Mackem Manager's THR Madness
Sunderland AFC football club head coach Lee Johnson has attacked tobacco harm reduction product snus for being like “smoking three or four cigarettes at one time”
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by Dave Cross
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Resembling some of the more ludicrous accusations thrown at vaping, Johnson attempted to equivocate the use of a nicotine product to that of smoking – missing the point that the danger comes from the combustion of the tobacco leaf, not the use of the alkaloid found in snus and e-liquid.
Snus is a smokeless product that consists of ground tobacco leaves in a teabag-style sachet that is placed under the lip. Tobacco-free snus doesn’t contain any tobacco.
The sale of snus was banned by the European Union but tobacco-free snus is not covered by current legislation in the UK. The government is currently looking at the legislation again, following the UK’s departure from the Union. Given its supportive stance on vaping, hopes are high that politicians will support the legalisation of all forms of snus.
Evidence doesn’t matter to Lee Johnson – who appears to believe that football managers are best place to offer advice on smoking cessation. He claims physical and mental health can suffer when people use nicotine products.
Speaking on the talkSPORT radio station, he said: “It gives you that sort of buzz. I have not tried it myself, but having spoken to the players, the worry for me is it is so highly addictive.
“I have had players who are so highly addicted that they are in hospital overnight with something else, maybe an operation, and are begging the doctors and nurses to get them a tub – or otherwise they say they are going to run out of bed and get (it) themselves when they have just had a knee operation. It is so highly addictive that it comes to the forefront of our minds which then becomes dangerous.
“You are messing with the balance of the body and mind, that is the biggest thing for me in terms of development. You will find that some players have two or three snus sachets under their lip, but then they are taking caffeine tablets, so it is giving themselves that calming effect. They are then going into a game trying to lift themselves and are therefore taking caffeine tablets or Red Bull to try to get the boost.”
“With so many spikes in the body, sort of balance if you like, I don’t believe it is conducive to top performance, but more important it is not conducive to the player being healthy for a long period of time. It is nicotine going into the body and an awful lot of it.
“I see how many players are actually on it – you could probably go to maybe a third or half of a dressing room. I think they are uneducated on the negatives towards it. I have seen it when I was playing myself, and I have seen the effect it had in both performance and also health of the players I have played with. Sometimes players can have three or four under their top lip at one time and it is effectively the equivalent of smoking three or four cigarettes at one time.”
Maybe Johnson should focus on promoting his side and leave health promotion to genuine experts who know what they are talking about?
Photo Credit:
Bridge photo by Ethan Wilkinson on Unsplash
Dave Cross
Journalist at POTVDave is a freelance writer; with articles on music, motorbikes, football, pop-science, vaping and tobacco harm reduction in Sounds, Melody Maker, UBG, AWoL, Bike, When Saturday Comes, Vape News Magazine, and syndicated across the Johnston Press group. He was published in an anthology of “Greatest Football Writing”, but still believes this was a mistake. Dave contributes sketches to comedy shows and used to co-host a radio sketch show. He’s worked with numerous start-ups to develop content for their websites.
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