Whether that characterisation is accepted or not, the FDA’s treatment of vaping has undoubtedly been contentious. But the appointment of Bret Koplow, Ph.D., J.D., as permanent director of the Center for Tobacco Products (CTP) could indicate a more pragmatic direction—one that combines strict youth protection with greater recognition of lower-risk alternatives for adults who smoke.

How did the FDA-Vaping conflict come along?

He also criticises the FDA for failing to adequately address widespread misunderstanding of relative risk. That concern has significance beyond the vaping industry because smokers’ decisions depend partly on whether they understand that the primary danger from cigarettes comes from inhaling the products of combustion.

Bret Koplow may be the change the FDA needed

That language reflects the fundamental balance tobacco harm reduction advocates have long requested: differentiate products by risk while preventing youth uptake. More importantly, Koplow’s actions while serving as acting director suggest this may be more than rhetoric. In June, the FDA authorised 20 ZYN nicotine pouch products to carry a modified-risk claim explaining that switching completely from cigarettes to ZYN reduces the risk of several serious smoking-related diseases. Koplow said accurate information about relative harms could help adult smokers make informed decisions.

Is the door to innovation finally being opened?

Perhaps the most significant shift has occurred with vaping itself. In May 2026, the FDA authorised fruit-flavoured e-cigarettes for adult smokers for the first time. Rather than treating flavour and youth protection as necessarily incompatible, Koplow highlighted technology designed to prevent underage access as potentially transformative. The decision suggests a regulatory model in which innovation could address competing objectives: preserving products that may appeal to adult smokers while using technological safeguards to restrict youth access.

The emerging philosophy therefore looks less like deregulation and more like risk-proportionate regulation: facilitate scientifically supported alternatives for adult smokers while acting aggressively against products and marketing practices that threaten youth.

Moving from senseless war to sensible regulations

The FDA regulates a market in which cigarettes—the most dangerous widely used nicotine product—coexist with non-combustible alternatives capable of delivering nicotine without burning tobacco. A coherent regulatory system should recognise those differences while ensuring that products intended for adult smokers do not create unnecessary risks for children.

Clickbait Obsession: Makary’s FDA Exit Revealed Media’s Preference for Political Theater Over Science

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Just weeks after Britain’s new vaping tax takes effect, another major set of nicotine regulations will take effect, adding to what is becoming one of the biggest transformations of the UK’s vaping market in years.

The Government itself has recognised the importance of maintaining a price advantage for vaping over smoking. When designing the duty, it explicitly provided for an accompanying tobacco-duty increase to preserve the financial incentive for smokers to choose vaping rather than cigarettes.

Another layer of regulations is added on October 29th

Adults will also be prohibited from buying—or attempting to buy—these products on behalf of someone under 18. Proxy purchasing can result in a £200 fixed penalty in England, Wales and Scotland and £250 in Northern Ireland, while retailers caught selling directly to minors can face larger penalties if prosecuted.

The new restrictions cannot be considered in isolation

The more difficult question concerns the cumulative effect of Britain’s new vaping policies. The previously discussed October tax does not arrive in isolation. The Government is also considering restrictions affecting vape displays, flavour descriptions, packaging and device appearance. Together, these policies could change not only how much vaping costs, but how easily smokers notice, understand and choose products as alternatives to cigarettes.

ELFBAR extrapolated that response across Britain’s vaping population and estimated that as many as 550,000 adults could potentially increase or resume smoking. Using estimates of smoking’s wider economic burden, the company calculated a theoretical maximum cost of approximately £4.5 billion annually.

That figure should not be interpreted as a prediction. It assumes stated intentions translate into behaviour and that all those affected are former smokers who subsequently resume smoking. Nevertheless, it highlights an unintended consequence policymakers need to consider.

Are lawmakers forgetting what actually matters?

Against that background, the key question surrounding restrictions should not be whether they reduce vaping, but whether they reduce smoking.  Preventing underage sales, proxy purchasing and irresponsible promotion can be pursued without undermining adult access. The 29 October measures largely illustrate that approach.

Timing matters here. From October 1st, vaping becomes more expensive through the VPD. Four weeks later, wider age and promotional controls arrive, while further restrictions on product presentation remain under consideration. Each measure may have a different objective, but smokers experience their cumulative effect.

The test for Britain’s evolving nicotine strategy should therefore be broader than whether fewer people vape. Youth uptake should fall, illegal sellers should face meaningful enforcement and regulated businesses should comply with strict age controls. But adult smoking should fall too – and this should be the priority

If Britain can strengthen youth protections while keeping regulated smoke-free products sufficiently affordable and accessible to compete with cigarettes, the two objectives can reinforce one another. If cumulative restrictions instead discourage switching, encourage relapse or drive consumers towards illicit markets, reducing vaping could come at the expense of reducing the behaviour responsible for vastly greater harm: smoking.

The UK’s Disposable Vape Ban One Year Later: Rising Smoking Rates and Illicit Markets, as Predicted

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The extent of the problem with illegal tobacco is already considerable. From April 2025 to March 2026, HMRC and the Border Force reported seizing about 1.9 billion illicit cigarettes, with an estimated revenue value of around £1.1 billion. Moreover, the Government’s own strategy on illicit tobacco admits that cheap illegal cigarettes give smokers access to an unregulated supply that can weaken the deterrent effect of high tobacco prices.

Industry research recently brought to light by Convenience Store has also raised concerns among independent retailers, since JTI’s Pack Swap data indicates that a high percentage of the cigarettes and hand-rolling tobacco inspected were not subject to UK duty payment. Although these estimates are based on industry sources rather than official market data, they support what the government’s enforcement statistics have already shown: illegal tobacco remains deeply embedded in certain areas of the retail sector.

Illicit tobacco: much more than a revenue issue

This raises an important question regarding tobacco harm reduction: if there is continued demand for nicotine, then what legal alternatives are smokers being advised to select? For many years, Britain adopted a fairly practical attitude towards vaping –  one that had proved successful. The government still holds the view that vaping is less harmful than smoking and that it can assist adult smokers to quit. Strong evidence supports this. The most recent Cochrane living review, which included evidence up to January 2026, once again concluded that nicotine vapes are more effective at helping people to stop smoking than conventional nicotine replacement therapy. Despite this, sadly, the economics of this kind of substitution are now changing.

New vape tax pressures the wrong recipients

Director General of UKVIA, John Dunne, says that viewing compliant vape retailers as businesses which contribute little to their local communities is difficult to square with Britain’s own acknowledgement of vaping as a means of quitting smoking. The association is not asking for less stringent action against illegal sellers; rather, it is urging policymakers to distinguish between responsible specialist retailers and companies that sell illicit products or supply them to minors.

A licensing scheme would be the way to go

That distinction is likely to matter more when duty stamps are introduced alongside the new vaping tax. Starting in October, compliant products entering the market will need stamps, and from April 2027 almost all vaping products not in duty-suspension arrangements will need one. The Government says the scheme should make it easier to identify legal products and help enforcement against illicit trade.

Safer options should remain affordable and accessible

From the point of view of tobacco harm reduction, the reasonable course of action is not to relax cigarette regulations, but to make sure that legal, lower-risk alternatives are easier and more appealing to get than combustible tobacco from the black market.

If genuine vape shops face excise duties, higher operating costs, and stricter regulation, while illegal cigarette sellers escape all three, the imbalance will, of course, become counterproductive.

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The dispute extends well beyond tax rates. At its heart is a fundamental question for European tobacco policy: should cigarettes and smoke-free nicotine products be progressively regulated in similar ways, or should taxation and regulation reflect their very different risk profiles?

Sweden must continue to fight for its success

Sweden has historically experienced widespread snus use and more recently growing uptake of nicotine pouches, while maintaining exceptionally low cigarette smoking. Smoke Free Sweden’s Delon Human has therefore urged the incoming Swedish government to defend risk-proportionate taxation. He argues that narrowing the price advantage of smoke-free alternatives over cigarettes could weaken the incentive for smokers to switch. That principle—lower risk, lower tax—is increasingly important as Brussels considers not only the TED but a much broader overhaul of European tobacco policy.

Cochrane confirms vaping outperforms NRTs

World Vapers’ Alliance director Michael Landl said the results strengthen the case for formally incorporating vaping into European smoking-cessation policy. He argues that increasingly restrictive regulation risks limiting access to precisely the alternatives capable of helping smokers leave cigarettes behind.

Brussels want to “modernise” tobacco framework

The Commission says that existing tobacco-control legislation has contributed to declining smoking and tobacco-related mortality, and believes that the rapid emergence of novel nicotine products—particularly their use among young people—requires the framework to be modernised. Harm reduction advocates agree that youth access requires effective controls but dispute the idea that this necessitates regulating non-combustible alternatives increasingly like cigarettes.

Nicotine abstinence vs harm reduction: what will prevail?

Taxation can powerfully influence that choice. If cigarettes and smoke-free alternatives become similarly expensive, some of the economic incentive for switching disappears. Excessive restrictions could also encourage cross-border purchasing and illicit markets rather than eliminating demand.

With both the TED and wider tobacco legislation under review, Brussels has an opportunity to place that distinction at the centre of policy: maintain strong protections against youth uptake and smoking while ensuring adult smokers retain affordable access to regulated alternatives. If Europe’s ultimate objective is reducing smoking-related death and disease, taxing and regulating nicotine according to risk rather than treating every product like a cigarette may offer the more effective route to a smoke-free future.

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For the Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA), New Zealand provides a particularly relevant case study for neighbouring governments that continue to prohibit or heavily restrict lower-risk nicotine products. Executive Coordinator Nancy Loucas argues that the results challenge predictions that regulated vaping access would derail progress against cigarettes.

Smoking decreases as vaping increases (worldwide)

These figures contrast dramatically with the U.S. youth smoking epidemic of previous decades. They also complicate the argument that introducing alternative nicotine products must inevitably renormalise cigarette smoking. Naturally, population trends alone cannot prove vaping caused declining smoking rates; taxation, smoke-free laws, changing social attitudes, prevention campaigns and other factors all contribute.

That distinction is really important. While it’s crucial to prevent young people from starting nicotine, tackling vaping and eliminating smoking are not the same public health goals. Cigarettes are especially dangerous since the combustion process creates a toxic mix that leads to most tobacco-related diseases.

Evidence for vaping as a smoking cessation tool keeps strengthening

In seven trials with 2,544 participants, nicotine vaping increased quit rates by 59% compared to NRT. To put it simply, about eight to ten out of every 100 people using nicotine e-cigarettes managed to quit for at least six months, while roughly six out of 100 who used patches, gum, or other NRT were successful.

That places vaping firmly within the evidence-based smoking cessation toolkit rather than merely making it an alternative consumer product.

A model to follow

New Zealand has increasingly attempted to combine adult access with measures intended to prevent youth uptake. Its government explicitly recognises less harmful alternatives such as vaping as practical tools for smokers trying to quit. CAPHRA argues that this approach deserves particular consideration across Asia, where millions continue to smoke while several governments favour prohibition or severe restrictions on vaping.

There are important qualifications. New Zealand authorities acknowledge that illicit cigarettes could account for part of the accelerated reduction in legal tobacco sales, while persistent smoking inequalities remain, particularly among Māori and more deprived communities. These challenges reinforce the need for targeted cessation support rather than complacency.

The undeniable case for tobacco harm reduction

New Zealand’s experience may not prove that vaping alone caused its remarkable decline in smoking. However, it does show that widespread access to vaping goes hand in hand with decreased smoking rates.

Punished for Success? New Zealand’s “Dirty Ashtray” Reveals The FCTC’s Embedded Bias

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The European Union is entering a potentially decisive period for tobacco harm reduction. With its latest tobacco consultation now closed, Brussels must decide whether future regulation will recognise the very different risks posed by cigarettes, vapes, heated tobacco products and nicotine pouches—or increasingly treat them as variations of the same problem.

Was the consultation truly neutral? 

His concern is particularly relevant to tobacco harm reduction because combining fundamentally different nicotine products within broad regulatory questions can obscure differences in relative risk. Polosa argues that reducing smoking-related disease and mortality should remain the central objective and that future EU legislation should clearly distinguish combustible cigarettes from non-combustible alternatives.

Protecting youth without protecting cigarettes

However, preventing youth nicotine use and encouraging adults to stop smoking do not have to be competing objectives. Age restrictions, responsible retailing, product standards and appropriately designed marketing rules can protect minors without removing potentially valuable alternatives from adults who smoke. The danger comes when youth protection becomes justification for eliminating distinctions between combustible and smoke-free products.

The excellent model that Europe refuses to acknowledge

Norwegian tobacco researcher Karl E. Lund believes policymakers should look more closely at Scandinavia. Rather than focusing exclusively on eliminating nicotine consumption, Lund argues that regulation should help people who cannot or do not wish to stop using nicotine move away from smoking. Sweden is particularly important because cigarettes have increasingly been displaced by non-combustible alternatives such as snus and nicotine pouches.

That argument becomes increasingly relevant when considering the estimated 90–100 million Europeans who still smoke despite decades of taxation, advertising restrictions, health warnings and smoke-free policies. Traditional tobacco control has achieved substantial progress. The issue is whether the remaining smoking population will respond to ever-tighter versions of the same policies—or whether substitution should become a larger part of Europe’s strategy.

Harsh restrictions support the illicit market

Perhaps the most overlooked issue in the consultation is how Europe communicates relative risk. The growing belief that vaping is as dangerous as smoking demonstrates what can happen when public-health messages emphasise uncertainty without adequately explaining the magnitude of risk. Even youth data challenge the assumption that exaggerated perceptions necessarily discourage experimentation: in 2024, 58% of British 11–17-year-olds who knew about vaping believed it was as harmful or more harmful than smoking, yet ASH noted that such beliefs did not appear to prevent young people from trying vapes.

Accurate communication therefore matters for both credibility and informed decision-making.

What will Brussels do with the responses this time round?

Stricter tobacco-control groups are pushing Brussels in the opposite direction, calling for tougher regulation of newer products, stronger restrictions on online promotion and greater freedom for Member States to impose additional measures. Agricultural representatives, meanwhile, have complained that the consultation did not adequately capture their sector’s concerns.

Europe therefore faces a choice that extends well beyond flavours, advertising or packaging. It can increasingly regulate nicotine by its presence, or regulate products by their risks. For tobacco harm reduction advocates, the test of the consultation’s credibility will now be straightforward: whether Brussels genuinely listens to the evidence it asked Europeans to provide.

From Poland to Lithuania: Are Europe’s Nicotine Policies Reasonable or Going Too Far?

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Texas Democratic U.S. Senate candidate James Talarico is suggesting that his Republican opponent for the seat supports banning cannabis in order to aid his political donors in the alcohol and tobacco industries.

“People are outraged across the state, and it’s not any one political party,” Talarico said of recently enacted state restrictions on hemp products in an interview with KTSM-TV. “It’s people across the spectrum.”

The comments come as Texas regulators are moving to ban certain hemp-derived THC cannabis products, including those containing delta-8 and delta-10 THC. Now classified as Schedule I drugs under state law, possession is treated as a felony, carrying a punishment of 180 days to two years in prison and fines of up to $10,000.

“Instead of getting it now from a local small business, Texans are now going to get it off the black market,” the Democrat, who currently serves as a state representative, said. “So this ban is a gift to the drug cartels.”

Beyond aiding cartels, though, Talarico also believes making hemp products illegal while continuing to ban marijuana is a fiscal benefit for tobacco and alcohol companies—and he’s alleging that state Attorney General Ken Paxton (R), his opponent for the U.S. Senate seat, supports cannabis prohibition in order to benefit his campaign contributors in those industries.

“It doesn’t make any sense until you follow the money and realize that it is big beer and big tobacco that are funding the politicians, like Ken Paxton, who turned around and banned these safe THC products in order to enrich the big beer and a big tobacco lobby,” Talarico said.

Paxton did not reply to KTSM’s request for comment, the outlet reported.

This isn’t the first time that Talarico has voiced support for cannabis reform or argued that prohibition of the plant benefits alcohol and tobacco companies.

In an interview with The Breakfast Club last week, the Democratic candidate said that keeping marijuana illegal while also moving to restrict hemp THC products is an “insane” form of “corruption.”

“Think about what industries are most worried about THC products being readily available: Big Beer, Big Tobacco, right? And so they were the ones pushing this THC ban because it hurts their bottom line,” he said. “And a lot of research shows that THC—cannabis—these products are safer and less addictive than than beer or tobacco.”

“And so to me, this is a prime example of what corruption looks like when you’ve got big industries buying politicians and pushing bills that harm people, but benefit them financially,” Talarico said.

The Senate candidate also noted that “a lot of young Texans, a lot of our veterans, they use THC products, for PTSD. Seniors use it.”

The recently adopted Texas hemp product restrictions are being challenged with a federal lawsuit filed by hemp companies.

A judge this week declined their request to impose a temporary restraining order on the THC crackdown while the overall litigation is considered.

Paxton, for his part, filed lawsuits to block several Texas cities from implementing local voter-approved laws to decriminalize marijuana in his capacity as state attorney general.

Meanwhile, voters in Houston will decide on an initiative to make misdemeanor marijuana possession the “lowest possible enforcement priority” for local police on the November ballot.

Image elements courtesy of Antonioaesparza and Gage Skidmore.

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HB 513, one of the bills that may be a slight break for vape sellers, has passed. Described as a “tax deduction for cigarette wholesalers when retailers fail to pay”, this may be one of the few pieces of legislation that doesn’t leave vapers unhappy with the law. 

Recap: What does this bill do?

As stated above, the majority of the bill focuses on taxes and how to cope with debts from uncollected tobacco taxes. Ohio is one of the states that taxes e liquids at a fairly high rate – 10 cents per milliliter of juice. That tax adds up quickly, and with a tax that high, there is incentive to start finding ways around the tax. One way that may have been done is through lack of clarity as to who pays the tax. When e liquid is sold from wholesale to retailers, there should be tax collected, but with lack of communication, it may not be clear who is responsible for this large tax.

Most of the bill deals with how to handle those taxes, particularly if they have not been paid. However, the taxation part is not the part that concerns vapers – it is the part of HB513 described by Ohio Capital Journal as “A late amendment tacked on prohibitions for local tobacco regulations.” The relevant parts of the bill are as follows:

“No political subdivision may enact, adopt, renew, maintain, enforce, or continue in existence any charter provision, ordinance, resolution, rule, or other measure that conflicts with or preempts any policy of the state regarding the regulation of tobacco products or alternative nicotine products.”

What happens now?

The reason this HB513 was referred to as a preemption bill was because the bill prevents any regulations that are more stringent than state tobacco laws from taking precedence. Currently, there are two main cities that would come into conflict with this bill. Since HB513 is a state law and the others are city laws, state law would take precedence over the bans. The fact that HB513 conflicts with those laws is what attracted attention in the first place. 

Columbus is a city in Ohio that has banned all flavored tobacco products –  a ban that is stricter than the FDA allowed products. Columbus’s ban was set to start in January 2024, but is likely not to come into effect due to the passing of HB513. Toledo is another city that has a ban on flavored cartridges. That ban is also in conflict with HB513. 

Though law and its application are two different things, HB513 passing is one of the more positive pieces of legislation concerning vapers for a long time.

References: 

What will DeWine sign? Lawmakers passed more than 30 bills on last day of session

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Turkey’s proposed tobacco legislation represents one of the most draconian anti-nicotine frameworks to date. By proposing a complete ban on tobacco products, including their production, sale, and consumption by 2040, Ankara is putting the finishing touches on its prohibitionist endgame. The proposal is critical in that it does not draw a distinction between combustible cigarettes and reduced-risk alternatives. Instead, it broadens the concept of “tobacco products,” including e-cigarettes and heated tobacco as well as all systems that contain nicotine.

Ignoring different risk levels

A wide body of toxicological and epidemiological literature has long shown that the carcinogenic properties of smoking derive from combustion byproducts—tar, carbon monoxide, and thousands of toxicants produced when tobacco is burned. While nicotine, although addictive, is not classified as a carcinogen by major authorities and is of minor importance in cancer causation.

But frameworks such as the one proposed in Turkey’s draft law obliterate these distinctions, building regulatory environments in which less harmful products are regulated with the same strictness as the most dangerous ones. This could sabotage one of the biggest levers to help reduce smoking-related disease: substitution.

An unfortunate global pattern — from Seoul to Hawaii

A fork in the road for Bangladesh?

By contrast, Bangladesh is now reviewing its planned 2025 ban on vaping and other new nicotine products. Advocacy groups such as the Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA), say this review is an opportunity to adopt a more pragmatic, risk-proportionate framework. Their stance reflects a commonly held view among harm reduction experts: it is possible to engage in effective tobacco control without forcing a choice between protecting youth and reducing harm for adults. Both can be accomplished through targeted regulation — strict age limits, product standards, and enforcement against illicit sales — while keeping access to safer alternatives for smokers.

The proliferation of such approaches was flagged by groups such as Prohibition Does Not Work (PDNW) and the Observatory for Harm Reduction in Medicine, which decried them as unscientific and inconsistent with reality. Demand doesn’t disappear; it moves, based on data from jurisdictions that have enacted restrictive policies. In the Netherlands, for instance, where flavour restrictions were introduced a few years earlier, a large proportion of users continue to consume outlawed products through the black market or cross-border access following these laws.

So what actually reduces smoking in the real world?

These results reinforce an important lesson: when smokers are given the opportunity to transition to attractive, lower-risk alternatives, many will do so. By contrast, when such alternatives are limited or stigmatized, smoking reductions slow and even reverse.

Turkey’s proposed law reflects a wider dilemma worldwide. Policymakers can choose effective nicotine elimination strategies that penalize all products uniformly, or proceed with risk-proportional measures informed by available science.

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Alcohol and tobacco cause far more harms to people who consume them, and to society overall, than marijuana does, according to a new government-funded study.

A panel of 20 experts with professional experience with substance use issues from across Canada were asked to evaluate 16 different drugs on 10 dimensions of harm to consumers, as well as six dimensions of harm to others, scoring each on a scale of 0 to 100.

“Alcohol causes the most harm overall, with a cumulative weighted score of 79,” the study, published in the Journal of Psychopharmacology, found. “It was followed by tobacco (45), nonprescription opioids (33), cocaine (19), methamphetamine (19), and cannabis (15).”

The analysis, which was supported with Canadian Institutes for Health Research grant funds, concluded that marijuana’s biggest harm comes not from its effect on consumers but instead is related to the illegal market.

“Cannabis’s highest weighted score was for organized criminal activity,” the paper, authored by a large team of academics affiliated with various research institutions throughout Canada, the United Kingdom and New Zealand, says. “Though more than 70 percent of Canadians who purchase cannabis now do so through legal sources, organized criminal groups are heavily involved in the remaining illegal cannabis market, from production to distribution.”

Marijuana—which was legalized nationally in Canada in 2018 but remains federally prohibited in the U.S.—is not completely without harms to consumers, however, with the study finding that it “also scored relatively high for mental harms to users (dependence, withdrawal, short- and long-term impairment of mental functioning), ranking third in that combined category.”

When it comes to alcohol, which is federally legal in the U.S., it “ranked first in 9 of the 16 harm categories: drug-related damage to physical health, withdrawal, short-term impairment of mental functioning, long-term impairment of mental functioning, loss of tangibles, loss of relationships, injury, family and social adversity, and economic cost,” the study found.

“This analysis of drug harms in Canada found that alcohol causes the most harm overall… Alcohol was followed by tobacco, nonprescription opioids (like fentanyl), cocaine, methamphetamine, and cannabis.”

Tobacco “ranked first in 4 of the 16 harm categories: drug-related mortality, drug-specific damage to physical health, dependence, and environmental damage,” the researchers wrote.

The paper concludes by urging governments to “consider the harm—both individual and societal—caused by drugs and by the laws and regulations that govern them” when developing drug policies.

The findings about relative harms of different substances may help explain why alcohol consumption—and particularly tobacco use—have been gradually declining over recent years, and why multiple surveys and studies have indicated that more adults are opting for marijuana.

For example, recent polling shows that younger Americans are increasingly using cannabis-infused beverages as a substitute for alcohol—with one in three millennials and Gen Z workers choosing THC drinks over booze for after-work activities like happy hours.

Another survey released last October found that a majority of Americans believe marijuana represents a “healthier option” than alcohol. And most also expect cannabis to be legal in all 50 states within the next five years.

Smoking marijuana is also associated with “significantly” reduced rates of alcohol consumption, according to a recent federally funded study that involved adults smoking joints in a makeshift bar.

A study published in 2024 that looked at adults who drink cannabis-infused beverages found more evidence of a “substitution effect,” with a significant majority of participants reporting reduced alcohol use after incorporating cannabinoid drinks into their routines.

In September, an international study identified a a “strong negative association” between tobacco use and legal medical marijuana sales, indicating a “strong potential substitution effect” where people choose to use cannabis where it is allowed instead of smoking cigarettes.

Meanwhile, as the Trump administration considers moving marijuana out of Schedule I, the most restrictive category under U.S. federal law, another recent study concluded that cannabis isn’t as dangerous as its current classification would suggest.

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