It’s time to launch an all-out assault on tobacco products in both Alberta and Canada, especially given it’s National Non-Smoking Week. While recent legislation at provincial and federal levels of government have made smoking both more expensive and inconvenient, there is one product that is still being effectively marketed to youth that Parliament and the legislature have failed to sufficiently address — smokeless tobacco.
The number of laws passed to rein in tobacco use by teens over the last 10 years has been vigorous — legislation has slapped gruesome photos and facts on every pack of cigarettes, cartoon characters on packages have been outlawed, bylaws have banned smoking in almost every indoor facility in the province and the cost of tobacco products has continued to climb, forcing smokers and users to shell out increasingly more money to feed their habit. For every manoeuvre by the tobacco industry to circumvent new rules, such as creating new brands of cheaper cigarettes and even adding attractive “flavours” to tobacco, governments have responded quickly with bans and new taxes.
But one issue unaddressed in the totality of all legislation designed to curb tobacco use, especially amongst teens, is that of smokeless or chewing tobacco. The stereotypical picture of baseball players and ranchers packing their gums with shreds of snuff might have faded somewhat in the public image, but the tobacco industry is using this product to target young people. Roughly one-quarter of all tobacco users are 15 to 19 years of age. The company’s success in recruiting young people? Adding flavour to a disgusting product.
Smokeless tobacco is no longer limited to menthol and regular. The range of flavours used to mask the unpleasant taste of a wad of chewing tobacco now includes chocolate, peach, mint and licorice. While Parliament has cut a wide swath in banning any form of tobacco manufactured in a way that would make tobacco products more appealing to young people, there is no ban on flavouring smokeless tobacco. The target of the industry is easy to discern — would a rancher really pack his gums with cotton candy-flavoured chew?
Dovetailed with this Parliamentary oversight is the mistaken belief, fuelled by recent studies, that deems smokeless tobacco as safe, compared to pipes, cigars or cigarettes. One University of Alberta researcher — who received a $1.5-million grant from the company that makes Skoal and Copenhagen smokeless tobacco, claimed in 2008 that using chew is almost as safe as giving up smoking altogether. While its use might be “99 per cent safer,” smokeless tobacco contains 28 carcinogens and is associated with increased risks of cancer of the mouth and pancreas, as well as soft-tissue sores along the gum line and tooth decay. Individuals who use smokeless tobacco, conversely, are more likely to become cigarette smokers.
Why government has failed to act on this measure, especially given the litany of measures taken to curb tobacco use, is inexcusable. The use of appealing flavours is much more of a blatant marketing move than a picture of a camel or a moose smoking a cigarette. It is time, once Parliament resumes, to finally correct this oversight — accidental or otherwise — and hold smokeless tobacco products to the same punishing standards as all other tobacco products.
