SMOKE MORE NICOTINE

I find it easy to believe that "Cigarette manufacturers abandoned
dozens of technologies that could have reduced the death toll from
their products" (This Week, 6 March, p 4) and I have absolutely no
sympathy for cigarette manufacturers. But it is interesting to note
that they have been maligned in the US Congress and elsewhere for
their efforts to produce tobacco with a higher nicotine content.

The lethal constituents of tobacco consist of nicotine, "tars" (an
enormous variety of carcinogens) and toxic gases, mainly carbon
monoxide. The nicotine appears to be the main cause of the cardiac
effects of tobacco smoke and the tars appear to be the main cause of
various cancers.

Experience with cigarettes containing reduced amounts of nicotine has
shown that smokers tend to smoke a constant amount of nicotine--- if
they are given low-nicotine cigarettes, they smoke more of them. Thus,
if they smoke low-nicotine cigarettes, they are not exposed to less
nicotine, but they are exposed to more tars and toxic gases.

It follows that the risk of dying from smoking cigarettes should fall
as the nicotine content of cigarettes rises. People only smoke enough
to maintain their regular nicotine intake. The higher the nicotine
content of cigarettes, the fewer cigarettes people will need to smoke
to maintain their intake, reducing the risk from tars and gases.

And, of course, (here's where my self-interest becomes manifest)
smokers of high-nicotine cigarettes will expose innocent bystanders to
less smoke.

Marshall Deutsch
Sudbury, Massachusetts