It's Not a Cigarette. It's Not a Vape. and It's Big in Japan(reason.com)
reason.com
It's Not a Cigarette. It's Not a Vape. and It's Big in Japan
https://reason.com/2024/01/09/its-not-a-cigarette-its-not-a-vape-and-its-big-in-japan/
21 comments
That was my thought too, but it also says it requires "specially treated tobacco" not sure what that means, but sounds like it doesn't work with regular tobacco (unlike the cannabis ones)
There are many references to heated tobacco as being safer in this article, but nothing supporting the contention. The filtered cigarette playbook used once again.
From TFA:
>Even among experts who are receptive to harm reduction, evaluating the impact of heated tobacco is more nuanced than gross sales figures suggest. Industry players have invested heavily in research to show that noncombustible products present much lower exposure to toxic substances than conventional cigarettes. This is a plausible claim backed up by reams of documentation, sufficient to convince even the FDA to authorize IQOS for sale in the United States and allow it to be marketed with claims of reduced exposure to harmful toxicants compared to cigarettes. (For a thorough comparison of emissions from heated tobacco products, e-cigarettes, and conventional cigarettes, see this recent review.)
>Even among experts who are receptive to harm reduction, evaluating the impact of heated tobacco is more nuanced than gross sales figures suggest. Industry players have invested heavily in research to show that noncombustible products present much lower exposure to toxic substances than conventional cigarettes. This is a plausible claim backed up by reams of documentation, sufficient to convince even the FDA to authorize IQOS for sale in the United States and allow it to be marketed with claims of reduced exposure to harmful toxicants compared to cigarettes. (For a thorough comparison of emissions from heated tobacco products, e-cigarettes, and conventional cigarettes, see this recent review.)
The development of this product is strongly tied to Juul and their investment from Japan Tobacco (prior to Philip Morris).
The history is covered in the excellent book[0] and documentary film[1] Big Vape, which I highly recommend. Also fascinating the USCF tobacco library[2], the compendium of internal documents, advertising, etc turned over during the Big Tobacco lawsuits.
[0] https://www.jamieducharme.com/big-vape-book
[1] https://www.netflix.com/title/81444184
[2] https://www.industrydocuments.ucsf.edu/tobacco/
The history is covered in the excellent book[0] and documentary film[1] Big Vape, which I highly recommend. Also fascinating the USCF tobacco library[2], the compendium of internal documents, advertising, etc turned over during the Big Tobacco lawsuits.
[0] https://www.jamieducharme.com/big-vape-book
[1] https://www.netflix.com/title/81444184
[2] https://www.industrydocuments.ucsf.edu/tobacco/
These been around for nearly a decade in eastern europe. Super popular to the point smoking cigarettes is seen as low class. I liked the convenience and flavour of it but at the end of the day it makes you sick and addicted.
Heated Tobacco Products.
"The first time I saw an IQOS, the innovative tobacco product on which Philip Morris International is betting billions of dollars to replace cigarettes, was at a wedding in 2016. A friend had excitedly pulled me outside to try this new device that had enabled him to finally kick his smoking habit. Not quite a cigarette because it didn't ignite, not quite a vape because it used actual tobacco, supposedly less toxic than conventional cigarettes but satisfying enough to compete with them, it seemed that this heated tobacco might be the future of nicotine."
"The first time I saw an IQOS, the innovative tobacco product on which Philip Morris International is betting billions of dollars to replace cigarettes, was at a wedding in 2016. A friend had excitedly pulled me outside to try this new device that had enabled him to finally kick his smoking habit. Not quite a cigarette because it didn't ignite, not quite a vape because it used actual tobacco, supposedly less toxic than conventional cigarettes but satisfying enough to compete with them, it seemed that this heated tobacco might be the future of nicotine."
I may be wrong but this device sounds like a dry herb vaporizer, which cannabis users have been using in the US for a bit now. I don't use one, but coworkers tell me that it really does eliminate a lot of the odor.
Example of one: https://dutchie.com/stores/lake-of-the-woods/product/atmos-j...
Example of one: https://dutchie.com/stores/lake-of-the-woods/product/atmos-j...
These IQOS devices are very popular here in Greece and are being used more compared to vape or cigarette. I think they’re better than other tobacco products, but even better is not smoking at all ;-) (ex smoker here)
[deleted]
Is there any evidence of human advancement without nicotine?
What if civilization depends on nicotine and without it, we devolve back to the stone age?
What if civilization depends on nicotine and without it, we devolve back to the stone age?
The ~90%[0] of people who don't smoke is probably good evidence....
[0]https://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/campaign/tips/resources/data/cig....
[0]https://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/campaign/tips/resources/data/cig....
Oh hey, that explains what the hell those "heat-not-burn tobacco" things all the Japanese customs documents mention.
That being said, I need to complain about Reason a bit here. Right-libertarians have an understandable aversion to anything that smells like a prohibition policy, and I can agree with most of that. However, we need to be particularly careful with the tobacco industry, which has historically proven itself to be particularly slippery. A decade and change ago, back when I read Reason, CATO, LvMI, and so on religiously[2], I remember reading almost the same article, but it was about vapes.
Vapes were supposed to be the harm reduction silver bullet. The theory went that the harmful product in cigarettes was the smoke[0], so if you took out the smoke, you had something that wouldn't kill smokers. In reality, vapes had their own toxic by-products that can kill your lungs in all sorts of new and different ways. This article does nothing to assuage my fears that we're going to see a bunch of people with new lung diseases in a decade's time thanks to a new tobacco product.
Furthermore, harm reduction should never be implemented in a vacuum, for the same reason why more efficient steam engines greatly increased Victorian England's appetite for coal[1]. If you just put less-harmful cigarettes on the market, more people will smoke them, leading to more lung disease in total. The tobacco industry, being particularly slippery bastards, pumped shittons of money into vapes specifically because the lower harm meant more scale and thus growth. They even found ways to advertise these things to kids with hilariously ineffective and terrible PSAs about the dangers of teen vaping.
You cannot make an entirely safe, or even 'acceptably safe' tobacco product. Addiction is a harm in and of itself, but it has multiplicative effects with other harms. The chemicals that you suck up vaping wouldn't be nearly as harmful but for the fact that people addicted to nicotine are going to vape way more often[3]. So I tend to be very skeptical of harm reduction plans that boil down to "just sell less harmful tobacco with no plans to dissuade new smokers from smoking". Heated tobacco isn't harm reduction, it's Big Tobacco business continuity.
[0] I distinctly remember seeing a Senator talking about smoking lettuce leaves at one point. It wound up somewhere in an Auto-Tune The News video.
[1] This is known as the Jevons Paradox. Genuinely surprised that Reason of all things isn't invoking it.
[2] Yes, I too used to be a right-libertarian shithead! News at 11.
[3] In fact, I would not be surprised if nicotine vaping produces more lung disease than, say, THC vaping, purely because nicotine is way more addictive than weed.
That being said, I need to complain about Reason a bit here. Right-libertarians have an understandable aversion to anything that smells like a prohibition policy, and I can agree with most of that. However, we need to be particularly careful with the tobacco industry, which has historically proven itself to be particularly slippery. A decade and change ago, back when I read Reason, CATO, LvMI, and so on religiously[2], I remember reading almost the same article, but it was about vapes.
Vapes were supposed to be the harm reduction silver bullet. The theory went that the harmful product in cigarettes was the smoke[0], so if you took out the smoke, you had something that wouldn't kill smokers. In reality, vapes had their own toxic by-products that can kill your lungs in all sorts of new and different ways. This article does nothing to assuage my fears that we're going to see a bunch of people with new lung diseases in a decade's time thanks to a new tobacco product.
Furthermore, harm reduction should never be implemented in a vacuum, for the same reason why more efficient steam engines greatly increased Victorian England's appetite for coal[1]. If you just put less-harmful cigarettes on the market, more people will smoke them, leading to more lung disease in total. The tobacco industry, being particularly slippery bastards, pumped shittons of money into vapes specifically because the lower harm meant more scale and thus growth. They even found ways to advertise these things to kids with hilariously ineffective and terrible PSAs about the dangers of teen vaping.
You cannot make an entirely safe, or even 'acceptably safe' tobacco product. Addiction is a harm in and of itself, but it has multiplicative effects with other harms. The chemicals that you suck up vaping wouldn't be nearly as harmful but for the fact that people addicted to nicotine are going to vape way more often[3]. So I tend to be very skeptical of harm reduction plans that boil down to "just sell less harmful tobacco with no plans to dissuade new smokers from smoking". Heated tobacco isn't harm reduction, it's Big Tobacco business continuity.
[0] I distinctly remember seeing a Senator talking about smoking lettuce leaves at one point. It wound up somewhere in an Auto-Tune The News video.
[1] This is known as the Jevons Paradox. Genuinely surprised that Reason of all things isn't invoking it.
[2] Yes, I too used to be a right-libertarian shithead! News at 11.
[3] In fact, I would not be surprised if nicotine vaping produces more lung disease than, say, THC vaping, purely because nicotine is way more addictive than weed.
yeah i've got to the point of being more afraid of touching vapes than actual combustible tobacco because its so easy to just start smoking them all the time, whereas with tobacco if my willpower fails I can very much content myself with sporadic social smoking, because nobody wakes up wanting to chainsmoke cigarettes unless you've built up years of tolerance already. I also do think the reason smoking or vaping THC is less harmful is laregely just because very few people smoke weed like they smoke cigarettes. The frequency is way more of an issue imo.
At any point in the day this company could choose to not do this, and fund scientific healthcare research instead.
Sure, but you could do the same thing, quit your job and become a humanitarian worker
This is a false equivalency. Their reach is manifestly larger and already oriented opposite to human values.
We'd also be better off if they just smoked the money but that might pose a health risk.
We'd also be better off if they just smoked the money but that might pose a health risk.
This is a product that helps people imo. Vapes were marketed to get adult smokers off cigarettes but what they do is get kids to vape because they're nice and don't taste of cigarettes. These things would actually help adult smokers and not 16 year olds. Also, as someone who has struggled with smoking, I find the tastiness of vape just makes you want to smoke more! Anyone who uses this will be smoking far less than vapers do. Huge win.
Personally, though I don’t smoke I am not particularly bothered by the smell. I’d rather smell cigarettes than other, more acceptable scents such as from incense or even certain types of ladies’ perfumes.