The Debate About Nicotine Regulation: Commentary on Zeller.

Abstract

Fifty-five years ago, Addison Yeaman, the General Counsel of Brown and Williamson, famously wrote, “Moreover, nicotine is addictive. We are, then, in the business of selling nicotine, an addictive drug effective in the release of stress mechanisms.” Until now, tobacco-related deaths and nicotine have been inextricably linked. Today, for the first time there is a serious debate about whether it is possible to separate nicotine from the products that kill. US Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Scott Gottlieb deserves enormous credit for his bold proposal to reduce nicotine levels in cigarettes. This proposal has great potential for accelerating declines in smoking and has transformed the debate about alternative nicotine products into a serious discussion about how best to regulate nicotine to protect public health. The debate is intense and has been divisive precisely because so much is at stake; the answers depend on scientific evidence that is difficult to develop and easy to dispute; these answers depend upon a series of variables that dramatically impact the eventual outcome and go well beyond a scientific analysis of any single product; and e-cigarettes are not a single “product,” but rather a highly variable group of products with potentially significant differences among them.