Two public health officials in Fargo, North Dakota, this
week were the source of grossly misleading claims about smokeless tobacco for a
local media story.
Fargo public health staffers Holly Scott and Melissa
Markegard asserted that smokeless is as risky as cigarettes in an article by TV
newscaster Robin Huebner (
here).
Here are the false claims:
“Just as dangerous”
“ ‘Some of that has to do with the misconception that if you
don’t inhale, it might be somewhat safer,’ said Holly Scott, a tobacco
prevention coordinator at Fargo Cass Public Health. In fact, it’s equally as risky. ‘When chewing, they’re actually getting more
nicotine than in cigarettes, increasing their nicotine addiction,’ said Melissa
Markegard, who is also a tobacco prevention coordinator at Fargo Cass Public
Health. The incidence of many types of
cancer and other diseases can be attributed to smoking and/or chewing tobacco,
but combining the products makes it even worse.
‘It greatly increases (the risk of lung cancer) if they use both
together,’ Markegard said.”
Virtually everything in this passage is false. I demanded corrective action from Fargo’s physician-mayor, noting
the report from Britain's Royal College of Physicians, which concluded: “As a
way of using nicotine, the consumption of non-combustible [smokeless] tobacco
is on the order of 10-1,000 times less hazardous than smoking.” (
here)
I also cited a 2004 study sponsored by the National Cancer
Institute that concluded: “…[smokeless] products pose a substantially lower
risk to the user than do conventional cigarettes.
This finding raises ethical questions
concerning whether it is inappropriate and misleading for government officials or
public health experts to characterize smokeless tobacco products as comparably
dangerous with cigarette smoking” (
here).
There’s been no response to my demand, but some in North Dakota
are interested in factual information.
Rob Port, a prominent state policy blogger, published a guest post from me (
here) and Jarrod Thomas at KNOX radio in Grand Forks gave me air time to tell North
Dakotans the truth.
It’s a shame that uninformed local public health officials misinform
smokers about far safer smokeless tobacco alternatives.
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