“DETOXICATED TOBACCO”
Article in Scientific American
November 11, 1876
“A correspondent, referring to our recent article ‘A Cigar Scientifically Dissected,’ asks whether there is not some method whereby tobacco can be rendered innocuous and yet have its agreeable aroma preserved. The fact that numerous attempts in this direction have been made, and yet thee is no substitute for tobacco and no de-nicotinized tobacco in general use, is itself a sufficient answer to the question. It is the combination of poisons which we enumerated that produce the agreeable taste and smell, and to remove [ ] the ingredients seems simply top render the tobacco unsmokeable.
“…the most successful efforts efforts to render tobacco less harmful have been those involving mechanical means. The Turkish nargileh or water pipe, in which the smoke is drawn through water, is probably the least harmful method of smoking practised, a fact proved by the thick dark scum of oil which appears on the water after use…Numerous pipes have been patented in which the smoke is filtered through cotton or sponge, or led into a little chamber where the oil is deposited, and thence withdrawn. Attempts have been made to treat the smoke chemically during its passage through the filter. M. Ferrier soaks the cotton in a solution of tannin, and dries it in the air. The tannin, he claims, retains the nicotine in chemical combination. French chemists who have tested this plan are widely at variance. Cahours confirms Ferrier’s experimental results, and says that the nicotine is wholly removed. Barrel objects that nicotine is not capable of uniting with tannin, and that the latter substance is not less injurious than nicotine. We do not find many records into this branch of the subject, and researches here also might be valuable.
“After the water pipe, the safest way of using tobacco is to smoke a mild quality in a pipe made of meerschaum, charcoal, or porous unglazed clay. The pipe bowl then absorbs the oils to a considerable extent, as the coloring of pure white meerschaum plainly shows; and the impurities should be frequently burned out., or new bowls substituted, in order to keep the absorbent qualities unimpaired. The most hurtful method of smoking is the Cuban paper cigarette, where the deleterious fumes of burning paper are added to those of the exceedingly strong tobacco enveloped.
“It may be justly considered that in most cases the use of tobacco is an abuse; but it is equally true that devotees of the weed have lived to the most advanced ages, and that thousands habitually smoke without being able to appreciate any deleterious results. Ther is no standard, therefore, whereby the evil effects of tobacco of the habit can be gaged for everybody. Dr. Smith, some years ago, read a paper before the British Association, in which he adduced experiments showing that, while tobacco smoking causes a large increase in the rate of pulsation of some persons, in others no increase whatever occurs; and hence is demonstrated a marked diversity in the mode of action of tobacco on different systems…It is clear that, if in one individual tobacco is able to produce conditions favorable to a disease [apoplexy (stroke)] which may kill at any moment, and in another is practically inert, it is useless to argue either that is generally highly dangerous, or, on the other hand, destitute of dangerous effects. As we said in our previous article, the ingredients of tobacco are separately poisonous; the probabilities are that are collectively so in every case…”
