Cigarette smoking kills more than 480,000 Americans each year and is the main reason behind lungs and heart diseases.
Under the new rule proposed by Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the level of nicotine in cigarettes sold in U.S would be taken down drastically, reported by NBC.
If the proposal passes, then combustible tobacco products would lose their ability to make most people addicted, though this rule is not applied to vapes and e-cigarettes.
Brian King, director of the FDA’s Centre for Tobacco Products, shared during a press conference, noting, "By reducing the nicotine level of cigarettes and certain other combusted tobacco products to a level low enough to no longer create or sustain addiction, the cycle of exposure to these toxic chemicals can be broken."
According to the experts, the level of nicotine on average is 13 milligrams per cigarette, which after the finalisation of the proposal will be reduced to 0.07 milligrams, that is a 95% cut down.
The plan was one of the last orders under Biden’s administration, hence the possibility of it moving forward depends on president-elect Trump and his government.
"If there’s a goal to make America healthy again, I can’t imagine anything more important to get done than this," Dr. Robert Califf, the FDA commissioner said on the briefing call.
If the rule moves forward, then companies will be given two years’ time to make necessary changes.
Furthermore, the proposal was largely welcomed by public health officials though the American Lung Associations wants the rule to cover all products.
Nearly 48 million kids and young adults would be saved from becoming addict if the rule passes along with that it would encourage around 13 million people to stop smoking within a year.
