• 2/5/2007
  • Wilmington, DE
  • Eric Ruth
  • Delaware Online (www.delawareonline.com)

Lots of products out there claim they’ll help people overcome smoking. Now comes one that aims to help them overcome smoking bans.

Smokers who are finding themselves frazzled by today’s increasingly tobacco-hostile world can now lotion up when they feel like lighting up, courtesy of a nicotine gel that is rubbed into their hands, purportedly giving hours of crave-free existence.

Already marketed around the world, “Nicogel” recently made its U.S. debut at Delaware’s Happy Harry’s drugstores and other Walgreen locations. Unlike the pricey patches, lozenges and gums that now fill shelves, Nicogel makes no claim to being a “nicotine-replacement therapy” that helps smokers quit.

Instead, the amber nicotine gel is specifically marketed with the idea of allowing smokers to get a fix when they’re stuck in a smoke-free place — which in Delaware includes just about every existing public building, and even a few grassy fields. Made from tobacco, each packet delivers enough nicotine to get users through four hours without a smoke, its makers claim.

Nicogel arrives at a time when smoking bans are increasing, along with the potential for profit for makers of nicotine therapies and other products. Last year, the National Bureau of Economic Research Inc., a nonprofit economic research group, estimated that smoking-cessation ventures overall had retail sales of nearly $1 billion annually and were spending more than $100 million annually on advertising. Sales research company MarketResearch.com recently estimated that sales of over-the-counter smoking-cessation products will grow to $809 million nationally by 2009.

One of the world’s biggest manufacturers of nicotine therapy products sees broader market opportunities and potential for rising profits as smoking bans become more widespread. GlaxoSmithKline, which makes Nicorette and NicoDerm, say the products were key drivers of its Consumer Healthcare business, which saw sales of $5.9 billion in 2005, up 2 percent over the previous year.

“Certainly, across the country, more and more businesses and public areas are going smoke-free,” said Walgreen spokesman Michael Polzen. “I think this product was developed in reaction to that, to give smokers some way of addressing their need without actually lighting up.”

To some tobacco opponents, a product that focuses more on sustaining than stopping still has health risks, even if it does temporarily let people avoid cigarettes.

“Nicogel may encourage smokers to continue smoking rather than make serious quit attempts,” said Dawn Ward, national spokeswoman for the American Cancer Society. Her group contends that Nicogel hasn’t been shown to be effective or safe, unlike nicotine-replacement therapies. Studies have found that traditional therapies sometimes double the chances of quitting.

“Nicogel is not approved by the FDA as many of the other cessation tools out there are,” said Deborah Brown, spokeswoman for the American Lung Association of Delaware.

Others worry that Nicogel isn’t regulated, though its status is the subject of some uncertainty. The King of Prussia, Pa., company that makes Nicogel has said it does not require FDA approval because it is not a drug or a food. Others contend that because it is made from tobacco, it could be carcinogenic, and should be regulated.

Bill Whalen, chief executive officer of the manufacturer, Blue Whale Worldwide, did not return calls for comment. His company also makes a “carcinogen-free” chewing tobacco — not available in Delaware — that’s made of tea leaves treated with nicotine. Blue Whale Smokeless ads also claim that it “fights plaque, and also contains fluoride.”

Nicogel’s distribution agreement with Walgreen means it will be available at 5,584 stores nationwide. At the Happy Harry’s in Branmar Plaza, where Nicogel has been on the shelves since Friday, sales so far were nearly nonexistent. A box of ten packets sells for $5.99.

“I had one person ask me for it” before Nicogel arrived, Happy Harry’s worker Sammie Kline said Thursday. “They haven’t been back yet.”

Nicogel is priced well below the boxes of traditional nicotine products, which can cost as much as $50 for 110 doses. Since the days when the first patches arrived on the market, today’s increasing variety of products has helped people seeking the best ways to quit, said Jacqi Tanzer, head pharmacist at the Branmar store.

Still, she said she would recommend products that offer a methodical, step-by-step path to cessation over nicotine substitutes like Nicogel. “Quitting nicotine is probably the hardest addiction to quit,” she said. “The patch is probably the most successful method.”

While they’re aggravating to smokers, smoking bans can provide enough inconvenience and discomfort to encourage them to quit for good, activists said.

“Products like that may also thwart the full effectiveness of the smoke-free laws we’re trying to pass or abide by,” Ward said.