State pushes nicotine therapy Health commissioner wants products available at stores where cigarettes are sold
By CATHLEEN F. CROWLEY, Staff writer First published: Saturday, August 23, 2008
ALBANY -- What would happen if nicotine replacement lozenges were as easy to buy as Tic Tac mints?
State Health Commissioner Richard Daines believes more smokers would purchase them instead of cigarettes.
Daines petitioned the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in January to relax the regulations on nicotine replacement therapy. Right now, so-called "safe nicotine" products are kept behind drugstore counters and sold only in large quantities.
The FDA responded to Daines' request earlier this month and said the agency needs more time to study the issue.
"We were disappointed, but we were not surprised by the FDA reaction," said Ursula Bauer, director of chronic disease prevention and adult health at the state Department of Health. "As they said in their letter, it is a complicated issue."
Bauer predicted the FDA wouldn't rule on the nicotine issue until after the presidential elections, when a new administration is in place.
The Department of Health wants nicotine replacements to be sold everywhere cigarettes are sold and to be packaged in small units, instead of making smokers buy a week's supply for $30 to $50.
"So a smoker can go into a convenience store and they see their pack of Marlboros behind the counter, but on the counter is a 10-pack of nicotine gum that is selling for $4.99," Bauer said. "And they can decide, 'Do I want to spend $6 on my Marlboros or $4.99 on a pack of gum?' "
Convenience stores, which derive 10 percent to 25 percent of their revenue from tobacco sales, are prohibited from selling nicotine replacement therapy, said Jim Calvin, president of the New York Association of Convenience Stores. Calvin supports changing FDA regulations to allow stores to sell the drug.
The Health Department effort to change the FDA rules is part of a larger campaign to get New York's 2.7 million smokers to quit. The state has already raised the cigarette tax and is looking at increasing the licensing fee for businesses that sell cigarettes, Bauer said. There is one tobacco retailer for every 100 smokers in New York, she noted, and the annual licensing fee they pay is just $100.
In 2009, the agency will launch an education campaign to teach smokers about nicotine.
"Nicotine is the thing in cigarettes that makes you feel good," Bauer said. "It's also the addictive component of the cigarette. We know that 70 percent of smokers say they want to quit, but they can't because they are addicted to nicotine."
But how safe is "safe" nicotine?
"It's certainly far safer to use the safe-nicotine products than the combustible nicotine," she said. "There are people in the tobacco-control community that say we should think about nicotine the same way we think about caffeine."
Bauer said it's the side effects of combustion -- the burning of the cigarette -- that create carcinogens and toxins. The mantra in public health is people "smoke for the nicotine, but die from the smoke." Cathleen F. Crowley can be reached at 454-5348 or by e-mail at ccrowley@timesunion.com.
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