The 13th World Conference on Tobacco OR Health

Objective: To investigate the pharmacological and other chemical effects of tobacco additives.

Methods: A “snowball” sampling method of the UCSF Legacy Tobacco Documents Library, in conjunction with searching PubMed, the U. of Indiana list of cigarette additives, review of tobacco related and reference textbooks, including the Physicians Desk Reference for Herbal Medicines, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture Dr. Duke Phytochemical Database, the Memorial Sloan Kettering, the U.S. Patent and Trademark and other internet websites.

Results: Over 200 of 599 documented cigarette additives were found to have possible pharmacological or chemical effects that could potentially affect human health. Conclusions: While the tobacco industry has stated that many of the additives were added specifically for improving the flavoring and customer acceptance, the data suggests that there may have been other or multiple intended actions of many additives. Our results suggest the possibility that over 200 of 599 documented cigarette additives may have pharmacological actions that can enhance or maintain nicotine delivery, increase the addictiveness of cigarettes, mask or treat symptoms and illnesses associated with smoking behavior, and have chemical effects to camouflage environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) emitted from cigarettes. Whether such uses were intended for all or many of the agents is unknown. The results provide a clear rationale for regulatory control of the use of tobacco additives.