Altria Group, Inc. recently announced that it has entered into a definitive investment agreement with Lexaria Nicotine LLC, a division of Lexaria BioScience. The Altria investment will fund research on regulatory compliant, oral forms of nicotine delivery.
Chris Bunka, c.e.o. of Lexaria BioScience, claims that teenage smoking of cigarettes is the lowest in recorded history.
“While vaping is not healthy,” says Bunka, “it is not as unhealthy as smoking, and lives will be saved by the trend away from combustion.”
The nicotine delivery process Lexaria is developing goes a step further with a completely different, non-combustion-based, non-inhalation-based method that requires no chemicals or additives. Nor is it a nicotine gum or a patch. Lexaria’s technology is designed to work through the human digestive system.“
The fight to give up cigarettes has cost 60 million lives over the past decade around the world, while we debate the ‘purest’ way to stop it,” says Bunka. “Meanwhile science has already shown nicotine in properly regulated small doses, is a mild stimulant not dissimilar to caffeine. It is even showing some success in partial treatments for Alzheimer’s. While the social and behavioral addictions are one side of the puzzle, the chemical addiction is another.”