• Snus, an oral product that is significantly safer than smoking, is acting as a widespread substitute for cigarettes in Norway;
  • 25% of Norwegians aged 16 to 74 smoked daily in 2005; this figure dropped to 7% by 2023, while 5% of Norwegians used snus daily in 2005, this had increased to 16% in 2023;
  • This consumer-led shift towards less risky forms of nicotine use will reduce tobacco-related harms.

Sweden’s historically low smoking rate hit the headlines late last year, and now a Briefing Paper from the Global State of Tobacco Harm Reduction (GSTHR) explores how neighbouring Norway is treading a similar path.

UK-based public health agency Knowledge•Action•Change (K•A•C) recently published a suite of connected reports from the GSTHR project offering a global overview of tobacco harm reduction in 2024. The Briefing Paper, How snus is replacing smoking in Norway: a revolution led by consumers and product innovation, formed one section.

Smoking has had a significant impact on the lives and health of Norway’s population. Researchers revealed in 2015 that one in five of all premature deaths before the age of 70 were caused by smoking, and in 2021, a study showed that more than 8 in 10 lung cancer cases in Norwegian women could have been avoided if those individuals had been non-smokers.

With the Tobacco Act of 1975, Norway took action to reduce smoking before many other countries; it ranks in the top five in Europe for the strictness of its tobacco control measures. But while smoking was already in decline in Norway, the last two decades have seen the drop accelerate significantly, coinciding with a rise in the use of the oral tobacco product snus. In comparison to smoking tobacco, snus offers a much safer way to consume nicotine.

According to official statistics in 2005, 25% of Norwegians aged 16 to 74 smoked daily; among young people aged 16 to 24, that figure was 24%. Meanwhile, 5% of Norwegians aged 16 to 74 used snus daily. By 2023, daily smoking rates among Norwegians aged 16 to 74 had plummeted to 7%, and just 3% among those aged 16 to 24. Snus use, however, had increased to 16% by 2023 among those aged 16 to 74. More than twice as many people now use snus compared to cigarettes (16% vs 7%).

Norwegian consumers’ adoption of snus since the early 2000s is due to many factors. Culturally, it was a familiar product, with a long history of consumption in the country, similar to Sweden. As explored in another GSTHR Briefing Paper, What is snus?, while it had long been safer than combustible tobacco, the advent of low-nitrosamine snus in the late 1990s improved the product’s safety profile yet further. This also coincided with other product developments, such as the switch from loose to portion snus, and the availability of more flavours. As tobacco control measures increasingly restricted where people could smoke, the discreet nature of snus consumption also became more attractive.

Snus is considered a viable option for those seeking to give up smoking, as it delivers a comparable amount of nicotine to combustible cigarettes. The latest GSTHR Briefing Paper finds that snus appears to be a widespread substitute for cigarettes in Norway. Researchers have observed that, as well as helping people who were already smoking to switch to a less harmful product, snus may also be contributing to a reduction in uptake of smoking among young adults, particularly young men.

The product’s reduced risk profile in comparison to smoking is not, however, something that has been widely or systematically communicated to the public. Snus is covered by a ban on tobacco advertising, and there has been no official endorsement of harm reduction by the Norwegian health authorities. In fact, the Norwegian Government has not officially recognised the role that snus is playing in reducing smoking, and is focused on achieving “a tobacco-free society”, with all tobacco products being treated equally, irrespective of their relative harms.

David MacKintosh, a Director of K·A·C, which runs the Global State of Tobacco Harm Reduction project, said:

“The profound shifts in nicotine consumption in Norway demonstrate that neighbouring Sweden’s smokefree status doesn’t have to be unique. Norway’s plummeting smoking rates are also due to widespread substitution of deadly combustible cigarettes for much safer snus. In both countries, this has occurred without official endorsement from the authorities. Consumers have embraced harm reduction on their own – and the data tells the story. Imagine what an integrated tobacco harm reduction strategy could achieve.”

ENDS

Notes to editors

Contact: For further information please contact Oliver on 07930 279916 or at [email protected]

References: Links to all data used in the press release can be found in the full Briefing Paper, How snus is replacing smoking in Norway: a revolution led by consumers and product innovation.

Latest major publication: The Global State of Tobacco Harm Reduction 2024: A Situation Report was published in November 2024, offering a global overview of tobacco harm reduction.

About us: Knowledge·Action·Change (K·A·C) promotes harm reduction as a key public health strategy grounded in human rights. The team has decades of experience of harm reduction work in drug use, HIV, smoking, sexual health, and prisons. K·A·C runs the Global State of Tobacco Harm Reduction (GSTHR) which maps the development of tobacco harm reduction and the use, availability and regulatory responses to safer nicotine products, as well as smoking prevalence and related mortality, in over 200 countries and regions around the world. For all publications and live data, visit https://gsthr.org

Our funding: The GSTHR project is funded with a grant from Global Action to End Smoking (formerly known as Foundation for Smoke-Free World), an independent, U.S. nonprofit 501(c) (3) grant making organisation, accelerating science-based efforts worldwide to end the smoking epidemic. Global Action played no role in designing, implementing, data analysis, or interpretation of the report nor did Global Action edit or approve any presentations or publications from the report. The contents, selection, and presentation of facts, as well as any opinions expressed, are the sole responsibility of the authors and should not be regarded as reflecting the positions of Global Action to End Smoking.