As promised quite a while ago, I wanted to sit down with you about tobacco risk reduction. There are a couple of things I want to establish before I get to it, though.

1. Tobacco products are expensive, more so or less so depending on where you live, and can deeply impact your budget in frugality terms. Not smoking is the cheapest solution, but as tobacco is addictive and required for an addict to function normally and unless you intend to quit, I feel it should be included in your food budget, just like those addictive caffeinated beverages, coffee and soda, or alcoholic beverages if you consume them regularly. Deal.

2. Tobacco is bad for you, period. However, the degree of bad is variable. Don’t get all messianic ex-smoker on me, I’ll delete your comments because it’s so not the point.

3. Quitting is a healthier decision than not quitting. This article is written for those of you who are either unwilling to quit (like if you’re on a diet, that’s a bad time to try quitting), or are unable to quit right now. Smoking is a charged topic and I’m trying to inject a little reason into the debate.

4. I am not a medical professional, or technically a professional anything. I’m a smoker and a blogger and I’m combining my two interests, both of which I’ve done more reading and research on than the average human being.  This still doesn’t guarantee that I know what I’m doing or what I’m talking about.

Are we clear? Good.

Now. We’re all familiar with the Latte Factor, right? It’s based on the personal finance concept of examining your “essential” expenses and seeing if you can discover any hidden luxuries. The usual suspects are often things like cable TV, alcoholic beverages, coffee, buying lunch at work, eating in restaurants, and smoking. The theory goes that once you ID those luxuries, you eliminate them from your life and redirect the money towards a debt or an investment or something.

Cigarettes are a very popular target for this kind of cost-cutting, and you hear it the loudest from either nonsmokers, who have no concept of tobacco addiction, or from ex-smokers, who are just fuckin’ annoying. They go on and on about the financial cost, they wave around the estimated gazillion dollars it costs to be a smoker for 10 years, they bitch about how smoking-related disease is raising the cost of healthcare, and how it’s just bad for you and it smells yucky and you should stop doing it.

Ok, every smoker in the room for whom this is news, please raise your hand. No? You all know this already? Thought so. And they’re right, they’re totally right. What they don’t tell you is that quitting isn’t the only option. If, for whatever reason, quitting isn’t an option, there are ways to reduce both cost and heath risks and continue to get your nic fix. 

First on the podium, cigarettes. Cigarettes are arguably one of the most addictive things we humans make. Tobacco itself is tough stuff, because it stimulates virtually every happy hormone your brain makes, and hungry little nicotine receptors in your brain will sprout faster than mushrooms on shit. They’re easy to use, the dosages are consistent between packs, available the world, and there are huge corporations who’s business it is to make them easier and more pleasant to smoke, and possibly more addictive than they’d be otherwise. Cigarettes are, infact, the most intense method commonly available to consume nicotine. Lungs are really good at absorbing nicotine and delivering it to the brain, and cigarette smokers inhale more deeply and smoke more frequently than any other sort of tobacco user. They’re also the most physically damaging.

If you are going to smoke cigarettes, try to smoke less of them, and try not to smoke menthol (in my experience, a lot of smokers have or develop allergies to the menthol). Perhaps more importantly, smoke expensive cigarettes. I know you’re trying to save money, but hear me out. Luxury-brand cigarettes are more likely to be made by cigar companies, not cigarette manufacturers. You’ll end up with a somewhat purer, and higher-quality product, and they’re a little bit less bad for you, in my personal experience. If you’re not willing to drop luxury coin on smokes, at least try to avoid the budget and generic brands, and stick to the majors. Cheap cigarettes are just that — cheap. Think about it economically. The tobacco companies know they make an addictive, killer product, so are they going to be more or less concerned with not killing the customers who won’t pony up full price? If you want to save money on cigarettes, buy them when they go on sale at the local gas’n'go, willfully break the law and cross a state line, for willfully break the law and order them online.

I’ve heard the argument that hooka, or shisha, smoke is more toxic than cigarettes, and I’m willing to buy that fact. I’m not willing, however, to believe that hookas are more dangerous than cigarettes, because hookas are propperly smoked less aggressively than cigs, as well as much less frequently in most cases. You sorta sip the smoke, as opposed to inhaling big puff. Moving on.

Next on the list is cigars. Cigar smoke is a little more carcinogen-laden than cigarette smoke is, because the tobacco is fermented as a part of it’s process, which ads new fun chemical crap to the mix. However, there is a lower incidence of some forms of cancer in cigar smokers, because they are less likely to inhale the smoke. It’s a very simple concept, wherever the tobacco or smoke touches, there is where you’re more likely to get cancer. So, lung cancer is reduced in a cigar smoker, as is emphysema, but thinks like mouth cancer are higher because the smoker is putting the tobacco in their mouth and drooling on it and chewing on it and all that garbage. Cigars to smoke a little bit cooler than cigarettes, though, which is a very minor health advantage

A cigar smoker smoker will most likely smoke fewer cigars in a day than a cigarette smoker smokes cigarettes, but that value of smoking less is very debatable. Cigars are much bigger, having 5 to 20 times or more tobacco in them than cigarettes, so fewer and less aren’t necessarily related. Additionally, real cigars don’t have filters, so more tar and particulate matter is coming out the business end. Again, price is a fairly reliable indication of quality.

Pipes are next. They’re a little bit more not-bad than cigars, because the pipe goes in your mouth, not tobacco. The quality of pipe tobacco varies widely, and is again linked to price. Pipes do smoke a little farther down in temperature, which is a small health advantage. A big social advantage is that pip tobacco makers are quite concerned with what’s called the “room note”, or how the smoke smells to other people, and have taken to heart the fact that when a smoker smokes something that smells good, the smoker is hated a little less. A big disadvantage is that pipes are a pain in the neck to maintain properly if you’re a newbie. A financial advantage is that, once you’re set up to go, pipe smoking is pretty cheap. Take it under advisement.

The big problem with all this stuff is that setting tobacco on fire makes for a very unhealthy product. Inhaling smoke is just plain bad for you, and compounds the toxicity immensely. Smokeless tobacco avoids the fire, but it has it’s own problems.

There are a few people around who sniff snuff still, and while there are limited studies on the health impact of dry snuff, sinus cancer is associated. Also, hello black lung. Still, no fire, it’s an improvement.

Oral snuff and chewing tobacco, however, are well-documented and linked to cancers of the mouth and throat. It’s also well documented that the incidence of cancer is lower among chewers than it is in smokers. The news isn’t all good though, because particularly in America, common smokeless products have a lot of sugar in them, so you’ve got a pretty good shot at screwing up your teeth.  You also run the risk of your friends and family hating your new spitting habit. Dip and chew are fermented products, again, so there’s that extra layer of carcinogenic goodness, but I’ll say it again: smokeless tobacco will kill you less than smoking.

It might addict you more, though. Compared to cigarettes, you ingest a lot more nicotine per “dose”, and unless you use little bandit pouches, you can adjust the dose size up really easily. It’s a toss up — less disease, more addiction.

All the way at the bottom of the list is snus, a distinctly Swedish breed of wet dip. Snus is relatively unknown in the US, but Camel is trying to change this as we speak and introduce a few brands of snus sweetened for the American palate. (Snus is traditionally salty.) Snus is unfermented, and traditionally is an all-natural product, just tobacco, water, salt, and a little flavoring maybe. This stuff is significant, though, because there has been shown almost no cancer risk with snus. I say almost, because a recent study showed a slight, way less than 1%, increase in the incidence of pancreatic cancer, and that’s it. Since nicotine is a stimulant, there’s a slightly higher risk for heart disease and stroke than for the average non-smoking Swede, but not a whole lot. It will be interesting to see how it compares in America. Snus is a little bit amazing if you think about it.  Hell, you don’t even need to spit with snus.

I’m not telling you to do anything, aside from educate yourselves. The whole anti-smoking movement has hardened the hearts of smokers everywhere thanks to their obnoxious tactics and blatant misinformation. Tobacco isn’t a safe product to consume, but it’s not all universally harmful, either. I encourage you to go dig up some real information, and if you’re interested, start here.  It’s enlightening.