Exceptional Experiences at Community Health Network

Dissolvable tobacco, made from finely milled tobacco and food grade binders, in the form of strips is being marketed in Indiana. These products will be sold in child resistant packaging, but resemble candy or breath-mints. Each strip contains 60% to 300% of a single cigarettes nicotine dose. If a child were to ingest multiple strips, this could certainly pose a health hazard with symptoms ranging from pallor, tremor, diaphoresis, and emesis to bradycardia and hypotension, possibly even seizures and coma.

Another concern is the teenage populations’ surreptitious use of smokeless tobacco, as the dissolvable strips do not leave odor on clothes or cause smokers-breath. Parents should be made aware that this product poses an increased risk to children, whether by accidental ingestion in younger children or in the form of tobacco abuse in teenagers.