News Release

Mild cigarettes offer 'no advantage' to heavy smokers - Japanese study

Peer-Reviewed Publication

BMC (BioMed Central)

Japanese smokers who believe that consuming 'light' or 'mild' cigarette brands will substantially reduce their nicotine intake are being misled, according to an article published today in BMC Public Health. Smokers who switch to these brands need to be made aware that the health risks are still substantial.

Smokers that switch to cigarette brands that yield 0.1 mg nicotine from those that yield 1.1mg, might expect their nicotine intake to reduce by eleven-fold. Yet Atsuko Nakazawa and her colleagues from Kyoto First Red Cross Hospital discovered that the actual reduction in nicotine intake was less than two-fold.

The researchers assessed the nicotine dependence of 458 smokers, and questioned them about their smoking habits. To investigate the smokers' nicotine intake, the researchers measured the concentration of the nicotine metabolite, cotinine, in the smokers' urine.

They found that people who smoke over 40 cigarettes per day would hardly reduce their nicotine intake at all by switching to 'mild' brands.

"Smokers who are heavily dependent on nicotine obtain no advantage by smoking low-yield cigarettes," said Nakazawa. She suggests that these smokers "may actually increase their risk due to compensatory behaviour," by inhaling more carbon monoxide or tar through taking more puffs per cigarette, or increasing the depth of their inhalation.

"Current labelling practices are misleading for the two-thirds of smokers who are moderately or highly dependent on nicotine," write the researchers. They stress that the amount of nicotine in the cigarettes, as stated on the packet, does not correspond directly to the amount of nicotine consumed.

Although previous studies have shown that low-yield cigarettes can be just as hazardous as regular brands, evidence in Japanese smokers is still scarce. Furthermore, an attempt in 2002 by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare in Japan to raise awareness of the fact that actual nicotine yields are higher than those stated on packets was hindered by tobacco companies who refuted these claims in a broad advertising campaign.

Communicating the hazards of low-yield cigarettes is clearly important in Japan where over 50% of men smoke, and the majority of smokers choose 'mild' or 'light' brands.

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This press release is based on the following article:
Smoking cigarettes of low nicotine yield does not reduce nicotine intake as expected: a study of nicotine dependency in Japanese males A Nakazawa, M Shigeta, K Ozasa BMC Public Health 2004, 4:28 To be published Wednesday 21 July 2004.

Upon publication, this article will be available free of charge according to BMC Public Health's Open Access policy at http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2458/4/28/.

Please quote the journal in any stories you write, and link to the article if you are writing for the web.

For further information contact Atsuko Nakazawa by email at aak83071@pop21.odn.ne.jp or by phone on +81 75 533 1272

Alternatively, or for more information about the journal or Open Access publishing, contact Gemma Bradley by email at press@biomedcentral.com or by phone on 44-0-20-7631-9931.

BMC Public Health (http://www.biomedcentral.com/bmcpublichealth) is published by BioMed Central (http://www.biomedcentral.com), an independent online publishing house committed to providing Open Access to peer-reviewed biological and medical research. This commitment is based on the view that immediate free access to research and the ability to freely archive and reuse published information is essential to the rapid and efficient communication of science. BioMed Central currently publishes over 100 journals across biology and medicine. In addition to open-access original research, BioMed Central also publishes reviews, commentaries and other non-original-research content. Depending on the policies of the individual journal, this content may be open access or provided only to subscribers.


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