Soldiers use tobacco pouches at a much higher rates than most American adults, a new study found. This news, while noteworthy, is unlikely to surprise anyone who is now, or has been, in the military.
Tossing in a pinch of dip, or a pouch, is so common in some units that you might spend your entire enlistment thinking your sergeant has an underbite and never realize that he just has a whole horseshoe of Grizzly Wintergreen Long Cut stuffed in his lower lip at all hours of the day.
As for the study, researchers surveyed 1,957 soldiers at Fort Liberty, North Carolina from 2022 and 2023, according to a news release from the University of Virginia, which conducted the study along with the Fort Liberty Department of Public Health and the University of North Carolina Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Of those soldiers who responded, 23.8% reported that they had used nicotine pouches in the past 30 days, the news release says. That compared with 2.9% of all American adults who reported ever using nicotine pouches in a separate 2022 study.
In fact, the popularity of nicotine pouches among soldiers grew as the survey was conducted, with 24.7% of soldiers reporting in 2023 that they used nicotine pouches, compared with 20.2% in 2022.
As if to underscore the point, one person on the unofficial Army subreddit recently asked if the PX at an Army installation in Poland sells nicotine pouches, adding: “Can’t live without them.”
In focus groups conducted in tandem with the survey, some respondents said that one reason why soldiers are using nicotine pouches is that their friends and co-workers are using them, said Melissa Little, the lead author for the study.
“And then also, they talked about it being almost like an ‘upper,’” Little told Task & Purpose. “So, when they do their field exercise and they’re carrying what they can carry and they’re out in the field for a week or two at a time, they can’t carry a bunch of energy drinks, but they can carry a bunch of tins of Zyn or On”
While some soldiers use nicotine products mostly or only in the field, Little said officials worry whether troops will be able to stop once their military exercises have ended.
The study also found that nicotine pouches are viewed as a safer alternative to alcohol, given the severe repercussions that soldiers can face for alcohol-related incidents, and illegal substances, Little said. But it’s unclear what types of health risks that soldiers who use nicotine pouches over a long period could face.
“Nicotine pouches are seen as safer than traditional products, even though we don’t actually know the harms,” Little said. “The difference between nicotine pouches and traditional smokeless tobacco is with traditional smokeless tobacco, you spit out the juice. But with nicotine pouches, there isn’t actually any tobacco leaf in them. It’s a synthetic nicotine powder. And so, you can swallow the nicotine juice that comes from that, and we really don’t know the long-term health effects of that.”
What is known is that nicotine use is associated with depression and anxiety and can affect the brain development of younger soldiers, and the more often that people use it, the more likely that they will become addicted to it, she said.
It’s also possible that soldiers who use nicotine pouches could decide to use other tobacco products as well, such as cigarettes or a hookah, Little said. She noted that smoking a hookah for an hour is the equivalent of smoking 100 cigarettes.
“I just think it would be really awful if we had a population that’s given so much and done so much for our country, and we just let them use a product without warning them about the potential consequences, and we find out later how bad it was,” Little said.
Little has worked with service members to help them quit tobacco products. She said she feels that it is important for people to know that troops are using tobacco pouches at such high rates.
“My thing is, look: It’s your choice; it’s up to you what you want to do,” Little said. “If it’s a legal product, anybody can use these things. My issue is when we market things to soldiers, when we make it more likely that they are going to initiate these products and we don’t give them all the information, then I think it’s less of a choice, because you don’t have an informed decision-making ability.”
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