Quitting nicotine

15% of higher education students use some type of nicotine product every day (the KOTT 2024 survey). While smoking and snus use have become less common in recent years, the use of other nicotine products has increased. Nicotine pouches are the most commonly used nicotine product among male students in higher education institutions. Among female students, the use of nicotine pouches is as common as smoking.

Nicotine is a highly addictive substance with harmful effects on health and the environment. Quitting may be difficult and often requires more than just willpower. But help and support is available for those wanting to quit.

Would I benefit from quitting?

Quitting nicotine products always pays off. Freeing yourself from addiction means no more withdrawal symptoms, which then no longer need relieving. In the long run, this can improve your mental health and sleep quality, helping to improve your ability to study. You’ll also save money, which you’ll then be able to spend on other things. Your breath will be fresher and you’ll have better oral health. You’ll also reduce your risk of many serious illnesses and at the same time improve your health and fitness.

>> Back to the menu

Making a plan will help you quit

Once you’ve started getting used to the idea of quitting, it’s a good idea to spend some time devising a plan to support you. This is because the addiction will be more likely to return if you try to base this lifestyle change only on emotions.

Spend some time thinking about the following questions: What has using the nicotine product given you? What benefits have you seen? What’s important to you in life, and why would you like to quit using nicotine products? It’s also wise to prepare yourself for future moments and situations where the risk of starting again might be high. What might help you resist the temptation in such situations?

>> Back to the menu

Support for quitting is available via healthcare services and online

Quitting and staying nicotine-free can be challenging, and isn’t just a matter of willpower. By using several types of support resources you increase your chances of succeeding. Healthcare providers, including the FSHS, provide support for quitting nicotine.

Information is also available online. At the end of the page, we’ve included links to pages dealing with quitting nicotine. Counting how much money you can save, learning about the adverse environmental impacts of nicotine products, and reading about the experiences of others who’ve quit might help you make the decision and boost your motivation. Maybe you could even invite a friend or your partner to join you in starting a nicotine-free life!

>> Back to the menu

How nicotine affects your health

Nicotine is a highly addictive substance. The use of any nicotine product – whether cigarettes, electronic or e-cigarettes (vapes), snus or nicotine pouches – leads to a nicotine addiction and is detrimental to physical and mental health. There is no safe way to use nicotine.

The effects of nicotine include:

  • constricted blood vessels and increased heart rate
  • increased risk of cardiovascular diseases and type 2 diabetes
  • increased cell mutations associated with cancer development, increased tumour growth and reduced effects from cancer therapies
  • acute intoxication at high single doses.

In addition to these physical effects, long-term nicotine use can make you more vulnerable to mental health problems, including symptoms of anxiety and depression. The risk of concentration problems is also higher in those using nicotine products.

As vapes, snus and nicotine pouches contain high levels of nicotine and therefore maintain and may worsen your nicotine addiction, they aren’t effective in helping you quit smoking.

>> Back to the menu

How nicotine products impact the environment

In addition to their health effects, nicotine products also have detrimental environmental effects at different stages of their production chain. Forests are cleared to make space for tobacco farms, and wood is burned to dry the tobacco. The manufacture, distribution and disposal of all nicotine products consumes natural resources and causes emissions.

For quite some time now, cigarette butts have been the most common type of litter found on beaches, and now e-cigarette parts and nicotine pouches are also a common sight. The toxic substances contained in cigarette butts and e-cigarette parts leach out into the environment, entering waterways and causing serious harm to the ecosystem.

Nicotine and snus pouches and their packaging break down in the environment into harmful microplastics. The pouches also pose an immediate danger to small children and animals. If swallowed, the pouches can cause intoxication requiring treatment.

>> Back to the menu

Forms of nicotine addiction

Nicotine addiction can develop quickly and even with occasional use – especially in young people as their brain is still developing.

A physical addiction manifests itself in withdrawal symptoms when you try to quit nicotine. The most common withdrawal symptoms include irritability, impatience, craving nicotine products, trouble concentrating, sleep problems, headache and craving sweet foods. Withdrawal symptoms start within 12 hours after quitting and peak after a few days, lasting for 3 to 4 weeks on average.

In addition to physical addiction, you can also develop a social addiction to nicotine products. You may get used to using nicotine with certain people or in certain situations, such as at student parties.

Physical addiction results in the need to use nicotine to ease withdrawal symptoms. Some of these symptoms, however, are psychological. For example, sometimes people use nicotine in the hope that it’ll improve their concentration or help them relax. In reality, however, nicotine doesn’t improve concentration; it merely causes the withdrawal symptoms affecting your concentration to disappear.

In other words, these different forms of addiction are interconnected. Nicotine addiction essentially involves the brain getting used to nicotine and the needs arising from its absence, which manifest themselves in various ways.

>> Back to the menu

Types of nicotine products

Cigarettes

Cigarette smoking is detrimental to the whole body. It damages the lungs and the circulatory system and causes various cancers as well as osteoporosis. It also has negative effects on fertility, oral health and skin condition. Tobacco farming, the cigarette production chain and the world’s most common type of litter – cigarette butts – all cause significant harm to the environment.

At the population level, cigarette smoking is becoming less common. According to the Finnish Student Health and Wellbeing Survey (KOTT, 2024), 4% of higher education students smoke daily. With traditional cigarettes becoming less common, new products have been introduced to the market, targeted particularly at young people and designed to turn them into long-term nicotine users.

>> Back to the menu

E-cigarettes (vapes)

Electronic (e-) cigarettes, or vapes, are battery-operated devices that heat up the liquid stored inside the device, causing it to vaporise into an inhalable aerosol. This liquid may contain nicotine and various other harmful substances (including acetaldehyde, benzaldehyde, benzene, formaldehyde, limonene, naphthalene, toluene, tobacco-specific nitrosamines, chromium, copper, lead and nickel). Investigations have found vaping products to contain harmful substances not mentioned in the product labelling, meaning that the labelling isn’t always accurate.

Vaping impairs lung function and may cause vascular and respiratory diseases. EVALI (e-cigarette or vaping use-associated lung injury) refers to lung damage caused by vaping. It can occur even in short-term use.

The most common symptoms of EVALI include cough, difficulty in breathing, shortness of breath, burning of the mouth and the mucous membranes, and a hoarse voice. EVALI involves inflammation throughout the body and may therefore cause nausea and other abdominal complaints, fever and heart palpitations.

Vaping products are aggressively marketed. They’re designed to look tempting and enticing to young people. They are often portrayed as harmless, something that is not true.

>> Back to the menu

Snus

Snus is made of ground tobacco and is consumed by placing a snus pouch or loose snus in the mouth, between the gum and lip. Snus contains carcinogenic substances that are absorbed into the body both through the mucous membrane in the mouth (the oral mucosa) and after being swallowed. Snus causes lesions of the oral mucosa as well as gum recession and increases the risk of gingivitis and periodontitis (forms of gum disease), root surface decay and bad breath.

Selling, supplying and passing on snus is illegal in Finland, as is ordering it online. Most snus is brought to Finland from Sweden, and the products arriving here tend to be stronger than the ones used in Sweden. Due to the high nicotine content and prolonged time in the mouth, snus use results in a strong nicotine addiction.

>> Back to the menu

Nicotine pouches

Nicotine pouches are used in the same way as snus pouches, i.e. placed under the lip. They contain no tobacco but can contain a significant amount of nicotine. Nicotine pouches make you vulnerable to the adverse effects of nicotine:

  • increased risk of cardiovascular diseases and diabetes
  • increased risk of cell mutations associated with cancer development
  • risk of acute nicotine intoxication when using high nicotine doses
  • oral mucosa damage similar to that caused by snus.

In addition to nicotine the pouches contain flavourings to make them more attractive to users. Their marketing, especially on social media, is carefully designed and targeted, sometimes with false claims about nicotine pouches being good for you and your health or for the environment.

>> Back to the menu

More information about the theme

>> Back to the menu