Here’s How BC Can Help People Quit Smoking

Every day, I work with people who are ready to take one of the hardest steps in their lives, to quit smoking. For most, it’s a deeply personal decision, often years in the making, and it requires the right tools at the right time.

That is why I welcome the legislature’s budget committee recommendation that the government “consider increasing access to Health Canada-approved nicotine pouches by allowing their sale alongside tobacco products as a smoking cessation aid.”

The call is included in the report on budget consultations by the legislature's standing committee on finance and government services. The committee held 16 public meetings and sought online comments.

I look forward to the B.C. government implementing this change, reversing its decision last year that put Zonnic, the only approved nicotine replacement therapy pouch, behind the pharmacy counter, available only to customers who asked for it.

At the time I couldn’t understand why B.C., the only Canadian jurisdiction that still allows tobacco to be sold in drugstores, would put a less harmful nicotine product, one that helps to solve tobacco addiction, as a Schedule II product — to be hidden “where there is no public access and no opportunity for patient self-selection.”

This made it much more difficult for smokers to access a full range of nicotine replacement therapy products and select the one that works best for them. Smokers, already being stigmatized, were being further hindered in their quitting experience.

Before this change, a smoker could walk into a convenience store, choose Zonnic at the counter and be on their way.

Now they are forced to find a pharmacy that stocks the nicotine pouch, wait in line, then speak to a pharmacist and, finally, once age-vetted and approved, complete the purchase.

For people who are ready to quit, those added steps can be the difference between acting on motivation in the moment and deciding it’s not worth the hassle, the wait or the stigma. In health care, timing is everything, and this unnecessary rule wastes precious time. Too often, the opportunity to help someone quit slips away.

From my perspective behind the pharmacy counter, I also see how this regulation diverts our resources. All pharmacists already work under intense pressure, balancing patient consultations, complex prescriptions, vaccinations, chronic disease management and medication reviews.

Adding the requirement to personally oversee every sale of an approved nicotine replacement therapy pulls us away from other patients waiting for urgent care. It may seem like a small extra task, but multiplied by dozens of interactions a day, it has a real impact on workflow, wait times and patient-centred practices.

I am not arguing against pharmacy access or support for nicotine pouches. Pharmacists play a critical role in helping people quit smoking. I have spent my professional career counselling, recommending the right nicotine replacement therapy and supporting my patients through their challenges to quit.

But that role works best when it is part of a patient’s quit plan, not when every single sale of an approved nicotine pouch is treated like a special intervention.

Smokers should be able to get the product quickly in the same stores where they buy cigarettes, and they should also be able to come to us when they want advice or support.

Public health policy should be based on what truly works for patients, and pharmacists see that reality every day.

The finance committee’s recommendation gets it right, restoring Canada’s only approved nicotine replacement therapy pouch to convenience and gas stores while keeping it available in pharmacies for those who want professional guidance.

This will also help to curb the burgeoning illicit market for nicotine pouches that can easily be purchased, with no oversight, in higher nicotine strengths, and with youth-attractive flavours and packaging.

The province should then also encourage the federal government to follow its lead by removing the unnecessary barriers it has created.

If we are to help meet Canada’s Tobacco Strategy of having only five per cent of the population smoking by 2035, we need to end policies that further stigmatize smokers, burden pharmacists and make it harder for Canadians to quit.