Jeffrey A. Singer
Jeffrey A. Singer
Axios reports that the Biden Administration is planning an 11th-hour move to order cigarette manufacturers to reduce the nicotine content in the tobacco cigarettes they market to consumers—possibly by as much as 95 percent. The FDA proposed the rule in 2022, and the Office of Management and Budget cleared the rule proposal on January 3, 2025.
The Food and Drug Administration has not yet issued the rule but may do so within the next two weeks.
Nicotine is the addictive component of tobacco cigarettes, but by itself is relatively harmless. The harm comes from carbon monoxide, a poisonous gas, and tobacco tar that contains carcinogens and other chemicals that harm the lungs and circulatory system. Britain’s Royal Society for Public Health claims nicotine is “no more harmful to health than caffeine.” As I have written here, what differentiates nicotine from caffeine is that it has calming as well as stimulative effects.
Tobacco cigarettes are a type of nicotine delivery system. While some smokers may enjoy the flavor of tobacco and the act of smoking, many primarily smoke for the effects of nicotine.
The rationale behind ordering cigarette makers to reduce the nicotine content of tobacco cigarettes is that it might nudge smokers to abandon smoking. In 2018, FDA researchers reported in the New England Journal of Medicine that they used a simulation model that suggested reducing the nicotine content of tobacco cigarettes by 95 percent could lower the percentage of adult smokers to 1.4 percent by 2100.
Yet one randomized controlled study of the efficacy of reducing nicotine content to such levels found:
In smokers not interested in quitting, reducing the nicotine content in cigarettes over 12 months does not appear to result in extinction of nicotine dependence, assessed by persistently reduced nicotine intake or quitting smoking over the subsequent 12 months. » Read More
https://www.cato.org/blog/black-market-beckons-bidens-last-minute-move-nicotine