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The newer synthetic nicotine pouches (Zyn, On, Velo) are everywhere in the USA and are being used by kids as young as 13. They are ruining the gut health of an

The newer synthetic nicotine pouches (Zyn, On, Velo) are everywhere in the USA and are being used by kids as young as 13. They are ruining the gut health of an entire generation of kids. Edit: Both boys and girls are dependent on these things now and they seem socially acceptable (no smoke, no spit, just swallow the chemical nicotine). Get ready for a huge wave of GI problems due to this.

wossab 4mo ago
And teeth. This stuff will do nasty things to your gums. And receded gums never recover.
- Forgeties79 4mo ago
  Unless you do an incredibly painful graft right? I have a buddy who had to do that in college and man it seemed incredibly unpleasant. They harvested the skin from the roof of his mouth IIRC Edit: yikes sounds like it gets worse and might not even work
  - loloquwowndueo 4mo ago
    My dentist has been peddling this procedure to me for years. It sounds incredibly invasive and painful and they don’t even promise it’ll cover 100% of the recession, nor that it won’t recede again unless one goes for an even more invasive jaw realignment which involves, I shit you not, intentionally fracturing the palate bone to make more space to align the teeth. That was the “let me stop you right there” moment. (Not even going into how much these horrendous procedures cost!)
    - ptaffs 4mo ago
      i had this suggested to me by a locum dentist, and i agree. This is totally off topic and going further so but if you didn't already, you should change your dentist.
      - loloquwowndueo 4mo ago
        Thanks but I won’t. My dentist is fine otherwise, I can say “no”, they’re ok with me saying “no”. We get along great and I find that’s both hard to find and super important - no better way of putting off dentist visits than having a dentist you dread seeing every 6 months.
    - port11 4mo ago
      What you’re describing sounds terrible in isolation, but usually these measures are only done if truly needed — at least in Europe? I passed on the jaw realignment surgery, knowing that the consequences are more bone wear over time and that I’ll never fully recover usage on the left side of my mouth. None of the dentists/orthos/surgeons involved said I *had* to do it, there is a trade off. Breaking your jaw might weaken it down the line, but bone wear along the tooth line isn’t great either. It’s a tough call. Grafting is another thing I’ve been postponing, but now the proximity to my roots is getting painful as sensitivity piles up. Again: this is all optional and full of trade-offs. Sibling comment suggesting you change dentists is not doing a fair assessment of the situation. People with bad teeth, on average, die younger and have worse diets.
      - loloquwowndueo 4mo ago
        > usually these measures are only done if truly needed — at least in Europe? I’m not in Europe :) Nah my dude, my dentist peddles all sorts of ridiculous unnecessary treatments. Invisalign? I’m 50, I don’t give a shit about how my teeth look, just want them not to fall off all at once. Invisalign is a subscription for your teeth. No thanks. I stay with this dentist because they are friendly, technically competent and a 5-minute walk from home. Literally the only downside is the FUD to get me to go for those treatments but it’s just steeling myself to say “no thanks” every 6 months.
        port11 4mo ago
        Ah, well… that doesn’t sound great, no. There’s plenty of 1/4-the-cost Invisalign competitors, maybe your dentist doesn't get a cut out of them.
  - data-ottawa 4mo ago
    I had to do a graft and it wasn’t especially painful. I got painkillers but only used them on the first day. The recovery period sucked, I needed antibiotics and couldn’t eat anything solid for two weeks. If you can behaviourally prevent needing gum grafts you should.
embedding-shape 4mo ago
Is your problem with them that they're synthetic, or that it's nicotine? Pouched tobacco like that been used for decades in some places in the world, or even without pouches, just making your own ball and sticking the tobacco under your lip. I'm not sure these countries have a higher rate of GI/gut problems than other places, which kind of would invalidate your entire argument here.
- DanielHB 4mo ago
  Snus (tobacco pouches you put under your gums) is super popular in Sweden: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snus It is basically the same thing but not synthetic. Supposedly nicotin pouches are not as harmful because they do not have tobacco leaves. I am a bit ambivalent about it, on one hand people don't smoke as much because snus which means I don't get as much second hand smoke. On the other hand it is WAY easier for kids to get started on it as they don't need to hide it after they put it in their mouths. I know a few people who are heavily addicted to it (one even keeps one in when he is sleeping) and they all started in their early teens.
  - embedding-shape 4mo ago
    Exactly what I'm talking about, just didn't want to name it by name as people have a lot of preconceived notions about it that pops up as soon as you say "snus", for some reason.
    - DanielHB 4mo ago
      I never heard about it causing GI problems, but snus definitely causes major teeth and gum problems. The guy I mentioned had his gums receded completely, he once showed it to me. It was very bizarre. Also see this other comment on this thread about this issue: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48411778 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48411778
- gwbas1c 4mo ago
  The problems with chewing tobacco are well-known. BTW, colon cancer is rising among men in their 40s, and there is no known reason why.
ipsento606 4mo ago
Source for the claim that nicotine use "ruins" gut health? My understanding is that the relationship between nicotine and gut health (indeed, overall health) is much more complex and nuanced than that. I know that nicotine has a positive effect on ulcerative colitis symptoms for many sufferers. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8895249/#s4 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8895249/#s4 A quote: Of all the diseases summarized here concerning systemic inflammation, especially in sepsis and endotoxemia, nicotine exerted the most pharmaceutical effect and significantly improved the survival. Next, nicotine is also a potential candidate for treating ulcerative colitis, rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, multiple sclerosis, and myocarditis; the in vivo data provided a much better foundation. For local inflammation, the nicotine administration route may be more important to avoid its accumulation in other healthy organs—for example, the effect of nicotine on arthritis will be more pronounced when nicotine is directly injected into the focus of infection. Perhaps that is why, in the early years, tobacco was used to treat enteritis as enemas (4). It is evident that nicotine has a significant pro-inflammatory effect on periodontitis. However, the latest research also found that nicotine positively affects periodontitis at a lower dosage. In this regard, we consider that the effect of nicotine on periodontitis is mainly due to the influence of inevitable and original oral microbes. At present, most studies focus on the cellular level, and in vivo studies may be limited due to the difficulty of model construction. Therefore, we recommend that individuals with poor oral hygiene avoid excessive direct exposure to nicotine for oral diseases.
- lesostep 4mo ago
  >> Source for the claim that nicotine use "ruins" gut health? Not gut health specifically, but we run the tests on taking nicotine orally for nicotine sprays. It's definitely makes ulcers more likely to happen in short term usage. What's even worse, it definitely fucks up your neuromodulators, which is very bad for children and young adults. That's a well known fact, it's why it's addictive, and that's why quitting it will make you have very bad mood swings. The body adjusts to the dopamine spikes by lowering dopamine, and if it happens during brain development, it's just not good. Any addiction during brain development is not good, but especially a chemical one. Kids need to learn what their emotions are and how to control them before they can control them by chewing. Kids usually do it through teens and up to early adulthood.

wossab 4mo ago

And teeth. This stuff will do nasty things to your gums. And receded gums never recover.

Forgeties79 4mo ago
Unless you do an incredibly painful graft right? I have a buddy who had to do that in college and man it seemed incredibly unpleasant. They harvested the skin from the roof of his mouth IIRC Edit: yikes sounds like it gets worse and might not even work
- loloquwowndueo 4mo ago
  My dentist has been peddling this procedure to me for years. It sounds incredibly invasive and painful and they don’t even promise it’ll cover 100% of the recession, nor that it won’t recede again unless one goes for an even more invasive jaw realignment which involves, I shit you not, intentionally fracturing the palate bone to make more space to align the teeth. That was the “let me stop you right there” moment. (Not even going into how much these horrendous procedures cost!)
  - ptaffs 4mo ago
    i had this suggested to me by a locum dentist, and i agree. This is totally off topic and going further so but if you didn't already, you should change your dentist.
    - loloquwowndueo 4mo ago
      Thanks but I won’t. My dentist is fine otherwise, I can say “no”, they’re ok with me saying “no”. We get along great and I find that’s both hard to find and super important - no better way of putting off dentist visits than having a dentist you dread seeing every 6 months.
  - port11 4mo ago
    What you’re describing sounds terrible in isolation, but usually these measures are only done if truly needed — at least in Europe? I passed on the jaw realignment surgery, knowing that the consequences are more bone wear over time and that I’ll never fully recover usage on the left side of my mouth. None of the dentists/orthos/surgeons involved said I *had* to do it, there is a trade off. Breaking your jaw might weaken it down the line, but bone wear along the tooth line isn’t great either. It’s a tough call. Grafting is another thing I’ve been postponing, but now the proximity to my roots is getting painful as sensitivity piles up. Again: this is all optional and full of trade-offs. Sibling comment suggesting you change dentists is not doing a fair assessment of the situation. People with bad teeth, on average, die younger and have worse diets.
    - loloquwowndueo 4mo ago
      > usually these measures are only done if truly needed — at least in Europe? I’m not in Europe :) Nah my dude, my dentist peddles all sorts of ridiculous unnecessary treatments. Invisalign? I’m 50, I don’t give a shit about how my teeth look, just want them not to fall off all at once. Invisalign is a subscription for your teeth. No thanks. I stay with this dentist because they are friendly, technically competent and a 5-minute walk from home. Literally the only downside is the FUD to get me to go for those treatments but it’s just steeling myself to say “no thanks” every 6 months.
      - port11 4mo ago
        Ah, well… that doesn’t sound great, no. There’s plenty of 1/4-the-cost Invisalign competitors, maybe your dentist doesn't get a cut out of them.
- data-ottawa 4mo ago
  I had to do a graft and it wasn’t especially painful. I got painkillers but only used them on the first day. The recovery period sucked, I needed antibiotics and couldn’t eat anything solid for two weeks. If you can behaviourally prevent needing gum grafts you should.

embedding-shape 4mo ago

Is your problem with them that they're synthetic, or that it's nicotine? Pouched tobacco like that been used for decades in some places in the world, or even without pouches, just making your own ball and sticking the tobacco under your lip. I'm not sure these countries have a higher rate of GI/gut problems than other places, which kind of would invalidate your entire argument here.

DanielHB 4mo ago
Snus (tobacco pouches you put under your gums) is super popular in Sweden: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snus It is basically the same thing but not synthetic. Supposedly nicotin pouches are not as harmful because they do not have tobacco leaves. I am a bit ambivalent about it, on one hand people don't smoke as much because snus which means I don't get as much second hand smoke. On the other hand it is WAY easier for kids to get started on it as they don't need to hide it after they put it in their mouths. I know a few people who are heavily addicted to it (one even keeps one in when he is sleeping) and they all started in their early teens.
- embedding-shape 4mo ago
  Exactly what I'm talking about, just didn't want to name it by name as people have a lot of preconceived notions about it that pops up as soon as you say "snus", for some reason.
  - DanielHB 4mo ago
    I never heard about it causing GI problems, but snus definitely causes major teeth and gum problems. The guy I mentioned had his gums receded completely, he once showed it to me. It was very bizarre. Also see this other comment on this thread about this issue: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48411778 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48411778
gwbas1c 4mo ago
The problems with chewing tobacco are well-known. BTW, colon cancer is rising among men in their 40s, and there is no known reason why.

ipsento606 4mo ago

Source for the claim that nicotine use "ruins" gut health? My understanding is that the relationship between nicotine and gut health (indeed, overall health) is much more complex and nuanced than that. I know that nicotine has a positive effect on ulcerative colitis symptoms for many sufferers. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8895249/#s4 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8895249/#s4 A quote: Of all the diseases summarized here concerning systemic inflammation, especially in sepsis and endotoxemia, nicotine exerted the most pharmaceutical effect and significantly improved the survival. Next, nicotine is also a potential candidate for treating ulcerative colitis, rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, multiple sclerosis, and myocarditis; the in vivo data provided a much better foundation. For local inflammation, the nicotine administration route may be more important to avoid its accumulation in other healthy organs—for example, the effect of nicotine on arthritis will be more pronounced when nicotine is directly injected into the focus of infection. Perhaps that is why, in the early years, tobacco was used to treat enteritis as enemas (4). It is evident that nicotine has a significant pro-inflammatory effect on periodontitis. However, the latest research also found that nicotine positively affects periodontitis at a lower dosage. In this regard, we consider that the effect of nicotine on periodontitis is mainly due to the influence of inevitable and original oral microbes. At present, most studies focus on the cellular level, and in vivo studies may be limited due to the difficulty of model construction. Therefore, we recommend that individuals with poor oral hygiene avoid excessive direct exposure to nicotine for oral diseases.

lesostep 4mo ago
>> Source for the claim that nicotine use "ruins" gut health? Not gut health specifically, but we run the tests on taking nicotine orally for nicotine sprays. It's definitely makes ulcers more likely to happen in short term usage. What's even worse, it definitely fucks up your neuromodulators, which is very bad for children and young adults. That's a well known fact, it's why it's addictive, and that's why quitting it will make you have very bad mood swings. The body adjusts to the dopamine spikes by lowering dopamine, and if it happens during brain development, it's just not good. Any addiction during brain development is not good, but especially a chemical one. Kids need to learn what their emotions are and how to control them before they can control them by chewing. Kids usually do it through teens and up to early adulthood.