The pros and cons of the Swedish snus (raw tobacco ground to a powder, rehydrated and “fermented” – very different rom chewing tobacco such as Skoal) has been debated over and over again. Today there is a total sales ban of snus in the rest of the EU countries, as well as in some countries outside the EU. A new study might shine some light on this whole issue. Swedish snus does not increase the risks of getting oral cavity cancer, nor lung cancer. It does however give a SLIGHTLY increased risk of getting pancreatic cancer, but the numbers are very low, so low that one wonders if it really is due to using snus – let’s say that 10 000 men have used snus for a period of ten years, then eight to nine of these 10 000 men will get pancreatic cancer. If you have a group of 10 000 men that neither used snus or cigarettes during that same period of time, then four to five of THOSE men will get pancreatic cancer.
Cigarettes are MUCH worse than snus, smokers are much worse off than snus users, but you don’t see any sales bans on cigarettes anywhere, do you?!? Still, there IS that smoking ban in public restaurants and so on… but SNUS doesn’t PRODUCE any smoke, so we can simply not understand why there is a sales ban on snus when you can buy cigarettes anywhere!
If smokers went over to using snus, sure, it’s still nicotine and it still isn’t absolutely healthy, but the smokers would live longer!
