Bray Drugs Awareness Forum

- Ni****ne Oral Pouches : WHO calls for stricter regulation -

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has called on governments to introduce stricter controls on the supply and sale of ni****ne oral pouch products, particularly in light of evidence that they are being 'agressively marketed' at young people.

Despite an EU wide ban on oral to***co products, such as 'snus', ni****ne pouch products are easily available in Ireland because they do not contain to***co. They therefore also avoid many of the sales and marketing restrictions that apply to traditional to***co products such as ci******es and to***co leaf.

The new pouch products use ni****ne extracted from the to***co plant that is then infused into other plant fibers, so that it contains no actual to***co leaf (therefore avoiding to***co defined legislation). It still however results in the delivery of a highly addictive substance (ni****ne) in a format that particularly appeals to young people because it is a less obvious form of consumption, without obvious smoke or smell.

This is an aspect that has been highlighted to us by local schools, who say that it is almost impossible to detect if pupils are using the products, during school time.

The World Health Organisation has stated that ni****ne pouches, particularly those sold in a variety of flavours, are 'designed for addiction'.

See an RTE report on the issue, here :
https://www.rte.ie/news/2026/0515/1573495-who-ni****ne-pouch-snus/