nicotine levels to minimally addictive or non-addictive levels would reduce the likelihood that future generations of young people will become addicted to cigarettes and help more addicted smokers quit.” Nicotine is the highly addictive chemical in tobacco products. The chemical can change the way the brain works, making people crave more, according to the FDA. Studies show that when the nicotine content of cigarettes decreases, people no longer seem to smoke to make up for the lack of nicotine. Cigarettes with lower nicotine levels also appear to be effective in relieving withdrawal, according to studies. , said the deputy chief scientific officer of the American Heart Association. “I have had patients in the past who were addicted to both nicotine and heroin at different times in their lives and one of them said it was much harder to quit nicotine.” Surveys show that two-thirds of young smokers say they want to quit. Reducing nicotine levels could make a big difference. “If we could prevent them from getting addicted in the beginning, that would be good and it has the potential to really make a dramatic difference in tobacco use,” Robertson said. Some 480,000 people in the United States die from smoking-related illnesses, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It is the leading cause of death in the United States. The number of smokers has dropped significantly in the last 15 years, but by 2020, about 12.5% ​​of adults in the US, or 30.8 million people, were smoking cigarettes. More than 16 million live with smoking-related illness, according to the CDC. “This is an important step forward for public health,” said Erika Sward, assistant vice president of national defense for the American Lung Association. The FDA estimates that lowering nicotine levels could prevent more than 33 million from becoming regular smokers, and about 5 million more smokers will quit within a year of lowering nicotine levels and gaining 134 million years of life. Even with low-nicotine products, not all smoking-related illnesses would go away. Low nicotine cigarettes still contain harmful products that can cause disease. “Much of the damage comes from inhaling burnt tobacco. Burnt tobacco is still present in cigarettes with low nicotine content,” Robertson said. “Just because they are low in nicotine does not mean they are low in anything else.” Therefore, a public health effort should be made to persuade people to quit smoking, Robertson said. Reducing the nicotine content could definitely help with that. The regulations will not be made overnight, experts say, and there is no guarantee that they will be enacted. The FDA will then have to issue a notice of proposed regulation by May 2023 and there will be time for public comment. This process can take at least a year. Then, it is “very likely”, experts say, that the tobacco companies will sue for non-compliance with the rule. Myers and other tobacco experts said they hoped the FDA and the Biden government would move quickly on the initiative. “We have seen how slow things are moving in many areas with tobacco and many obstacles to action can arise,” Myers said. “We just have to commit to making sure it happens.”