Anecdotal reports have shown that individual smokers have quit smoking by switching to ST [13]. However, this study provides evidence from a nationally representative survey that switching to ST is a viable, although infrequently attempted, quit smoking method for men in the U.S. Of the 261,000 men who switched to ST and became former smokers, about 120,000 (46%) were current ST users at the time of the survey, indicating that the switch may be permanent for some. On the other hand, 54% of switchers did not use any tobacco product at the time of the survey, suggesting that switching to ST is not incompatible with a goal of achieving complete nicotine and tobacco abstinence.
This study shows that switching to ST resulted in over twice the proportion of former smokers (73%) than the nicotine patch (35%), gum (34%), inhaler (28%) or nasal spray (0%). It is important to note that these percentages do not mean that switching to ST is successful 73% of the time or that using pharmaceutical products have a 30% success rate. This type of study cannot answer the question "How often does a particular method work when tried by a particular individual?" The percentages reported for various methods in our study may be substantially different from corresponding answers to this question. The main reason for the distinction is that the NHIS only collected information about the most recent method used. It has no information on the methods used in previous failed quit attempts, or how many times each method was tried.
Regardless of how one interprets the proportions of former and current smokers, it is particularly striking that an estimated 359,000 smokers tried to stop smoking by switching to ST – and over a quarter of a million became former smokers – especially since Americans are largely misinformed about the health risks of ST use [1, 18]. For example, in 2005 a survey of 2,028 adult U.S. smokers found that only 11% correctly believed that ST products are less hazardous than cigarettes [19]. In another survey, 82% of U.S. smokers incorrectly believed that chewing tobacco is just as likely to cause cancer as smoking cigarettes [20]. These findings are in direct contrast to the general agreement among tobacco research and policy experts that ST use is far less hazardous than smoking. Although estimates are not precise, ST use likely confers only 0.1% to 10% of the risks of smoking [21–23].
It is safe to assume that rates of switching would increase substantially if smokers knew that switching to ST achieves almost all of the health benefits as quitting tobacco and nicotine altogether [1]. In 2000 the most likely beneficiaries of this knowledge would have been the 1.1 million American men who were dual users of both cigarettes and ST products. These men were already comfortable consuming nicotine from both combusted and smoke-free tobacco. With the knowledge that ST products were 100 times less hazardous than cigarettes, it is conceivable that most would have chosen exclusive use of ST, resulting in a decline of 1.2 percentage points in national adult male smoking prevalence.
Comparison of ST and pharmaceutical nicotine in a regulatory, legal and social context further suggests that the potential of ST as a cessation aid has been under-realized. Nicotine gum and the nicotine patch have been available since 1984 and 1992 respectively [24], and both achieved non-prescription status in 1996, when the manufacturer conducted a large promotional campaign in conjunction with the American Cancer Society Great American Smokeout [25]. In 1999 an estimated $200 million was spent on print and broadcast advertising for smoking cessation products [26].
In contrast to the heavy promotion and advertising of pharmaceutical nicotine products for smoking cessation in the late 1990s, the environment for ST products was quite negative. A ban on broadcast advertising of ST had been established as early as 1986 [27], so the estimated $170 million spent by manufacturers in 1999 was restricted largely to print media and other forms of advertising and promotion [28]. Not only were manufacturers effectively prohibited from offering ST products as reduced-risk options for smokers, a counter-marketing program was launched by congressional legislation in 1986, in the form of a mandatory warning on every third package of ST sold in the U.S.: "This product is not a safe alternative to cigarettes" [27]. In addition, major efforts have been made by the American tobacco control community to impede any widespread transition from cigarettes to ST [1, 18]. Despite the pro-pharmaceutical and anti-ST climate, an estimated 261,000 men had used smokeless tobacco to quit smoking by the year 2000. While this number is lower than the number who had successfully used the nicotine patch (about one million), it is comparable to the number who had successfully used either nicotine gum or antidepressants, and far more than the number who were successful with other pharmaceutical nicotine products.
We expected to find evidence in later surveys that increasing awareness of the low risk profile of modern, socially acceptable ST products would have resulted in heightened popularity for this cessation method. Unfortunately, no information on switching to ST is available in subsequent NHIS surveys, because that option was removed when the Cancer Control module appeared again in the 2005 NHIS [29]. It is possible that individuals responsible for designing the module expected an increase in switching as well, and that they chose to not find out.
A major strength of this study is that it is based on the survey series that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) uses for national smoking prevalence estimates [16]. In fact, our findings were produced from the very same dataset (and specific survey questions) used by the American Cancer Society in a recent study of smoking cessation treatments used by American smokers [30]. Thus, we were surprised when a senior Cancer Society scientist, who was a coauthor on that study [30], stated emphatically that "There is no evidence that smokers will switch to ST products and give up smoking" [31]. Although the Cancer Society has not endorsed tobacco harm reduction, its scientists certainly know that there is unequivocal evidence from the 2000 NHIS survey that 261,000 smokers have switched to ST products in order to quit smoking.
Studies based on survey data are limited by the nature of the survey instrument and the quality of self-reported information. With respect to this survey, current and former smokers were encouraged to choose multiple methods that were not mutually exclusive, which creates some difficulty in reporting the results and may be confusing for some readers. For example, "Stopped all at once (cold turkey)" was so frequently chosen (with or without other methods) – as would be expected – that all other methods pale in direct comparison. That comparison is certainly confusing, but it may also be inappropriate, since the cold turkey response is orthogonal to the other methods. However, excluding this item would have eliminated information that some readers consider useful. Our goal was to present a complete picture of the data, including how frequently all of the methods were chosen.
We noted some inconsistencies among former smokers using medications and switching to ST. For example, among the 128 former smokers who used the nicotine patch, 16 reported that they quit before the patch became available. Two subjects using nicotine gum and two using bupropion had similar inconsistencies. In addition, for three subjects who switched to ST, their responses to other questions indicated no ST use. It is not possible to resolve these irregularities in a systematic manner, but they may affect the certainty of the estimates.