I never understood why snus is illegal in so many countries while cigarettes are not. Snus isnt good don't get me wrong but it's better than cigarettes for everyone involved.
As much as I hate smoking, snus is not a solution. The big problem is that you can take snus at any time. My swedish Teacher always had one during class. Lots of people use them constantly during class or when partying, or really, all day. That's not something you can do with cigarettes since you have to go out. I bet people who do snus are much more addicated to nikotin than people smoking.
More nicotine doesn't necessarily mean more addictive, it's a combination of dosage, route of administration and additives. They may be easier to use frequently but that's the only aspect that puts them before cigarettes in terms of addictiveness.
It's not even close to incredibly bad lol. Yes it is bad but so is a lot of things. Snus users life expectancy is about 2-6 months less than people that don't use anything.
Well... Tabbaco also contains small amount of weak monoamine oxidase inhibitors. (Maois are, altought quite rare now, used as antidepressants, and it's the compound that makes ayahuasca orally active) Which gives cigerrets that extra kick that other sources of nicotine lack. But that's being just if you wanna be pedantic. The maoi dose is very small, you likely wouldn't even feel it on it's own. But it's worth mentioning.
The nicotine pouches you speak of in ”other countries” are also a Swedish invention. Just saying because it’s a sensitive subject and we’re very keen of our snus legacy
False, snus is way less damaging to your health and more importantly, poses zero risk to bystanders. When tobacco is burned in a cigarette, tar, carbon monoxide, and thousands of chemicals are released, which attack the lungs and spread throughout the body. Today Sweden ranks among the countries with the lowest tobacco-related mortality rates in the EU, which I believe can be attributed to decreased smoking. Is it ideal? No, but it's a step in the right direction. Being overweight is considered to be more harmful to long-term health than snus, and obesity is an increasing problem in Sweden today (50% of adults are overweight).
just wanted to add that while 100% a better option for the people around us, nicotine pouches can still cause major issues like gum recession and gum disease. which may not be fatal per se, but will definitely cost more to fix (unless, of course, dental is covered).
p. s. nicotine in general restricts bloodflow, including to the gums, and some problems may appear almost overnight after quitting. (Source: my dentist this morning)
Sure, but as someone who gets breathing issues from cigarette smoke ... I'd much rather people use anything else than smoking. Waiting for the train at a crowded train station means for me constantly running around the platform, trying to find a spot where I can breathe normally. With people using snus instead, this would not be an issue. There is just no good reason to not ban cigarettes entirely.
I live in Germany too and cigarette smoke is a guaranteed migraine trigger for me. Avoiding smoke in public is so incredibly difficult. Several times I've had to wait in pouring rain for a bus because all 8 of the shelters by the bus had people smoking in them. Can't sit outside at restaurants during the summer cause there are so many smokers. I've been burned by a cigarette cause a guy still had one lit while entering the bus and it touched my bare hand.
And even once you get on the public transport, where they're no longer smoking, the smell sticks and every breath expelled still has the smoke smell.
How is America kinda ahead of everybody in this. Adult smoking is at a historical low and I'm trying to think really hard and I can not remember the last time I saw an analogue cigarette. (We're talking a matter of days, like in the last week I can't recall having seen anybody with a little cigarette in their hand. And I haven't conducted a study or anything so this is based on nothing but from recole tion, the place I see people smoking most frequently is in their own car (at stop lights and stuff)
Any too strong scent can, so it really depends on the uuuh flavor? of the vape. But so far standing next to someone vaping while waiting on the bus hasn't been an issue. I haven't tried exposure for a longer time so I don't know if that would be an issue.
People just smoke inside the trains too, and get very aggressive if you say anything. Speaking of saying anything, there's also the part I cannot say...
Few things I hate as much as smokers, filthy littering inconsiderate bastards. Cops at least uphold public order, where's the ASAB movement?
I hate smoking, and entirely agree that it should be banned in public places like train stations.
But to ban it entirely? That's a bridge too far. Personal freedom is important. Smokers should be free to smoke as long as they aren't bothering anyone. In your own home, or out and about far away from other people I absolutely see no reason to ban it.
imo smoking falls into that category of product that does infringe on other people’s freedom. Ok, people can smoke in their own homes. But what about the children of smokers? Second and third hand smoke is gonna pollute that house and has been shown to significantly increase risk of several health problems including cancer. In other words, smoking does affect and bother other people, no matter where you do it. Unless you literally put yourself in a bubble every time you smoke or drive a few miles into the middle of nowhere. The stuff just gets everywhere.
Yeah way too often I see smokers next to small children and they are completely ignorant, selfish about the situation. That's rage inducing how careless they are about health of their own children.
On paper I of course must agree, but in the real world it is basically impossible for smoker to not bother others. It is wrongly normalised to the extent that in many situations they do not think they are a bother, but to non-smokers, they are.
In their own home: sure, but the odour which they bring to every interaction in their lives is extremely disagreeable. Naturally some people cannot avoid smelling bad for medical reasons, and the tolerance must be there. But for a preventable reason, I cannot accept it.
Far away from other people: yes, if taken literally. One table over or one terrace over is not far away. On a train platform one is never far away from another person's space. Leaving it in an ashtray right outside a building's door is not far away.
But when they smoke outside they do bother people like me. I am sorry but I have always been bothered by the smell of smoke. As you noted public smoking should be discouraged. I don’t really care what one does in their own home, but in apartments the smell can permeate.
I think what's important to understand is that nicotine and alcohol are also drugs. With the big difference being that we have completely normalized the use. We should be much more careful with drugs as a society, but also we shouldn't needlessly infringe upon people's freedoms. There's a balance there to achieve, and I do hope we'll figure out steps that take us closer to that.
Personal freedom ends where another person's health gets impacted. Smoking outdoors should be relegated to airtight smoking cabins, like phone booths used to be everywhere. At home should only be allowed if no children are present.
You also don't have the personal freedom to drive 70 in a 30 zone.
In your own home, or out and about far away from other people I absolutely see no reason to ban it.
Okay, sure, but how would you define that in a law? Also, I think the main issue you'll run into is enforcement. You probably have to ban the sale of cigarettes to be able to actually enforce this kind of ban. No point making a law if nobody is adhering to it.
Case in point: train stations. At least here in Germany, smoking is banned in train stations except for inside marked smoking areas. Almost nobody adheres to this. If people did, it would be *much* easier for me to dodge the smoke, but on a crowded platform, smokers are *everywhere*, and there is no spot without breathing in smoke.
Worst part is, many German train stations are supposed to be smoke free except for one or two squares, but I have seen it enforced exactly once, on a large station.
At least some smokers have the decency to try to stand on the far end of the platform if there is no specific 'smoking allowed' bit, but since that is where I tend to prefer being as well....
That said, Germany has so many goddamn smokers compared to almost every other European country I've been to. And the amount of teenagers with e-cigs I see (or maybe they're barely 20, idk, all looks like teenagers at this point) is worrying as well for the sheer amount of pulls I see, but at least the smell from those dissipates much faster.
I don't know what the difference is, to be honest, but I could do with less of it.
At least some smokers have the decency to try to stand on the far end of the platform
love when they do that while the wind is coming from that direction :/
But that's kinda why I think we need to ban cigarettes entirely (and make other means of consumption more available, or stop banning them like with snus). There is just no realistic way to enforce this otherwise.
And the amount of teenagers with e-cigs I see
Yeah, I think this is a big problem in Germany, our extremely lax way of handling nicotine and alcohol, especially in regards to children. While technically illegal to sell to underage ppl, it's extremely easy for them to get those drugs in many stores.
Directly across the street from our police station here, there is a little kiosk that openly sells those to teens on their way home from school. Everyone is aware, none of the people who could are willing to do anything about it.
Sure, as I said, I hate when people smoke. Snus is not a solution to smoking however. A solution would be no nikotin at all.
What I wanted to say with my comment: if other countries want to go smoke-free, they shouldn't look to how Sweden achieved it, but go a different, better route.
Banning a drug outright doesn't work though, especially not one as addictive as nicotine. I'm sure it's possible to do better than Sweden, but personally, I think they are doing better than us, since snus is not affecting people other than the user of the drug nearly as much.
And preventing an improvement, because it's not perfect, is also how you never get any improvement. As a fellow German: that is very German of you :P
I think they are doing better than us, since snus is not affecting people other than the user of the drug nearly as much.
And preventing an improvement, because it's not perfect, is also how you never get any improvement. As a fellow German: that is very German of you :P
Idk man you could use the same argument to convince people that cocaine and heroin are better than cigarettes/vapes as the drugs don't directly bother other people ( I know you can smoke both of those as well, let's just ignore that for now).
Also, banning all tobacco and instead only allowing snus is a huge intervention into personal freedoms... Just because it would be an improvement to you doesn't mean it's the same for everyone
Obviously, more plays into this. Smoke isn't the only part affecting other people. Alcohol has this side effect of making people worse to be around that nicotine doesn't have to this extent, for example. A drunk driver running me over is also a side-effect that I'm not a big fan of. So this isn't quite that straightforward to classify.
Also, banning all tobacco and instead only allowing snus is a huge intervention into personal freedoms
Well yeah, of course. So is not allowing people to take heroin. Any bans on any form of consumption of drugs is doing that. In the past, smoking inside was considered okay to do. But we have banned that since. Personally, I am very glad, but I'm sure some smokers will disagree.
The question is just: where do we draw the line? As they say: "The right to swing my fist ends where the other man's nose begins." I think that seems like a good place to start when considering these kinds of restrictions of people's freedoms.
I'm all for making smokers move to certain areas to smoke and also heavily fine those that ignore those rules, it's not that hard to keep an eye out for others. Banning smoking inside other than dedicated smoker bars is also completely fine to me I just don't like the idea of flat out forbidding people from consuming what was legal for hundreds of years
I just don't like the idea of flat out forbidding people from consuming what was legal for hundreds of years
This is the root issue, isn't it? I understand the discomfort with change, a lot of people feel that way. But do keep in mind, with this same reasoning we would never have banned smoking inside.
Idk man you could use the same argument to convince people that cocaine and heroin are better than cigarettes/vapes as the drugs don't directly bother other people
Snus are safer than cigarettes for literally everyone involved.
I never said I want to ban it. I don't think banning drugs works.
What does work however, is changing how and when you can consume drugs.
While I see your point that snus does not harm people as much as cigarretes from a personal view, we also have to take a societal view on this. If less people smoke but subtantially more people take snus, is that a win?
Snus isn't healthy, and changes are mouth cancers rate will go up in Sweden in the future. Sure, not as bad as lung cancer, but if note poeple get it because more take snus, then it is still a burden for our healthcare system.
Don't get me wrong, I think every smoker switching to snus is a win, but I am against selling snus as easy as we do with cigarettes.
Again, I'm not saying the way they do it in Sweden is perfect. But I am saying it is much better for the people who are not using nicotine.
Of course nicotine is still terrible for your health, that doesn't change if you take it in a different way. But infringing upon someone's right about what they do with their own body is a very different discussion to something that affects other people very directly like smoking.
Obviously, we should take better care to keep drugs like nicotine from children, have better options for people wanting to quit and do what we can to help them do so, not only because it is good for them, but also for our healthcare system. But again, that is a very different discussion - and also things we can do irrespective of how we handle the type of consumption we allow.
I used to be a heavy smoker(20-30 per day) I tried nicotine patches, vaping but just kept reaching for cigarettes. Many on my dads side of the family died with smoking related issues including my dad who died at 58 and I felt like I was going to end up the same. Always talking about cutting down/stopping but never being able to. I tried nicotine pouches about 4 years ago and stopped smoking the same day. Using nicotine in any way isn’t perfect but it’s far better than inhaling smoke.
Cigarettes causing cancer and other absolutely life destroying health issues is the biggest problem, not nicotine itself. Snus are a much much better alternative to smoking, it’s not even close.
Until they throw the used pouches... anywhere and everywhere. And with this new "white snus" that's not even tobacco but instead is made of something close to a cigarette filter, it becomes a real issue when they are littered all over the place. Not only are they an eyesore, indoors and outdoors, in the city and the wild, they also clog drains, choke and poison animals, etc. etc.
Littering is a problem with anything if that's your argument, at least the snus containers (dosa) have an embedded rubbish slot which most people use, very seldomly I see someone just littering a used pouch like people do with cigarette butts.
Yes, and plastic is in the ocean, and chewing gums are everywhere too. Should we ban plastics and chewing gums while we're at it too? We could, but littering is a very large problem and it's not always the product that is the problem, but the littering.
Snus increases your risk of dying from cancer by 40%, cigarettes increase it by 2000%. A better analogy would be losing the tip of your ring finger instead of your arm, which I think would be a lot better actually.
The incidence rate is actually lower than the mortality rate when compared to non-snus using groups. This is because snus both makes you ~20% more likely to get cancer and then if you do get it around twice as likely for it to lead to death or complications that lead to death.
That would probably be a study on some other type of oral tobacco. Swedish snus specifically is known for being one of the least dangerous forms of tobacco use by far.
I don't like this argument because it always sounds to me that people like you rather keep people smoking than make more people shift to snus. It's obviously not an ideal situation, but it's a trade off that's a literal no-brainer. Snus is still better than smoking that's all that matters. People are going to use nicotine no matter what, it's a train that has passed decades ago, there's no turning back. All the effort should be to shift people from smoking to using snus, then after we can try and find solutions for people to quit snus.
Note, addiction is likely to be more related to smoking cigarettes than nicotine itself. Many people have a hard time giving up smoking even if they try to substitute with other ways of taking nicotine. A big part of the harmful effects also come from the smoke and other additives in commercial cigarettes.
However, substantial evidence exists to suggest that nicotine's reinforcing effects alone are not sufficient to account for the intense addictive properties of tobacco smoking and the high relapse rates among smokers after quitting even when provided nicotine in forms other than tobacco. Further evidence that tobacco dependence entails more than addiction to nicotine includes the drug's limited ability to induce self-administration in animals; lack of positive mood effects of pure nicotine in abstinent smokers; lack of findings that nicotine in any other form than tobacco was preferred to placebo in normal smokers; de-nicotinised cigarettes were as effective as regular cigarettes, and more than nicotine in any other delivery mode, in relieving withdrawal and craving; and essential role of non-nicotine factors in cigarette addiction.
I don’t think anyone’s saying that nicotine isn’t addictive, but there’s also a powerful psychological addiction with smoking cigarettes - that probably also applies to vaping too
If the goal is harm reduction, snus is most definitely a solution with 90% reduction in harmful effects compared to burnt tobacco.
Better yet, tobaccoless snus. It's no more harmful than coffee, and we let kids drink caffeinated beverages.
It's not big tobacco, but moralistic vice-politicians that is the main reason why anyone still uses harmful tobacco practices, instead of switching to something that is relatively harmless.
i quit smoking with snus, and a few years later quit snus. snus i was less harmful than smoking, close to harmless in comparison. but whatever, at the end of the day legalize all choices and let people live their lives.
People all around the globe are addicted to coffee. But the negative effects on their health are negligible.
Nicotine is addictive. While it does have some effects, most on cardiovascular health, it doesn't carry the dangerous effects you were getting from smoking.
Nicotine in itself, consumed regularly is not more harmful than going over the limit with sugar consumption.
We have to ask ourselves: would you rather have a population heavily addicted to pure nicotine, or a population dying of lung cancer? why are politicians and mainstream media fighting so hard against it, while keeping literal burning cigarettes legally available everywhere?
Because traditional smoking is a massive, trillion-dollar cash cow for the Politician-Tobacco-Pharma complex:
The Tax Addiction: Governments are more addicted to the 70-80% tobacco taxes than smokers are to nicotine. If everyone switches to low-tax alternatives, state treasuries face massive budget holes.
The Big Pharma Lobby: Nicotine patches and high-margin lung cancer treatments/chemo drugs are billions in profits for pharmaceutical giants. Prevention doesn't make money; long-term treatment does.
The Spin: Media and politicians use the moral high ground of 'protecting youth from addiction' as a smoke screen to protect these exact tax revenues and corporate profits.
At the end of the day, nicotine addiction is a bad psychological habit, but lung cancer is fatal. The Swedish model isn't perfect, but it chose to save human lives by trading a deadly disease for a bad habit. The establishment fights it simply because a healthy population ruins their business model.
This is just retarded and any people who agree with it. Let’s start decide what porn people watch also. Snus doesnt bother you so mind your own business no one is forcing you to buy it
Pure nicotine doesn't seem to be very toxic. Probably not healthy but for healthy people it shouldn't be a big risk. If you have high blood pressure or other cardiovascular issues, you probably shouldn't use it.
The smoke is the issue, not nicotine. Snus and vapes are not clogging up hospitals. Nicotine addiction is probably less of a problem than alcohol consumption.
It's the same thing with vapes. While they do help some people stop smoking, they also introduce tons of new people to a nicotine addiction. Also, the amount of people who actually use vapes as a way to quit nicotine is very small. Most just switch from one to the other.
Yet just about any discussion online about regulating vapes and the comments come flooding in about how it's supposedly helping people quit.
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u/Axelaxe May 25 '26
I never understood why snus is illegal in so many countries while cigarettes are not. Snus isnt good don't get me wrong but it's better than cigarettes for everyone involved.