New Tobacco Tested in Alberta

Source from:  2007-09-13 By CP/SUN MEDIA EDMONTON 09/14/2007

But opponents want to snuff out smokeless product said to be less carcinogenic. Imperial Tobacco Canada announced yesterday it will test market a new type of smokeless tobacco in Canada called snus -- and while the company is touting it as a safer alternative to cigarettes, it's been banned as a health risk in most of Europe. Benjamin Kemball, president of Imperial, said the powdered tobacco product will be sold at 230 retail outlets in Edmonton in the coming months to determine whether it might catch on. Users wad the moist powder between their lips and gum, where it dissolves. Kemball points to recent studies from Sweden, the U.K., New Zealand and Australia which suggest snus is less harmful than cigarettes. "According to these independent reports, there is no increase to the risk of lung (or oral) cancer among snus users, compared to people who have never used any tobacco products at all," he said. "We should be looking at products such as this because if people are able to move away from cigarettes and to this sort of product, there will be a substantial reduction in risk to those people." The process to produce snus -- Swedish for "snuff" -- pasteurizes the tobacco, removing cancer-causing agents associated with oral and lung cancers. Traditional North American smokeless tobacco -- snuff or dip -- has much more of the agents than snus. Snus is associated with a doubling of the rate of pancreatic cancer, but Sweden has the lowest lung and oral cancer rates in the developed world. Rob Cunningham, of the Canadian Cancer Society, said he doubts tobacco companies are trying to turn people away from smoking. "Their commercial interest is in expanding the market, or slowing the decline of the market," he said. Les Hagen of the lobby group Action on Smoking and Health noted Alberta accounts for 40% of the smokeless tobacco market in Canada. Hagen dismissed the company's efforts to portray snus as less harmful than cigarettes as "a hollow public relations gesture." He said snus will be sold under the DuMaurier brand, which will promoting sales of DuMaurier cigarettes. Enditem