A campaign being run by youth in Wisconsin who are part of a group called FACT is urging their fellow youth to complain to legislators about having to see people using nicotine pouches in workplaces. Youth are instructed to tell their legislators: "What tobacco products do you still see used in places covered by the smoke-free air law (workplaces like restaurants, hotels, and offices)? Vapes? Nicotine pouches? What bothers you about seeing these products in those places?"
I spent many years of my career lobbying for smoke-free workplace laws. But when I said "smoke-free" I meant "smoke-free." In other words, I was promoting the elimination of tobacco smoke in workplaces. My efforts were based on voluminous scientific evidence of the long-terms harms of tobacco smoke exposure for employees, especially those working in smoky bars and restaurants.
I have to honestly say that I'm not crazy about banning vaping in public places because I'm not aware of solid evidence that it causes significant health effects but I can at least understand the rationale. People are being slightly exposed to chemicals in aerosol that they did not create. However, I fail to see the rationale behind banning the use of nicotine pouches in public places. The use of a nicotine pouch has absolutely no health effects for bystanders. It doesn't create any kind of smoke, vapor, aerosol, or any other exposure for people who are not actually using the product. So why would youth want to ban the use of this product? It just doesn't make any sense.
Something else bothers me about the appeal being made by this FACT organization. The appeal does not give youth the option of not being bothered by the use of nicotine pouches in public places. It asks "what bothers you" about seeing nicotine pouches in these places, essentially implying to youth that there is no option other than to be bothered by the use of nicotine pouches.
This sends a bad message to youth. It sends the message that we should be banning individual behavior that has no harmful effect on anyone else. And that we should ban a behavior that actually may be life-saving for people, since many - if not most - adults who use nicotine pouches are doing so in an effort to quit smoking.
This is tantamount to telling kids that they should be bothered by seeing methadone clinics, naloxone distribution programs, or needle exchange programs. It asks youth to oppose life-saving harm reduction policies in the name of regulating people's lifestyle choices that affect nobody else except themselves.
It struck me that there has to be something else behind this organization because youth on their own would not promote such an idea that is totally contrary to public health and also contrary to the way most youth think.
The Rest of the Story
Well, the truth is that these youth are not acting independently. The organization is actually an initiative of the American Lung Association and is funded by the state health department!
According to the web site: "FACT is ably managed by the American Lung Association, funded by Wisconsin’s Commercial Tobacco Prevention & Treatment Program, and organized with the help of local health alliances."
The American Lung Association is basically using youth to do their bidding. They are taking advantage of youth in order to try to push their own agenda of banning nicotine pouches.
This is not the first time I have exposed tobacco control organizations using kids as a pawn in their efforts to support their own agenda in a way that is far from transparent. While anti-nicotine groups have the right to try to ban life-saving harm reduction products, they should not be manipulating youth into promoting these misguided policies for them. This is why I find what the American Lung Association is doing in Wisconsin so disturbing.
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