According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the consumption of combustible tobacco – smoking cigarettes, more specifically – remains one of the world’s biggest public health challenges. The Middle East, where approximately 16 percent of the region’s adult population smokes cigarettes, is certainly no outlier.
Smoking rates in the region have remained consistently high despite public health efforts, highlighting the necessity for complementary measures to support and accelerate the cessation of smoking.
Leading global regulatory entities and research bodies such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and the European Union have acknowledged the health risks associated with the combustion of tobacco, which releases chemical compounds linked to several health issues.
In this context, Tobacco Harm Reduction (THR), aims to mitigate the adverse health effects associated with continued smoking by encouraging adult smokers who will not quit, to switch completely to reduced-risk alternatives to cigarettes.
Read: From smoke rings to science: The evolving world of tobacco
Tobacco use in the Middle East
In the Middle East alone, a study by Global Health Consults assessing tobacco harm reduction and improved treatment as strategies to reduce smoking-related deaths, encompassing the 390 million people living in the region, as well as Egypt and Pakistan, found that about 61 million adults use tobacco products.
The report calculated the combined impact of embracing THR efforts, alongside improved cessation services and enhanced lung cancer treatment, on long-term health trends across seven Middle Eastern countries. The analysis shows that these interventions could save over 1.8 million lives by 2060 – offering a major opportunity to advance public health beyond the limited impact of current tobacco control efforts.
A report by the Royal College of Physicians in London concluded that nicotine itself is not a carcinogen. Instead, the harmful effects of combustible tobacco come primarily from the toxic chemicals in cigarette smoke produced by burning tobacco. The same report indicates that in 2014, smoking caused over 450,000 (or about 4 percent of all) hospital admissions in England.
As such, proponents of THR strategies contend that delivering nicotine effectively without combustion could result in the significant reduction of the harm associated with smoking.
UAE regulates non-tobacco oral nicotine pouches
To this end, tobacco-free oral nicotine pouches, which are placed under the lip so nicotine can be effectively absorbed, have been recently regulated in the UAE. According to the available industry scientific data to date, these pouches present a smoke-free alternative with reduced-risk potential to adult smokers.
Lower risk alternative
Today, tobacco-free oral nicotine pouches are used by millions of consumers worldwide and have been recognized as a lower-risk alternative for nicotine use by several government bodies and members of the public health community. In fact, the product has aided in reducing smoking rates in countries like Sweden for decades.
Official data from Sweden’s public health authority has revealed that the smoking rate among Swedish nationals was 5.3 percent in 2024, approaching WHO’s definition of a smoke-free nation, with less than 5 percent smoking rate. If Sweden is to reach its smoke-free status this year, it will be about 15 years ahead of the EU target to create a tobacco-free generation by 2040.
As such, nicotine pouches have the potential to play a significant role in reducing smoking rates and associated risk profiles. But this can only be achieved if supported by well-designed, risk-appropriate regulatory frameworks that guarantee product safety and quality, including strict ingredient and manufacturing standards.
In order to leverage tobacco-free oral nicotine pouches as an effective THR tool and enable the product’s potential to reduce the health impact associated with smoking, policymakers must develop a balanced legislation that takes the reduced-risk profile of the category into consideration.
In this context, the WHO has highlighted the ineffectiveness of the conventional approach to smoking cessation, predicting that with the continuation of current tobacco control efforts alone, the Middle East will experience only a nominal decrease in smoking prevalence, from 33.3 percent in 2020 to 31 percent in 2025.
Emerging products like tobacco-free oral nicotine pouches reflect the industry’s ongoing innovation aimed at reducing smoking rates – progress that can be further supported through constructive, transparent dialogue with stakeholders and policymakers who play a vital role in shaping a smokeless future.
Achieving this vision will require a solid foundation of scientific research, a strong commitment to public health, and a steady stream of products designed to offer lower-risk alternatives to consumers who would otherwise continue to smoke.
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