A fresh Nordic Council report has delivered compelling new population-level evidence showing that snus and nicotine pouches are not a gateway into smoking – they are a gateway out.

The data comes from the recent Nording Monitoring (NORMO) 2025 report, which looks at a range of behaviours that can impact public health – from dietary habits and physical activity to tobacco and nicotine consumption – at a pan-Nordic level.

The new report shows that, across the Nordics, daily smoking continues to decline, while use of smokeless nicotine products rises. Yet the overall share of adults using any nicotine product remains, as the report itself states, “relatively stable.”

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Looking at the region as a whole, snus and nicotine pouch use has surpassed smoking over the last decade. Between 2014 and 2024, daily smoking across the Nordic region fell from 16 percent to 10 percent. By comparison, 13.6 percent of adults now report daily use of snus or nicotine pouches.

“This is yet another clear, aggregated proof that the so-called ‘gateway’ simply doesn’t exist,” says Patrik Strömer, Secretary General of the Association of Swedish Snus Manufacturers.

Why the ‘gateway’ myth doesn’t hold

Critics often warn that snus and nicotine pouches could act as a “gateway” to smoking. But the new Nordic data challenge this claim directly.

According to gateway logic, the rising popularity of nicotine pouches should have led to increased smoking. But across the Nordic countries, the exact opposite has occurred: as snus and pouch consumption increased, smoking declined sharply.

In other words, these products are not pulling non-smokers into smoking. Instead, they appear to be replacing smoking among existing nicotine users, or at the very least coinciding with historic reductions in cigarette use.

READ MORE: New study dispels nicotine gateway myth

“The data shows exactly what we’ve known for years: snus and nicotine pouches replace cigarettes, not the other way around,” says Strömer.

“Every former smoker is a public health win worth celebrating. It means fewer people will die early due to tobacco-related diseases, something that hopefully everyone – including nicotine alarmists – can agree with.”

Country-by-country evidence: smokeless products replacing cigarettes

Across individual Nordic countries, the pattern becomes even clearer.

In Sweden, which already has the lowest smoking rates in the EU, daily smoking fell from 9.5 percent in 2014 to just 6.5 percent in 2024, while daily snus and pouch use rose from 14.8 to over 20 percent. Few examples globally illustrate substitution as clearly: as snus and pouches rise, cigarette use collapses.

In Norway, daily smoking has dropped to historically low levels, especially among young adults, a group sometimes cited as “vulnerable” to gateway effects. Instead, the data show they choose snus or nicotine pouches rather than cigarettes, accelerating the decline in smoking rates rather than reversing it.

READ MORE: Most pouch consumers are former smokers, US study shows

Even in Finland, where traditional snus is restricted, the same trend emerges. Smoking continues to fall while nicotine pouch use increases, suggesting that adult nicotine users gravitate toward smokeless options when they are available.

A public-health trend policymakers can’t ignore

The new Nordic data adds to the growing body of evidence that disproves the “gateway” myth that nicotine opponents use to try to discredit tobacco harm reduction.

A 2024 study looking at ten years of data from the US, for example, found that smoking among US high schoolers has “basically disappeared” despite a recent surge in vaping.

With such clear data, the Nordic region provides one of the strongest real-world demonstrations of tobacco harm reduction anywhere in the world.

“These numbers should put the final nail in the coffin of the gateway argument,” says Strömer.

“When adults gain access to safer alternatives, smoking declines, full stop. The Nordic countries are proving in real time that harm reduction works – something policymakers can no longer afford to ignore.”