The Invention Of A Safer Cigarette
Tobacco was initially used by pre-Columbian Native Americans,
who smoked it in pipes and even used it for hallucinogenic
purposes in shamanic rituals. Christopher Columbus was given
tobacco by natives and introduced it Europe when he returned
from North America.
However, tobacco did not become widely used in Europe until the
middle of the 16th century, when explorers and diplomats such as
France's Jean Nicot (for whom nicotine was named) popularized
its use. Tobacco was introduced to France in 1556, Portugal in
1558, Spain in 1559, and England in 1565.
Initially, tobacco was produced for pipe smoking, chewing and
snuff. Cigarettes were made in a crude, hand-rolled form since
the early 1600s, but did not become popular in America until
after the civil war. Cigarette sales surged with introduction of
the cigarette rolling machine by James Bonsack in 1883, in a
contest sponsored by tobacco company Allen and Ginter, who
promised $75,000 to the first person to invent a fast
cigarette-rolling machine. This facilitated industrialized
production and widespread distribution of cigarettes.
Since then, nicotine addiction has become a public-health
concern in virtually every nation on Earth. Warnings about the
health risks of smoking were muted until the 1950's and 1960's,
when a series of unsuccessful lawsuits forced the issue into the
public eye. Not until the 1990's would a lawsuit be won by the
plaintiff. However, the American Surgeon General first demanded
that warning labels be placed on cigarette packages started in
1966.
Both the tar and nicotine in cigarettes are toxins, each its own
way; and that's without mentioning the poisonous substances such
as arsenic used in the curing process. Nicotine is as addictive
as heroin or cocaine, and has long-lasting effects on the
brain's dopamine systems. The "tar" which filters attempt to
remove falls into four categories of substances: nitrosamines,
widely held to be the most carcinogenic of all the agents in
tobacco smoke; aldehydes, created by the burning of sugars and
cellulose in tobacco; polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons which
form in the cigarette behind the burning tip; and trace amounts
of heavy metals from fertilizers used to grow the plant.
Tobacco companies were loath to admit in public that they knew
the dangers posed by their product; however, in a sideways
concession to tobacco foes, they produced what were advertised
as "safer" filtered cigarettes.
In the 1958 a scientist working for Philip Morris went so far as
to admit publicly that, "Evidence is builing up that heavy
smoking contributes to lung cancer." He cleverly suggested that
this admission could be turned into a "wealth of ammunition" to
attack the competion by suggesting that Philip Morris, unlike
its competitors, made cigarettes with filters to screen out the
toxins. In 1986 the CEO of British American Tobacco, Patrick
Sheehy, had a different opinion, and wrote that, "in attempting
to develop a "safe" cigarette you are, by implication, in danger
of being interpreted as accepting the current product is unsafe,
and this is not a position that I think we should take."
However much tobacco executives attempted to hide the dangers of
their product from the public, increasing market demand
eventually forced all cigarette companies to develop some filter
systems for their cigarettes. Filtered cigarettes accounted for
only 1 percent of cigarette purchases in 1950, but this had
soared to 87 percent by 1975.
However, the development of filtered cigarettes met two hurdles,
one medical and the other a matter of personal taste. Because
smokers are nicotine addicts, they will smoke until their
craving for nicotine is satisfied. A filter which removes
nicotine will simply prompt them to inhale more deeply or smoke
more cigarettes. A filter which removes the tar components of
tobacco will remove the taste and smoking sensation to which
smokers have become accustomed, and consumers find such a
product lacking in "flavor". Due to compensatory behavior by
smokers, the amount of toxins consumed is not significantly less
than from an unfiltered cigarette, and there is no proof
filtered cigarettes are less of health risk.
Still, tobacco companies persist in their efforts to develop
better filters. Often they are hampered not by lack of technical
knowledge but by consumer behavior. In 1975, Brown and
Williamson introduced a new cigarette called Fact, with a new
filter designed to selectively remove toxic compounds such a
cyanide. However the product did not please consumers, and was
removed from the market two years later.
An internet search for "cigarette filter patent" produces
425,000 results as manufacturers strive to outdo each over in
the invention of filter materials and baffles to construct a
cigarette which they claim is less toxic but still appealing to
smokers.
It is difficult to make a filter which removes tar but not
nicotine, and tobacco companies have now focused their attention
on growing tobacco plants with a higher nicotine content, in
order to satisfy smokers' nicotine addiction with
proportionately less exposure to tar. Rumors that cigarette
companies "spike"their products with extra nicotine have met
with public uproar, since cigarettes are sold as a natural
agricultural product.
Scientists have also experiments with tobacco substitutes , with
ingredients such as wood pulp, which would produce smoke flavor
with less tar. Legal hurdles have stopped such projects, as they
are no longer "natural" but rather an artificially-manufactured
substance about which health claims are being made. Such
products are treated as drugs, and subject to lengthy regulatory
battles before they are allowed to be sold. For the tobacco
companies, manipulating naturally-grown tobacco leaf is cheaper
and more profitable in a competitive marketplace. Since a
cigarette is basically a delivery system for an addictive drug,
nicotine, it is theoretically possible to produce a product
which has only nicotine, without the diversion of tar. In fact,
such a product exists: the nicotine patch. At its most basic
level, it has exactly the same function as a cigarette. However,
it has less social cachet than the packaging, rituals and
paraphenalia associated with smoking: it is for people who want
to wean themselves off their addiction.