Nicotine pouches: solution or smokescreen?
Best of the Spectator
The Spectator
4.4 • 785 Ratings
🗓️ 1 December 2025
⏱️ 29 minutes
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Summary
There has been a renewed focus on tobacco and nicotine products across Europe. Just as countries seek to speed up the process to a smoke-free future, through measures like generational smoking bans and increased regulations on packaging and advertising, there has been a sharp increase in young people using alternative nicotine products like vapes and pouches.
Philip Morris International (PMI) expects to see two-thirds of its revenue come from smoke-free products by 2030 – including its product, Zyn. Dr Moira Gilchrist, chief communications officer at PMI, and Charlie Weimers MEP, a member of the Swedish Democrats, join The Spectator’s Lara Brown to talk about how nicotine pouches can help the transition away from tobacco to a smoke-free future. While this podcast was sponsored by PMI, The Spectator retained full editorial control, with no subject off-limits. Is PMI’s concern genuine or purely for future-proofing their business? What lessons can the UK take from Sweden, which expects to be declared the first ‘smoke-free’ country? And what does the science say?
This podcast is sponsored by Philip Morris International.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Subscribe to The Spectator in our Black Friday Flash Sale and you'll get 12 weeks of the magazine, along with full access to all of our online content, for just £12. Not only that, but we'll also send you a bottle of Johnny Walker Black Label Whiskey worth £30 on the shops, absolutely free. |
| 0:18.3 | Hurry though, this ridiculously good offer, ends on the 1st of December. |
| 0:22.6 | Go to www.com.com.uk-Frily Friday. |
| 0:32.9 | Welcome to a special edition podcast from The Spectator. |
| 0:36.1 | My name is Laura Brown, and I'm the |
| 0:37.5 | Spectator's commissioning editor. Philip Morris International is one of the world's most interesting |
| 0:41.3 | and controversial companies. They're the firm behind Marlborough cigarettes, probably their best |
| 0:45.3 | known brand. But in the 21st century, the company is diversified into smoke-free products. |
| 0:50.6 | These include electronic cigarettes, heated tobacco products, and also nicotine pouches, like their brand Zinn, with the topic we're going to discuss now. |
| 0:57.9 | What is motivating PMI, and to what extent is this driven from genuine concern rather than just future-proofing? |
| 1:03.5 | Dr. Moira Gilchrist, Chief Communications Officer for PMI, joins me now, alongside MEP Charlie Weimers, who is vice chair of the European Conservatives and Reformists Group. |
| 1:15.4 | Now, we should say from the offset that Philip Morris has sponsored this podcast. In return, we can ask any questions we want. |
| 1:22.0 | So starting with that, Moira, I'm quite interested. Why did you want to sponsor this podcast? |
| 1:26.7 | Would it be fair to say you're looking to promote Zinn or your own product? |
| 1:29.6 | No, this is absolutely nothing to do with product promotion. I think what this is to do with is misinformation and making sure that we are straightening out the facts about these products, which I believe have an enormous potential to help smokers move away from cigarettes, |
| 1:46.4 | the most dangerous way that you could possibly consume nicotine. |
| 1:51.2 | So we see a lot of misinformation floating around, |
| 1:53.9 | reaching the ears of policymakers, |
| 1:55.5 | and ultimately potentially ending up with regulation |
| 1:59.6 | that's not going to help the problems of smoking may |
| 2:03.1 | actually have the potential of being counterproductive. So that's why I'm here and that's why we're |
| 2:09.3 | sponsoring this podcast. I think I find PMI's commitment to a smoke-free future very interesting |
... |
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