Just the nicotine, hold the tobacco

Twisp · #1 08-13-2007, 09:57 AM

A Chinese company is seeking FDA approval for a battery-powered cigarette that delivers nicotine without the toxins, reports Business 2.0 Magazine.
Business 2.0 Magazine
By Kara Newman, Business 2.0 Magazine
August 13 2007: 6:57 AM EDT

For smokers who want to quit, there are pills, patches, and gum. But how about an electronic nicotine delivery device that looks and feels like smoking -- without the smell or the carcinogens?

That's what Hong Kong-based Golden Dragon Group is selling. Known as Ruyan (meaning "like smoking"), the electronic cigarette is a $208 battery-powered atomizer.
Cartridges containing pure nicotine, available in three strengths and good for some 350 puffs each, cost about $4.
Have you driven a Fjord lately?

Inhale, and the Ruyan -- powered by a Motorola (Charts, Fortune 500) chip -- turns the nicotine into smokelike vapor. "We don't claim smoking cessation, just smoking substitution," says Scott Fraser, vice president of Golden Dragon subsidiary SBT, which came up with the Ruyan.

But "it could be used to ratchet down nicotine consumption."

Ruyan was launched in China in 2004, and last year its sales reached $36.5 million. Turkey quickly became Golden Dragon's second-largest market, followed by Israel and Australia.

Working with an unnamed U.S. partner to get FDA approval, Golden Dragon expects to double current sales by the end of the year. Morgan Stanley analyst David Adelman says the e-cigarette would be lucky to snare even 1 percent of the U.S. cigarette market.

Still, that would add up to a healthy (cough) $750 million.

www.money.cnn.com

Interesting way to continue smoking with minimal health risk.

Rico · #2 08-13-2007, 10:31 AM

American companies are working on ways of delivering nicotine without having to smoke as well. Using nasal snuff, the oldest known form of tobacco use, is an option that is growing in popularity again in America. Nasal snuff has been tested and researched to death, and no connection with cancer has ever been established. In fact, there is at least one nasal snuff producer from England that has never had a claim made against it, and they've been in business since the 1600s.

jwharv · #3 08-13-2007, 10:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rico

American companies are working on ways of delivering nicotine without having to smoke as well. Using nasal snuff, the oldest known form of tobacco use, is an option that is growing in popularity again in America. Nasal snuff has been tested and researched to death, and no connection with cancer has ever been established. In fact, there is at least one nasal snuff producer from England that has never had a claim made against it, and they've been in business since the 1600s.

Rico · #4 08-13-2007, 10:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jwharv

What is so crazy about it? Nasal snuff is the only known safe way of using tobacco.

Twisp · #5 08-13-2007, 10:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rico

What is so crazy about it? Nasal snuff is the only known safe way of using tobacco.

Wouldn't you get nose cancer, akin to the way you can get mouth cancer from chewing tobacco? Don't know, just wondering.

Rico · #6 08-13-2007, 10:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Twisp

Wouldn't you get nose cancer, akin to the way you can get mouth cancer from chewing tobacco? Don't know, just wondering.

Not according to what I have read on the subject. Nasal snuff has been studied to death, and no link to cancer has ever been found. Maybe I will find the articles I have read on it and post them. I don't have the time to find them right now, though. I do remember that the company I was talking about that is in England is called Wilson's of Sharrow, or something to that effect.

The Swedish government regulates a product referred to as Snus as a food product. It is a form of oral tobacco, similar to Skoal, except it doesn't have all the chemicals Skoal has in it. The cancer rates in Sweden, among those who use Snus, is extremely low. I am sure the government regulating how it's produced has a lot to do with it.

Rico · #7 08-13-2007, 10:58 AM

You would be surprised what you'd find out if you ever studied the history of tobacco use. Smoking tobacco is really not as old a practice as one would think. During the Civil War era, it was very common for the people to have rolled up tobacco (sort of like a short rope), and they would scrape it against this grinder type of device to produce the nasal snuff. The reason oral tobacco use became so popular is because of miners not being able to smoke in the mines. They needed an alternative, so that's how products like the plugs and Skoal type tobacco became popular.

At one time is was popular to use the nasal variety of snuff orally. What the women would do is have a hickory stick they'd wet with saliva. Then they would dip the stick into the nasal snuff and put it under their tongue. This method of tobacco use can cause cancer, however.