When entering or leaving any airport in Sweden, stores have a prominent stand next to shelves filled with colognes, tobacco packets or sweets: ‘snus’a product unknown to most Europeans but contributed to the Scandinavian country becoming the most important country in the world. first country in the world while thinking”Smoking free”Label which regions WHO grants less than 5% of the population smokes combustion cigarettes.
The European Union (EU) has urged its members to become “smoke-free” countries by 2040, but Sweden could reach that target 17 years earlier as it currently consumes almost no conventional cigarettes. 5.6% of the population.
The reason for these low rates is that most smokers have either quit or switched to cigarettes. snusIt is a product that has been sold in Scandinavian countries for years and has gained followers over it. mouth to mouth and health officials’ campaigns against traditional tobacco, as explained by Patrick Hildingsson He’s vice president of communications for Swedish Match, one of the manufacturers of this product.
Snus is a stimulant that normally includes: tobacco and nicotine and it is consumed by orally they are small bags The gum is placed near, under the lip and they are left there for a while so that the porous nicotine is carried to the rest of the body through the bloodstream. Tobacco does not burn no burning or smokeThis is it less harmful for your own health and the health of others.
In fact, an advisor to three WHO director-generals, Dr. A study led by three Swedish experts, including Delon Human, Cancer incidence in Sweden 41% lower than the European average, which is “equivalent to 38% fewer deaths”. “In 24 of the 27 members of the EU smoking death rate twice or more than in Sweden, one of the three countries with the lowest death toll lung cancer” highlights research that calculates what other countries ‘could do’ if they adopted Swedish smoking ‘harm reduction’ policies. save 3.5 million lives in the EU”.
health damage
Sweden’s strategy is strict legislation betting on and against traditional tobacco other forms of nicotine use And smokeless tobacco, less harmful to health and therefore less taxed. However they are not harmless. Some research links consumption of ‘snus’ with damage to the oral cavity, higher incidence diabetes type 2 and some tumors, also very addictive. One of the authors of that report, Dr. “None of the tobacco-related products are harmless, but you die with cigarettes, not with alternatives,” says Anders Milton.
In every situation, commercialization ‘snus’ banned In the rest of the EU, bags of heated tobacco or electronic cigarettes without tobacco but with nicotine, a fact adopted by Swedes, are contributing to the drop in the proportion of traditional smokers, according to the report. 12% of the Swedish population have tried e-cigarettes, with consumption of ‘snus’ causing the percentage of smokers to drop in half from 11% smokers in 2012. 5.6% in 2022. A figure 17 points below the EU consumption average According to the authors (28% in 2012 and 23% in 2020).
situation in Spain
Like Sweden, other countries such as Portugal, the United Kingdom or Japan are also promoting alternatives to traditional tobacco as a way to reduce the consumption of harmful conventional cigarettes. However, this is a strategy vilifiers, According to a large part of the medical community, since they are not harmless products for health and there has not been enough time since the advent of paper or other products to know about their long-term harm. There is also a danger that non-smokers will become particularly dependent on these products. youth.
therefore, in Spain, Ministry of Health Introduced in 2019 Offer combines all forms of nicotine consumption under the heading ‘tobacco binds you and kills you’. However, the Government has yet to approve a tightening of the tobacco law, which aims, among other things, to impose the same restrictions on the consumption of all forms of nicotine. A legislative reform promised by three consecutive Ministers of Health, but yet to be implemented by any Executive.