Nicotine pouches are everywhere. In the back pocket of the guy at the brewery. In the lip of the podcast host. Possibly in the mouth of the Secretary of Health and Human Services during his confirmation hearing. Zyn shipped about 50 million cans to the U.S. in 2019. In 2025, it shipped nearly 800 million. Philip Morris owns it.
The pitch has changed, though. Nobody’s selling cigarettes as a cowboy’s reward anymore. Now nicotine is a focus tool, a nootropic, a pre-workout, a metabolic hack. Same molecule, better packaging, plus a productivity claim. It’s smokeless, tobacco-free, and tastes like espresso. Very modern.
On this episode of Your Diet Sucks, Zoë and Kylee trace how a 400-year-old addiction became a wellness trend. Then they dig into what the research actually says about nicotine pouches and your brain, your heart, your training, and your metabolism.
Are nicotine pouches bad for you? What’s in this episode
How tobacco went from Indigenous ceremonial use to colonial cure-all to the Lucky Strike diet ads
Zyn, Philip Morris, flavored pouches, and why FDA “authorized” doesn’t mean “approved”
Whether nicotine makes you smarter, calmer, or faster, and how the dependence loop works
Appetite suppression, insulin resistance, and why “metabolic optimization” gets it backwards
RFK Jr., HHS cuts, and the FDA’s new modified risk claim for Zyn
What actually helps people cut back or quit
The bottom line on nicotine pouches
Nicotine pouches are less harmful than cigarettes for people who switch completely. That doesn’t make them safe, and it doesn’t make them a nootropic. If you don’t use nicotine, there’s no health, cognitive, or athletic reason to start.
If you’re trying to quit or cut back, call 1-800-QUIT-NOW or text with Truth Initiative’s free This is Quitting program.
Want more? Our Patreon community gets monthly bonus episodes, weekly discussion threads, and nutrition Q&A with Kylee. Come hang out with us.
- What nicotine is, how it mimics acetylcholine, and why tolerance builds so fast
- Tobacco's history, from Indigenous ceremonial use to colonial cure-all to the Lucky Strike diet ads
- How the industry manufactured doubt once the cancer evidence came in
- The nicotine pouch boom: Zyn's growth, Philip Morris, flavored pouches, and Tucker Carlson's brand
- What FDA "authorized" means, and why it isn't "approved"
- Does nicotine make you smarter? Attention, memory, and the dependence loop
- Stress, mood, and why a lot of the "calm" is withdrawal relief
- Nicotine and athletic performance, from hockey to GI distress mid-ultra
- Appetite suppression, energy expenditure, and nicotine's effect on insulin sensitivity
- Are nicotine pouches safer than cigarettes? Harm reduction vs. added risk
- RFK Jr., HHS cuts, and the FDA's modified risk claim for Zyn
- What actually helps people cut back or quit
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Why is nicotine a wellness trend now?
Zoë: Welcome to Your Diet Sucks, the podcast that won't help you find your zen. I'm Zoë Rom.
Kylee: And I'm Kylee Van Horn.
Zoë: So, Kylee, this might be one we're underqualified for.
Kylee: Why is that?
Zoë: Today, we are talking about nicotine. And I feel like I have a guess for what your personal end of one experience with this particular substance is. But I would hazard a guess that you would describe yourself as naive to it.
Kylee: What would make you think that, Zoë?
Zoë: Have you ever smoked a cigarette?
Kylee: No.
Zoë: Have you ever popped a Zyn? I'm going to sound so old. I'm so sorry. To all of our dozens of Zoomer listeners, I apologize in advance for everything about how I am and everything I say today. But I've never popped a Zyn. I've never Juuled a Juul. I don't think I've ever had nicotine in my body of any kind. I once held a spliff.
Kylee: There's this tobacco cocktail that I've tried before. So it has real tobacco leaves in it. I have the only nicotine that I've gotten my body, I guess. Yeah.
Zoë: When I was a backpacking guide, I had to report a crew of Boy Scouts for trying to feed dip to a burro.
Kylee: Oh.
Zoë: Which, don't do that. Like, no putting smokeless tobacco in your pack animal. Oh, my God. You wouldn't think you'd have to explain that. But all of that is to say that, like, I don't have a ton of personal context for this one.
Kylee: No. I'm about the lamest as it comes when it comes to nicotine here.
Zoë: Why in the world is nicotine a thing again?
Kylee: And it's been popping up more. Like, I just see it in public more, I think. I feel like I've seen more ads for things and know that certain people start talking about it more, have started talking about it more on podcasts.
Zoë: Yeah, I definitely feel like a lot of my younger male friends are talking about this, or I will see guys out and about on the town in the bustling metropolis of Carbondale with the telltale sign of a Zyn in their back pocket. What on earth? How did we get here? Today, we are going to explore nicotine. What are some of the wellness claims surrounding it? And why, for the love of Christ, is it a thing again?
What is nicotine?
Kylee: I feel like we need to start this out by talking about what nicotine even is.
Zoë: Yeah, we have to back all the way up because, again, naive. Eve. So nicotine is an alkaloid that tobacco plants make.
Kylee: Which is kind of cool.
Zoë: Yes.
Kylee: In a way.
Zoë: Yes. Well, it's kind of like built-in pesticide. They produce it most likely to kill insects trying to eat them. Hold on to that thought. Marinate. But it also shows up in, this is fascinating, trace amounts in tomatoes, potatoes, eggplant. Again, you could eat a whole thing of ratatouille. You're not going to get a buzz. A pouch is not trace amounts.
Kylee: That would be amazing, though.
Zoë: That would be sick. I love eggplant. It mimics acetylcholine, which is a neurotransmitter involved in attention. It's involved in learning, memory, and it switches on nicotinic receptors throughout your brain and body. So nicotine is a knockoff of this endogenous substance. It's not a perfect copy. So nicotine, the exogenous substance effects, last way longer than your own endogenous acetylcholine signaling. and it ripples through the whole brain. It sets off this chain reaction of dopamine, norepinephrine, and friends. So that's where you get this sense of like reward, alertness, attention, a mood boost. So folks who use it regularly, the receptors will get less responsive over time. So the brain responds by building more of them, which is not great because that is tolerance. And actually, I was almost kind of like, oh, like relieved researching this one I was like, oh my God, finally, we do have an addictive substance to talk about. Because I feel like we spend so much time debunking that things are addictive. But spoiler alert, nicotine is addictive as hell.
Kylee: Do you know if it's as addictive as certain drugs?
Zoë: It is as addictive as cocaine and heroin.
Kylee: Okay.
Zoë: Yes, in one study. That's like what we're talking about with like that your brain has to build more receptors. That is the physical scaffolding for dependence. And nicotine is what makes tobacco and these tobacco products addictive. It's not the main reason cigarettes cause cancer, though, right? Like, I think, like, as a kid of the 90s, it's just bad because maybe smoke, maybe nicotine. I don't know exactly why they're bad because Nancy Reagan said so. So most of the carcinogens, carbon monoxide and particulates, come from setting the tobacco on fire. So I think that distinction is really important science to keep a handle on because it has sort of acted as a gift to marketers. Because the gap that sort of opened up is this one where advertisers are claiming that nicotine, smokeless nicotine, smokeless tobacco nicotine without smoke, can now be sold as this interesting brain chemical once it's been liberated from this filthy and outdated delivery system and promoted as a quote-unquote less harmful alternative, but also less harmful than one of the most harmful things on earth is not exactly a rave review.
Kylee: Tobacco companies are rejoicing. They're like, oh, it's a rebrand.
Zoë: Yes. Yeah, it fully is a wellness rebrand.
Kylee: I mean, as humans, how did we, I'm curious how we first encountered nicotine, tobacco, did somebody go around like chewing leaves and they were like,
Zoë: Yes. Long before, you know, these things were a twinkle in Joe Rogan's eye. Indigenous folks, particularly across the Americas, cultivated tobacco. They used it ceremonially, medicinally, diplomatically and socially, which is a really important distinction. They smoked it, chewed it, snuffed it, drank it, used it in enemas.
Kylee: Wow.
Zoë: Fascinating. That was a new one for me. I found some very interesting old illustrations that I wish I could share. But this is unfortunately an audio format. Wellness culture didn't invent some of the more complicated delivery systems we're seeing here. This has been embedded in particularly indigenous cultures for a very long time, but with really different cultural scaffolding that I think is really important to recognize. So Europeans arrived on the scene and did what Europeans historically do when Europeans arrive on the scene and what they do with culturally significant artifacts, plants, practices, which is that they misunderstood it, declared it to just be medicine, shipped it home at scale, and built an extractive global industry around it. So not ideal. Tobacco was actually sold as treatment for like this comical range of ailments, which is, I think, exactly the playbook that we see in the wellness industry now. They were basically doing back in the days of Plymouth Rock. And this is sort of mimicked from indigenous peoples in the America, but they would use it to care for wounds. They would apply crushed tobacco directly to wounds and skin infections because of perceived antiseptic properties. They were chewed to numb toothaches. Seems not ideal. Soothe sore throats, alleviate headaches. Basically, anything that you could treat, they would throw. Let's slap some tobacco on it.
Kylee: Okay.
Zoë: In 1604, King James I published a Counterblaste, with an E, A Counterblaste to Tobacco, And he slapped a massive tax on it because he was like, oh, we could really make some money here because folks are 100 percent addicted to this. So moral outrage and lucrative taxation have basically coexisted peacefully ever since. Again, another fascinating trend with this particular substance. But essentially, historically, tobacco has helped power colonization and the economy. I think it's really important to note that you just can't extricate its production from stolen indigenous land and enslaved labor, that tobacco has a real dark past that is just baked in and always worth acknowledging.
How did tobacco go mass market?
Kylee: Was there a time that it then went to the mass market or what happened?
Zoë: Yeah. So in 1828, scientists were actually able to isolate nicotine from the tobacco, sort of taking the first big step towards the smokeless pouches of today. In the 1880s, James Bonsack's rolling machine turned cigarettes from a handmade product into something that was cheap, consistent, and infinitely more scalable than having to, like, roll your own. Companies didn't sell nicotine. I think this is really where we start to see the modern advertising industry really sink its talons into culture. And when you really see this mass market and advertising take off, you can see imagery where they would sell cigarettes for sophisticated women. It was for rugged men. It was for athletes, like specifically marketed at athletes. Tour de France riders used to smoke cigarettes to open their lungs. I've seen advertising that aimed cigarettes at pregnant women saying it'll lower birth weights, which like, that's not great. Like you don't want your baby to be underweight at birth.
Kylee: These identities, I feel like it's a similar thing that we're seeing today with Zyn, right? Like there's companies that we'll probably get into. There's companies like specifically for athletes.
Zoë: Athletic nicotine.
Kylee: Athletic nicotine. Yes.
Zoë: And I think it's also really fascinating to sort of see the gender component here because there's always been this whole strategy, particularly around Lucky Strike, marketing it to women. Reach for a lucky instead of a sweet. this knowledge that, yeah, you might be able to lose weight if you replace eating with this highly addictive substance.
[Clip] Light up for lucky. It's light up time. Be happy. Go lucky. It's light up time. For the taste that you like. Light up for lucky. Strike. Relax. It's light up time. You know, friends, a lucky tastes better every time. Cleaner, fresher, smoother. Try them.
Zoë: It's taking the same messaging that historically has worked really well on women, which is do you want to lose weight? Do you want to suppress your appetite? But it's aiming that now at men and sort of in this more masculine packaging because men are being sold through the language more of biohacking than of weight loss. Because historically, if you just want to sell anything to women, you're just like, yeah, it'll make you skinny. Don't worry about it. Lucky strike. Like Virginia Slims, you know, it's my skinny tactical dichotomy that we see all the time of like, back in the day, they told women to smoke cigarettes to be thinner. Now they're telling guys to pop a Zyn so they can absolutely crush their next deck at work and then get their VO2 max bumping in the gym. Again, whenever I say stuff like that, I sound like an alien in a human costume, but I am so sorry. I know that's not how people talk. But back in the day, they actually used to put cigarettes in military rations. They were endorsed by doctors.
[Clip] You know, if you were to follow a busy doctor as he makes his daily round of calls, you'd find yourself having a mighty busy time keeping up with him. In a repeated national survey, doctors in all branches of medicine were asked, what cigarette do you smoke, doctor? Once again, the brand named most was Camel. More doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette. See how mild and good tasting a cigarette can be.
Zoë: Which is a little bit of a stain on that profession, not holding that against you anymore. And when the cancer evidence finally became overwhelming, as it eventually did, the industry poured a shitload of money into trying to manufacture doubt, specifically attacking researchers and insisting the science was unsettled. So the playbook that we will continue to see and is getting spruced off today is when you can't prove the product is safe, make certainty itself look unreasonable. You can't really prove beyond a reasonable doubt that cigarettes cause cancer, right? They've long disregarded trying to sell the idea that cigarettes or nicotine was healthy. They just wanted people to be able to buy into the myth that the question was still open long enough to buy yet another pack of cigarettes.
How big is the nicotine pouch market?
Kylee: So we're in the wellness phase now.
Zoë: Yes.
Kylee: And nicotine. And how did we get to nicotine being a wellness product?
Zoë: Yeah. So I actually kind of want to backtrack and talk about how the business side of things has scaled. Because Zyn launched in the U.S. in 2016. It's actually, shout out, first test marketed in Colorado. So congrats to us.
Kylee: Great job.
Zoë: In 2019, Zyn shipped about 50 million cans to the U.S. By 2021, it was nearly 200 million. In 2025, it shipped 794 million cans of Zyn.
Kylee: Wow.
Zoë: That is a huge amount of growth. That's a 16-fold increase in just six years. So for a product that I personally hadn't heard of before the pandemic, it's now selling one bajillion cans. Also worth noting that Philip Morris, which people might have heard from, from fame of being one of the most nefarious companies of all time, bought Swedish Match, which is Zyn's owner, in late 2022 for about $16 billion. So that, you know, the fact that, like,
Kylee: the cigarette company bought this tells you exactly what's going on. They're just like,
Zoë: we are so back, baby. Zyn is now legally sold in 60 countries, and those pouches themselves, or other brands are becoming a huge industry. So monthly in the U.S., pouch sales went from about 146 million in January of 2023 to over 511 million in August of 2025, which is a 250 percent increase. Those numbers are from the CDC. It's starting to become an increasingly competitive and crowded marketplace. British American tobacco's brand Velo had over 17% of the U.S. market by mid-2025. Zyn's share has slipped a little bit, hovering somewhere in the mid-70s at its zenith to about 60% now. Altria sells on. Tucker Carlson, shout out, jump scare.
Kylee: He has his own brand?
Zoë: Yes, ALP, ALP.
[Clip] Nicotine's super important. This country's gotten far sadder and less healthy since it was discouraged and is coming back. And I think it shows. Like, people are just happier. I'm super enthusiastic. I help pick the name and the design and the flavors. Like, I know a lot about that because I'm a lifelong nicotine user. Over 40 years, I know a lot about nicotine.
Zoë: Which helped its parent company grow its oral nicotine sales by more than 600% in a single quarter. So those are really only numbers you can get through grift or addiction.
Kylee: I feel like there's like this political component to this too.
Zoë: Yes. Yeah, there's a really fascinating political valence to this of again sort of being here. I have an incredible Instagram for us to watch that I think helps illustrate this quite well.
[Clip] These are Lucy's. These are espresso flavor. This is contraband in California.
[Clip] Are these?
[Clip] These are eights.
[Clip] Wait, are these the Tucker Carlson ones?
[Clip] No, no, no. This is another company, Lucy's. These are breakers. They have a little thing in there. You break it. It gives you flavor. It tastes like coffee.
[Clip] right here we're in this doesn't seem this doesn't seem like it should be illegal freedom
[Clip] in texas no if you want flavor you have to have that and a stick of gum if you live in california
Zoë: thank god i think that is fascinating because it's a clear attempt to be like freedom they don't want you to have it it's so dumb but when you actually look at the i mean both the research of what makes these things addictive and compelling and the market research flavor is the number one thing driving growth in sales. Mint is the most popular flavor with like 60%. There's fruit, candy, drink flavors, coffee. Tobacco flavor is, do you want to guess, what percentage of the marketplace tobacco-flavored products are making up?
Kylee: Is it like 1% or something? Is it low?
Zoë: 0.1% of the market is driven by tobacco-flavored products.
Kylee: The interesting thing, too, that I think about is the young crowd. I know there's some regulation on these products, right? Yes. But it reminds me of the Juul. They were trying to get high schoolers or something to
Zoë: stop using that. Because flavors, you know, things like strawberries and cream, creme brulee, that again just goes to show you that there's this continued attempt to launder these things through these like increasingly palatable culturally in the form of Juuls look like a little USB stick and you can like charge it wherever and Zyns are really discreet. You can pop it during a congressional hearing without that many people noticing. So it's culturally getting much more acceptable lower key. And the flavors are also making it feel less like the addictive substance it is because it's not flavored like nicotine. It's flavored like tutti frutti or whatever. I feel like I suddenly couldn't think of a single fruit to name.
Kylee: Is that why you think it is becoming more popular as a wellness thing too because of...
Zoë: I wouldn't say that's driving the attractiveness to wellness, but it's definitely driving the sort of broader appeal that wellness is capitalizing on. And you can sort of put this hand in hand with Make America Healthy Again. you know, this is the movement that wants you to take red food dye out of your cereal, but is apparently fine with putting a highly addictive substance in your lip. So the pitch from the wellness side of things is that nicotine is just a misunderstood molecule. It's been unfairly smeared by its association with cigarettes. And that is so 1950s. And now we're more evolved and you can get your nicotine in the form of something that looks like a USB port and smells like strawberries. I think that you also see a little bit of this appeal to nature, right? Oh, it's this plant-based compound. It's natural. It's found in nature. Again, if you listen to our episode there, this is a vibe. This says nothing about the actual safety of said product. You can be extremely addicted to many things found. in nature. It's become really big in this manosphere and bro podcast world. Joe Rogan openly talks about his pouch habit, though it does seem like he's been trying to walk that back in years, which like I have to like. Wait, really? Yes. Or recently. More recently, it seems like he's been trying to tone it down, though I can't speak to that. I do not have enough time and bandwidth in my life to go too deep on like what his current nicotine consumption is. But to just give an addictive substance to a guy in your garage on your podcast. Like how much of that is just the very 90s dare to say no in me is just, that's it, a stranger trying to harass you into smoking. That's what it looks like. Joe Rogan is going to make me smoke a cigarette. So I think I'm still trying to disentangle my own sort of child of the 90s moralization around cigarettes because I definitely was raised in a culture that had zero chill about cigarettes. Oh,
Kylee: yeah.
Zoë: Yeah. I think that what you're really seeing is like, you know, again, these men that particularly other men look up to Joe Rogan, Tucker Carlson has his own brand. And they sort of try to launder it in this scientific science washy language using receptors, neurotransmitters. They make it sound like a biohack.
[Clip] The main effects of nicotine in the brain are mediated by nicotine binding to the so-called alpha 4 beta 2 receptor. Nicotine triggers the release of dopamine from the nucleus accumbens, but also decreases the activity of GABA. And so this is like pushing on the accelerator for dopamine. Just understand nicotine increases motivation. It decreases negative feelings of mood. It increases positive feelings of mood and motivation.
Zoë: And they make it sound clinical and sophisticated, even when essentially at the end of the day, what the pitch boils down to is put this addictive substance in your mouth and don't worry about it. Don't think about it too hard. So now there are products that are stacking nicotine with caffeine and nootropics, and they're being sold as productivity hacks, as hacks for an athlete, something that makes you more alert and boosts your mood. And it sort of has really thrived in this like very male-specific corner of the Internet with founders, finance guys, athletes, soldiers. I found an entire Reddit page for firefighters talking about their favorite smokeless tobacco and this sort of testosterone clinic cold plunge crowd. the old pitch with cigarettes was take a break and enjoy yourself you're a cowboy and the new one is still well you're still a cowboy but you should be a focused more productive and more athletic cowboy most folks hit snooze these days others saddle up you need a break
[Clip] nah need an L all right back to work for those who still choose the hard way Good work, Cowboys. Bring it in. The Out Frontier Collection. Aim your frontier.
Zoë: Don't be like those pussies in California who don't want you to have coffee-flavored products that might inadvertently undermine your understanding that what you're consuming is an addictive substance.
Why do nicotine pouches feel safer than cigarettes?
Kylee: Why do the pouches feel safer than a cigarette? I mean, the thing that I think of initially is the smoke aspect. Yes. There's no smoke inhalation going into my lungs. And I'm like, maybe it is a little bit safer than, you know, there's that carcinogen thing.
Zoë: Yes. I guess you can accurately say it's a little bit safer than one of the least safe things that you can repeatedly do to your body without dying instantly.
Kylee: But then my brain goes to, but then what about mouth cancer? You know, like, yeah, I'm like, I have like health OCD stuff.
Zoë: If someone handed you a nicotine pouch right now, what would your gut reaction be? And like, why would you have that reaction? Why would you feel like saying no? Like watching Joe Rogan, I'm like, oh, the 90s kid is you absolutely can't have even one cigarette because you'll definitely get addicted.
Kylee: When I start thinking about it, though, if you if somebody offered you an alcoholic drink, I mean, that isn't great for you. But I still would have an alcoholic drink. And so it does make me be like, well, why do I have this reaction to that? And I drink coffee and that has a neurochemical effect on my brain.
Zoë: Yeah.
Kylee: And I think a lot of it comes down to when I was younger, the cigarette thing, mouth cancer, teeth rotting.
Zoë: I feel very uncomfortable with some of the drug conversation that happened in my milieu growing up. And yet I am also certainly not about to pop a Zyn.
Kylee: Yeah. So it is kind of interesting, though, to think about your own upbringing and preconceived notions about certain things, substances, etc.
Zoë: Yeah, that's been a really sort of intentional play on the part of advertisers to sort of make these pouches not feel so scary. Because there's no smoke. There's no smell. There's no ash. There's no cloud of smoke. You know, the pouches are pretty discreet and nothing about them screams tobacco. And the tins look like mints. Like, they look pretty nondiscreet. And the pouches themselves almost look like gum or some other supplement. They seem pretty harmless. To me, they look like little tiny pillows.
Kylee: They do.
Zoë: Is always what I think. So calling them tobacco-free might technically be true, but in people's brains, sometimes I think that gets translated to harmless. And like you said, those sort of artificial flavors, and again, not to say artificial, like that's the problem with this. The problem is making something that contains nicotine taste like a hot fudge sundae. Yeah. If you're just have dessert, I would honestly probably smoke a hot fudge sundae if I can. But those flavors mask the bitterness, which makes nicotine easier to start and easier to keep using, particularly for children. You know, there's more attempts like with vaping and Juuls and stuff to market it a little bit more specifically to women with some of these flavors, though it just hasn't caught on in quite the same ways that it has with Zyn. And backing up, the product isn't just delivering a chemical. When you're thinking of these pouches, what it's really delivering is removing friction. It's removing stigma and it's removing some of these sort of natural pain points like the smoke breaks, smelling like an ashtray all the time that used to limit how often people would engage with this substance. You know, to smoke a cigarette, you can't do that on a plane. You can't vape on a plane. I guess you can kind of pop a Zyn whenever, wherever. And people may not know. The strength of these products also can vary a lot. Some of these stronger pouches are actually gaining in market share. And some online products, when tested by third-party testers, have been shown to contain more nicotine than the Zyn products that the FDA originally authorized.
Kylee: Well, the wild thing is, you know, just thinking through the addiction component and how quickly someone can be like, oh, I'm just going to have one. And then it becomes, oh, I'm doing a whole 10 of these things a day.
Zoë: Yeah.
Kylee: And that part is a little bit kind of freaky. I am worried about, oh, my God, if I take one, then I'm going to like want to max out and take 15. Same.
Zoë: I'm almost like knowing my psychology, I have no chill about anything ever.
Kylee: I'm like, what would happen to me?
Zoë: I'm absolutely sure I would be just like trying to gargle an entire pouch all at once. And next to cigarettes, these products look way more pristine. So the sales pitch is like, well, it's safer than smoking, which, again, technically true, but just because something is safer than a car wreck doesn't mean that we should all be like, I got to get that energy in my life. Safer than smoking gets sort of downplayed to like generally safe and gets upplayed and laundered through the like MAHA Joe Rogan universe as maybe it's even good for you.
Kylee: So then that's how the wellness could be a wellness thing.
Zoë: Exactly. Not only is it not as bad as cigarettes, but it might actually be awesome.
Is Zyn FDA approved?
Kylee: What's going on with the FDA and this whole Zyn thing? Is it approved?
Zoë: Yes.
Kylee: Not that, I don't even know if that matters these days, supplements aren't regulated by the FDA that well.
Zoë: Yes. Well, yeah. So Zyn is regulated. Yay! We found it! Oh,
Kylee: wow.
Zoë: A thing that's regulated. So in January of 2025, the FDA did authorize 20 Zyn products for sale in the U.S.
Kylee: Which I'm kind of like, okay, interesting.
Zoë: Keep that in mind. Keep that in mind. Authorized is not exactly the same thing as approved. The FDA did not say that Zyn is safe, healthy, performance enhancing, or a valid way of quitting cigarettes. It did make a comparative judgment that these products have fewer harmful constituents than cigarettes and may help some smokers switch completely.
Kylee: Which,
Zoë: again, is not a rave review. That is a public health call about people who already use tobacco. It is not a permission slip for people who never would have picked a can up to begin with.
Kylee: But people don't interpret it that way.
Zoë: I know, right? Prior to doing research, I think in my head, I had not quite been, like, authorized approved.
Kylee: Yeah.
Zoë: So the awkward truth here is that a product can be harmful and addictive and still in some ways technically and potentially be harm reduction for, like, someone doing something significantly worse. But again, that is not the messaging that we are seeing on these podcasts. So the pouches have not been approved for cessation products. Nicotine gum patches and lozenges are the things that have actually been studied and shown in the research to help with cessation. So that is where I would like to throw a bucket of cold water on some of the harm reduction conversation.
What does nicotine do in the body?
Kylee: What does nicotine actually do in the body? I feel like I've heard it helps give you energy and helps you think and stay focused.
Zoë: Yeah.
Kylee: Are there other things that it does?
Zoë: What it does is it flips on the sympathetic nervous system. So like activating your fight or flight response. So your heart rate and blood pressure will go up and your blood vessels constrict.
Kylee: That might not be good for some people.
Zoë: Right. You're like, OK, I don't even need the caveat. I'm out.
Kylee: OK.
Zoë: So if you keep hitting that switch over and over, that's not going to be amazing for your heart. So it can really impact people's sleep, their cardiovascular health. But yeah, people will feel energized and sometimes also this kind of weird mix of feeling stimulated and focused, but also calm. So some of how people experience that is going to depend a bit on dose, tolerance, and what your prior relationship was with nicotine. Cigarettes, because you smoke them, deliver nicotine to the brain in seconds. Pouches absorb a little more slowly through the mouth, but high strength pouches can still push blood nicotine levels up a ton. Well,
Kylee: and from what I was seeing in the trends on social media, there's like the, what is it, the TikTok trend with the kids that are like trying to put in the massive amount of Zyn pouches in their mouth. I forgot what it's called. But yeah, there's a thing where they're trying to like fit in as many as possible. And then that could lead to a potential overdose or like something weird. when people do gain that tolerance, then they start probably popping more of them more frequently. So what is that doing to, you know, the cardiovascular system? Because you're like, you put a little bit of stress with a small milligram dose, but then in order to get the same effect later, you might have to use more, which then is still putting more stress on the heart. So I don't know if people are thinking of those. They're probably not thinking of those things, obviously.
Zoë: I understand that people lock in and like nail your next presentation. But also, I do not need to be more in flight or fight mode. I don't think anyone has ever met me and been like, could we turn this girl's sympathetic nervous system up a notch?
Kylee: Yeah.
Zoë: Even when I'm sleeping, I have to use a mouth guard to protect my teeth from whatever my brain is doing at night.
Kylee: The other challenge I see with this is using it as a crutch for overworking someone and not dialing back and not trying to get sleep or not trying to, like, reduce your stress. And it's pushing you over the edge. Right.
Zoë: Exactly. Do you actually need to lock in or do you need to have a job that doesn't demand you like work 18 hours a day at maximum effort to get things done?
Kylee: I mean, I guess that the alternative side is what if somebody says, oh, yeah, I'm just going to like use it for this one presentation to gain energy and focus. And then that's all they do. But then I guess that on the alternative side, then what if you become addicted?
Zoë: You are playing with fire. Yeah, it is addictive.
Kylee: It's kind of like alcohol, though, right? Oh, I'm just going to have a drink. But we know that that's not good for your body. Correct. Right.
Zoë: And I mean, nicotine does act slightly differently than alcohol in terms of how it specifically operates in the reward system. But similarly, some people are going to be more likely to use substances in this way, just like genetic predisposition to these things. So some people, I think, need to be warier than others. And, you know, my sort of take that I've had since literally episode three of this podcast is maybe we should talk differently about alcohol rather than like alcohol is legal.
Kylee: I think that's the kind of the point that we're making with this as well as the conversation around nicotine is, oh, yeah, it could be like this amazing wellness product. So we're not talking about, oh, what about the heart attack that you could have or your sleep and recovery being impacted and not recovering and downsides are not being talked about at all.
Zoë: Right, like maybe you can nail that project at work, but also it can absolutely fuck with your insulin resistance.
Does nicotine make you smarter?
Kylee: So we just talked about some of the negative side effects. What about, like, does nicotine actually make you smarter? Is it like doing something to your brain?
Zoë: Yeah, this is one of the ones I feel like you see on Huberman, Joe Rogan.
[Clip] Nicotine vape pens, they're good for thinking, though, for whatever reason. Nicotine is a cognitive enhancer. It's like a nootropic.
Zoë: There have been some studies that show small, short-term bumps in attention, vigilance, reaction time, and some types of memory, but modest and short-term. The effects are also really inconsistent because more stimulation isn't better stimulation. At higher doses, you start to see side effects like nausea, anxiety, dizziness that will start to cancel out any quote unquote advantage you got from nicotine use. So where there's a benefit, it may show up in people mostly with mild cognitive impairment. So healthy people might get zero boost at all [Editor's note: A 2010 meta-analysis found small, real short-term effects on attention and memory in nonsmokers, too. They're modest and don't last.] and high performers would be potentially likely to do even worse. So the optimizer crowd, the people like yelling about this in between conversations about nootropics are the people least likely to benefit. And a lot of the studies on these products specifically look at groups who already use nicotine. And if you give nicotine to someone in withdrawal and then you're like, ah, they improve. Yeah. Thank you, science. Here is kind of like how the dependence loop works and how it sort of piggybacks on some of these claims of improving focus and cognitive function is, yes, nicotine will give you a noticeable lift, but your tolerance will build. So you will need more or you will need it more often. And between doses, you can experience withdrawal. You can feel foggier than how you felt that made you take nicotine in the first place. Irritable, restless, lack of focus also reported.
Kylee: Then you're like, I need more.
Zoë: I need more. Exactly. The next pouch will temporarily fix it. Boom. Feels like performance. And then eventually many folks will find themselves using these products just to function normally in a dependent cycle that the product created. So this is the reason I get so concerned about this being taken up with the biohacking crowd is it really does make self-experimentation seem seductive. And there is no good evidence that nicotine improves long-term productivity, intelligence, or brain health. Feeling dialed in for one presentation? Sure, I'll give you that. But, like, let's zoom out more than 90 minutes here, you guys. A substance can measurably change attention without it being a worthwhile nootropic worth throwing away your insulin resistance for.
Kylee: Yeah. What about your stress and mood as well?
Zoë: Yeah, this is one that I feel like you hear a lot. Like you'll hear influencers pitch nicotine as this tool for stress relief or a mood booster. And again, it does light up reward pathways. So the pleasant feeling is real. It is also temporary. Long-term users often find stress and anxiety harder to manage in the context of withdrawal. So a lot of the calm is actually withdrawal relief, which is not the same thing as added benefit. It's just not feeling shitty. But it's certainly not feeling good.
Kylee: That sucks because it's not going to let people, it's not going to motivate people to want to stop taking it. Yes.
Zoë: There's a Cochrane review from 2021, we love Cochrane reviews, that found that people who consistently, and this is just broad nicotine products, not looking at pouches specifically, but people who quit consistently end up with lower rates of anxiety, depression, and stress, and subjectively end up reporting better mood and quality of life. So that's one of the highest sort of bars of evidence available.
Kylee: So they can get there. But I wonder what that process looks like. Of quitting? You know, I feel like a lot of people might get to a certain point and they're just like, oh, I don't want to fully go off. It'd be hard to quit.
Zoë: Yeah.
Kylee: But what you're saying then is if they can quit, then they end up with less anxiety, depression, and stress.
Zoë: Than when they were on products. So I think that that's a really interesting comparison to look at.
Kylee: What about this idea of brain health and aging? Like, I feel like isn't there something with Alzheimer's?
Zoë: So nicotine has been studied for Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, and mild cognitive impairment because nicotinic receptors do play a role in attention, movement, and memory. So smokers in observational data have been shown to have lower Parkinson's rates, which is more of like an interesting wrinkle in the data than something that doctors are like, hell yeah, you know, hit the cigs, guys. When researchers actually tested it, it failed. So there's an NIC-PD trial. They had users use a year of nicotine patches in Parkinson's patients and found that it did not slow Parkinson's progression. So that's from a study from 2023. So like all longevity claims, this one mostly rests on, say it with me.
Kylee: Mice. And yes,
Zoë: cells. Cells, I'm close, you know,
Kylee: not humans.
Zoë: Mice and cells looking at oxidative stress, inflammation, and aging pathways, but none of it has shown that nicotine extends lifespan or prevents age-related disease in actual humans. So this is another instance of the podcast Bros of the World taking plausible studied mechanism and turning that into a wildly irresponsible prescription.
Does nicotine improve athletic performance?
Kylee: Okay, so athletes and performance enhancement are athletic Zyn or whatever the hell is.
Zoë: Athletic nicotine.
Kylee: All you have to do is put athletic in front of the thing and it's great.
Zoë: Honestly, yes. Or tactical. Or skinny.
[Clip] You've been lied to about nicotine and its performance hacks. So you've probably heard nicotine is bad for you. But the real problem is the tobacco, vapes, and sketchy gas station pouches. Athletic nicotine makes tobacco-free pouches that support mental clarity, sharper focus, and smooth energy. They're even tested for WADA-banned substances so athletes can use them without worry. It feels like we are finally seeing nicotine being rebranded, not as a vice, but as a tool for performance. Rogan said it best. These are a great way to stimulate your mind before writing, going on stage or a podcast.
Zoë: So, you know, in the research, it is shown to raise alertness, raise heart rate and sympathetic activity. The actual research on exercise is small and like honestly kind of a hot mess when you dig into it. A few studies find benefits on isolated measures, but many find nothing. And again, the tradeoffs here are substantial. So always something to bear in mind. But athletes are totally using it anyway. There's a really interesting study that used urine testing and found high rates of nicotine in team sports with hockey having the most prevalent usage. [Correction: In that study, American football had the highest rate, about 56%, with ice hockey around 32%. A separate study found about half of players at the 2009 Ice Hockey World Championships had used nicotine recently.]
Kylee: I mean, this is bad, but like just I think baseball, I think hockey, you know, those are the things that I'm like, the sports that I'm like, oh, yeah, they probably use it. I feel like endurance athletes are such goody two shoes, though. They're like, oh, I'm not going to use that. It's related to a cigarette. Yeah,
Zoë: exactly. Right.
Kylee: That's why I'm wondering if I don't see it as much.
Zoë: I know. Well, exactly. We're in a little bit of an echo chamber, but it is taking on a lot more prevalence, again, sort of in the world of biohacking and general fitness.
Kylee: So I could see it creeping in as it gets more, the talons get more in the wellness industry.
Zoë: Correct. In a lot of the habitual users, the boost that they might actually be reporting is just withdrawal relief. Some things worth noting are that constrict, like especially for runners or endurance athletes, constricted blood vessels and extra cardiovascular strain. Not great. That's not really what you want for your blood vessels to be getting all small.
Kylee: We want oxygen getting to our working muscles. Yeah,
Zoë: that's not a desired outcome. It can cause nausea, dizziness, hiccups, which, fascinating, and also GI distress. none of which, again, is like something...
Kylee: Ultrarunners are like, yeah, I want to struggle with GI distress.
Zoë: Running 100 miles would be so much more fun if I was hiccuping constantly. When you look at testosterone, thinking of how heavily a lot of this is being aimed at the dudes, smoker versus non-smoker studies are inconsistent, super confounded, but there is not persuasive evidence that pouches make you stronger, more muscular, or, I mean, obviously, again, more manly. The advertising here is out of control. This is where things get a little bit sticky. But WADA monitors nicotine, but it's not banned. But again, legal is not the same thing as effective or healthy. Alcohol is only banned in like power boating and archery. So doing a shot ski is not exactly going to help you with your steeplechase. I think that a lot of the claims that it boosts athletic performance are very not good.
Kylee: Very not good. Yeah, I mean, they're going on vibes.
Zoë: Going on vibes.
Kylee: Yeah, I mean, it is interesting, though, when you think about how in athletics, caffeine's normalized, right?
Zoë: Yeah.
Kylee: And we talked about this a little bit already, but it's, oh, well, you can use caffeine to give you that boost. It's not like, oh, yeah, I'm going to take a Zyn to get my boost before my ultra.
Zoë: Right. It is still addictive, but the trade-offs are less than. Because, like, with coffee use, you don't get the same cardiac issues. Like, you would have to do...
Kylee: But you can. With caffeine, you can.
Zoë: It would have to be extreme.
Kylee: Yeah.
Zoë: But with non-extreme nicotine consumption, you can have really negative cardiac impacts. You can have insulin resistance, like all of these nasty things at pretty low levels. Like any amount of regular consumption can have negative health trade-offs. Whereas with coffee, you have to kind of try for it to fuck your shit up.
Kylee: People are going to be like, well, I take my caffeine in.
Zoë: Yeah.
Kylee: Why can't I take this in?
Zoë: Absolutely. Because again, heart health. Caffeine will not fuck up your A1C. But nicotine will.
Do nicotine pouches suppress appetite?
Kylee: Going back to the whole weight loss thing, I feel like most things we talk about, it comes back to weight loss, body image, all that kind of stuff. We talked about cigarettes, smoking those and reducing appetite and trying to use those to lose weight. Is there any kind of approach going on with nicotine appetite and weight?
Zoë: Yeah, you're seeing the exact same sort of advertising machine kick into gear because it does and will suppress appetite. So you're definitely seeing advertisers capitalize on that. Yeah, because nicotine blunts appetite and it does nudge in some studies energy expenditure up a little bit in the short term again because of that parasympathetic [Correction: sympathetic] upregulation. I wonder how much that actually is,
Kylee: though. I'm curious. Is it like, oh, 50 calories? You know what I mean?
Zoë: It is insufficient for body composition change. That's my point. Weight gain also can happen sometimes when people do try to quit smoking or wean off these products. But importantly, they are also directly linked to impaired insulin sensitivity and glucose regulation. So selling nicotine through this fear of weight gain, particularly to women, is the oldest play in the book. It's just like being branded as metabolic optimization. To that point of appetite suppression, the mechanism here is pretty interesting and specific. So there was a 2011 study in science that looked at mice and nicotine-activated receptors on the POMC neurons in the hypothalamus. So this is part of the brain's built-in fullness system. When the researchers knocked down the downstream melanocortin-4 receptor, nicotine stopped reducing food intake. So all of that is to say it works through the same fullness pathways the body uses on its own. To the energy expenditure point, there was a study that had, and again, sample size, eight smokers who spent 24 hours in a metabolic chamber twice, once smoking 24 cigarettes and once not smoking,
Kylee: which is a shit ton of cigarettes.
Zoë: On smoking days, they burned, wait for it, 215 additional calories with 24 cigarettes.
Kylee: Wow. I wonder how much nicotine is in 24 cigarettes compared to a Zyn pouch.
Zoë: 24 cigarettes would basically be one very heavy day of Zyn use. So in the U.S., Zyn can be either in three or six milligram strengths with about 15 pouches per 10. Again, you don't absorb the whole labeled amount on the pouch either. So not all of it crosses the lining of your mouth. Assuming you're taking the highest dose Zyn and you're absorbing all six milligrams, that would be four to six pouches of the highest strength Zyn equivalent to 24 cigarettes in a day.
Kylee: So someone would like be like, oh, I want to burn 200 extra calories. Let me take four Zyn pouches.
Zoë: I cannot stress enough how fucking dumb that is. You know, like if that is how your brain does math.
Kylee: I know. What about, OK, this insulin sensitivity thing. Is that a.
Zoë: Yes.
Kylee: I'd love to hear more about that.
Zoë: What happens is that nicotine raises adrenaline, noradrenaline, and cortisol, so stress hormones that our longtime listeners will recognize that push blood sugar up and just make the body less responsive to insulin. Long-term nicotine gum users had higher insulin levels and were more insulin-resistant than non-users. Snus, which is a Swedish oral tobacco product that basically is like the pouches, has been linked to type 2 diabetes in five pooled Swedish cohorts of men who had never smoked, but who used five or more boxes of snus a week, had about 70 percent higher risk of type 2 diabetes. [Correction: The roughly 70% higher risk was for about a box a day. Five or six boxes a week was linked to about 40% higher risk.] That's from a study in 2017, Journal of Internal Medicine. So the whole metabolic optimization pitch has it like completely backwards and upside down. Nicotine may lower the number on the scale while making the metabolism inside worse, which is, again, why weight is just not an amazing measurement of health.
Kylee: Somebody is using this and then if they are like, oh, shoot, I should stop using it, then they're going to gain the weight back. Yes.
Zoë: When you unsuppress your appetite, that is what happens. Yeah.
Kylee: Yeah,
Zoë: unfortunately. Or fortunately, because your appetite is your body's way of keeping you alive. And that is good. Listen to our episode about hunger.
Kylee: With any of this, like if an athlete's using it, I always have to go to, is it a good thing that we're like suppressing the appetite and then causing risk for underfueling? Correct. Probably not.
Zoë: Let's say in this hypothetical world, nicotine is like the only unhealthy thing you're doing.
Kylee: Yeah.
Zoë: Great, but still not great. a lot of times this can be a comorbidity with other factors. Like, again, especially if you're taking it for alertness. If you're taking it so that you can take on more work and get shit done, how good is your stress? If you're someone who has been given to believe that nicotine is good for your health, I would hazard a guess that there are other elements of your diet and lifestyle that could use some dialing in.
Are nicotine pouches safer than cigarettes?
Kylee: What are the actual risks then if people are like, well, I still might want to use it after this whole spiel that we've been talking about. Still want to try it. And are the pouches as bad as a cigarette? It kind of sounds like maybe not. I don't know.
Zoë: Again, not as bad as a car crash.
Kylee: Okay.
Zoë: So nicotine is highly addictive, significantly more addictive than caffeine because it floods the brain's reward system with high levels of dopamine. But caffeine as a chemical releases a very small amount of dopamine. So it creates a mild physical dependence than a severe addiction. So they're a totally different scale. Again, research would put nicotine closer to heroin and cocaine than coffee. But we are getting closer to consuming it as if it were our daily cup of coffee. Withdrawal can bring craving, irritability, anxiety, bad focus, low mood, bad sleep. The pouches are also not amazing for your mouth. early research documents, changes, and lesions right where the pouch can sit, the long-term oral health and cancer risks are a big question mark right now.
Kylee: See, this is where my brain goes. I'm like, I don't fucking want some kind of mouth cancer.
Zoë: No, same.
Kylee: Because I think about, like, chewing tobacco and seeing D.A.R.E. and then I'm seeing people's teeth rotting out. This is perfect, though, because they're like, the risks are unknown. So the companies are probably like, great, we don't have to, like, we're not going to talk about that.
Zoë: We don't have evidence it makes your teeth rot out.
Kylee: Yeah.
Zoë: Well, it's definitely not the same thing as this doesn't make your teeth rot.
Kylee: You might get cancer, but you might not.
Zoë: But yes, so we do know that too much can cause nicotine poisoning, which is not great. Obviously, this is risky in pregnancy and for young people whose brains are still developing. But are they as dangerous as cigarettes? No, there's no combustion, carbon monoxide or tar. But safer really depends on how and what you're comparing it to, because someone who smokes and then switches completely, yeah, that could plausibly be harm reduction. Someone who doesn't use nicotine and starts for focus is added risk, because nothing was removed, particularly with young people who prior were not using nicotine substances. The alternative isn't that pack of Marlboros. The alternative is no nicotine dependence at all, which is the preferred outcome. So dual use, which is when you pile pouches on top of cigarette, use can absolutely shoot your nicotine exposure out the wazoo.
Kylee: Why would you do that? Is it like to get a higher amount of nicotine in the body then or what?
Zoë: I can't speak to why people do this.
Kylee: Yeah.
Zoë: I am not the person to ask. I just know that there is research on dual use, which blew my mind.
Kylee: Okay.
Zoë: So we're going to have to hit the bricks to find out. If you're someone who has listened to an hour of this podcast and you're a dual user, reach out. We want to get to know you. Like you hinted at, the true statement, we don't know all the long-term effects yet, absolutely doesn't mean science has no issue with this. It means the products are new and long-term data takes time. And my personal comfort with being a guinea pig is minimal.
Kylee: Yeah. No, agreed. Although I will say there's a lot of things out there, like GLP-1s, we don't have long-term research on those too. And I'm like, oh, interesting.
Zoë: But we differently, again, just to throw cold water on that, the research that we do have about these would put the tradeoffs and risks, I think, in another category than GLP-1s. Just always worth noting. People are using these in one way, and the research has not looked at it in this way. That feels worth talking about.
Who profits from nicotine's wellness rebrand?
Kylee: We're talking about nicotine as this rebrand, essentially. There has to be someone benefiting from this, but my brain goes to, oh, man, somebody's excited. Philip Morris is excited. Yeah, exactly.
Zoë: Follow the money. Philip Morris bought Zyn Swedish Match in 2022. So again, really hard to believe any of the wellness scaffolding here when something is owned by Philip Morris. Influencers and podcasters get this hotbed of contrarian content, right? Like this thing of like, oh, doctors don't want you to know this thing that you thought was bad is actually good. or like that Joe Rogan clip we heard of, ooh, it's subversive. And like in California, they won't let you have it. Okay, having it be banned in California is not an endorsement, you guys. Like, not great. And wellness brands get another consumable that promises focus, energy, appetite control, and performance. And you get to like sort of Trojan horse this extremely addictive substance in as a wellness product because you're not getting people hooked on jade egg usage, you know? So, and again, it is short-term effective and will make you feel a certain way, which makes the marketing really persuasive, more persuasive than like some nootropic that just absolutely doesn't fucking work at all. The business model is reliant on repeat customers. Addiction is not some like, oh man, that's a bad side effect. That is the product. That is the business model. It is 100% the aim and ambition of these companies is to monetize and profit on people's addiction to this substance.
Kylee: I feel like there's a political side of things too, right? Do we feel like that politics is playing a role in this and that potentially some of these companies might be influencing?
Zoë: So now that you've mentioned RFK Jr., during his January 2025 Senate confirmation hearing, or he appeared to put a nicotine pouch in his mouth on camera. He has not officially confirmed what it was. He has since called pouches the safest way, probably the safest way to consume nicotine. And when he was a guest on Fox and Friends, he said nicotine itself doesn't cause cancer. There is no evidence that it's carcinogenic. And the thing that we really want to get away from is cigarettes. which is not in and of itself 100% untrue. But like, again, nicotine is problematic for other reasons. So again, I think it's just like really ironic that Mr. MAHA is fighting food dye and seed oils while vouching for something that we do have very solid evidence is addictive and is detrimental to, again, people's meta, like not to over play the like metabolic card here, but your boy's always talking about metabolic health.
Kylee: But he's always talking about optimizing metabolic health. So it's just interesting.
Zoë: Yeah. So here's what has actually happened in terms of regulation. In April of 2025, the HHS layoffs basically shut down the CDC's office on smoking and health. That was like 120 staff vamoosed. That is the office that ran the National Youth Tobacco Survey. You know, the tips from a former smoker campaign. A former director on the record called it the greatest gift to the tobacco industry in the last half century.
Kylee: Oh, interesting.
Zoë: So that's very cool and good. In September of last year of 2025, the FDA launched a pilot to fast-track nicotine pouch reviews. The companies that were selected were Philip Morris with Zyn, Altria with On! Reynolds slash BAT with Velo, and Turning Point Brands, which makes Tucker Carlson's ALP. Zyn's original authorization had taken more than five years. Reuters has reported that White House officials pushed the FDA to speed this specific process up, and the FDA has said in response it wasn't lowering its scientific standards.
Kylee: Okay.
Zoë: In May of 2026, FDA guidance let manufacturers keep selling vapes and pouches while waiting for authorization. So where are we as of now? in June, the FDA granted Zyn a modified risk status, which is the it's the first nicotine pouch to get this. So Philip Morris can now legally advertise, quote, using Zyn instead of cigarettes puts you at lower risk of mouth cancer, heart disease, lung cancer, stroke, emphysema and chronic bronchitis.
Kylee: What? Yeah. This is where we're at now, Zoë. Great.
Zoë: Yes. So again, like fair pouches are far less harmful than cigarettes for people who switch completely. Harm reduction, valid. But I don't think the problem is that message. It's the lower risk than cigarettes. This should be so heavily caveated. And if that claim is reaching people who were never going to potentially engage with nicotine in the first place. So things are great and very cool. Thanks for checking in.
How to quit or cut back on nicotine pouches
Kylee: What if someone happened to be listening and they were like, maybe I do want to cut back on using the pouches. Like, what could they do? Totally.
Zoë: So nicotine replacement therapy using things like those patches, gum, lozenges, is studied and shown in the research to be beneficial for cessation. Tapering to lower strength pouches or fewer per day can work for some people. But again, I think this is a great instance to phone a friend and like follow the research. There's also free help available for folks at 1-800-QUIT-NOW and the Truth Initiative's This is Quitting text program. Those are awesome free programs that I would shout out. And a lot of them can even help like getting prescriptions for different cessation products. So this stuff is tricky,
Kylee: but there is a way out. Yeah, I could see that being challenging, though, with like, oh, like the withdrawal effects of like, yeah, oh, my focus is not as good or, you know, I can't think correctly. And I'm just not wanting to fully rip that bandaid off.
Zoë: Totally. Which is why my concern is so many more people who wouldn't otherwise are picking up this harmful substance because now it's gotten this like bizarre upside down world health halo around it.
Kylee: What should people take away from our convo here about nicotine?
Zoë: RFK Jr. is correct. Nicotine is not the same thing as smoking and pretending that it is isn't helpful and can erase the legitimate harm reduction. But again, less harmful than cigarettes is not the same thing as healthy, safe, or amazing performance-enhancing nootropic for your four-hour podcast extravaganza. An acute effect on attention or appetite is so not worth the long-term cost of this stuff.
Kylee: Yeah, yeah.
Zoë: If you don't use nicotine, there is absolutely zero compelling health, cognitive or athletic reason to start. Do not let advertising and podcast bros and Health and Human Services Secretary RFK Jr. convince you otherwise. The really revealing part of this whole story, and the reason I wanted to talk about it on YDS, is that the fascinating part of this isn't the molecule. It is just how quickly an old addiction can become a wellness trend once it gets better, more modern packaging, a productivity claim, and then a couple bald guys with microphones.
This transcript was lightly edited for readability.
