Could Nicotine Stop Covid?
This video follows on from an OpEd I wrote for TrialSite News: Could Tucker Carlson’s Nicotine Gum Habit Stop Covid?
Thanks for joining me. My name's Dr. Cameron Jones and I'm an Environmental Microbiologist. I work in public health and today I've got a really interesting show to bring to you. I have been very taken with a whole lot of the research that I've got in my hands. And what is this all about? Well, as we move towards the end of the second year with the SARS-COVID-2 pandemic, obviously all of us are wondering what we can do to minimize our risk of contracting the illness. And that is the topic of today's show.
I'm bringing you this breaking research as well as some interviews that I have done. And we are going to be talking about, could nicotine protect you from COVID? Now I know you might be thinking, what on earth are you going on about? Because we know that COVID is a virus which predominantly attacks the respiratory system. So how on earth could there be a connection with smoking? And that's the topic of today's show. And to put this in perspective, we need to go back to some of the early research that came out last year that was looking at some of this early epidemiology.
And what they showed was that there was definitely a connection between a person's smoking status and whether or not they would have severe death or a non-severe outcome. And I'm not making this up. This was published in the Journal of Immunotoxicology. And this is a really seminal paper looking at whether or not there is a connection between nicotine and COVID. And as you can see on the graph and certainly for those who are listening in on the live stream, the smoking history appears to have a connection with whether or not people will have a severe death outcome or a non-severe outcome.
And for those who don't have access to the video, I'm going to explain what the graph shows. And it shows that smoking history seems to offer some protection. And in terms of non-smokers, they don't seem to show protection against the SARS-COVID-2 virus. So how could this make any sense? Because we all know that smoking's bad, and I'm certainly not here to promote smoking or vaping at all. But I do want to present some of the research which is contained in all these articles. And to put some context into this, I wrote an article recently and published this on TrialSiteNews.
And this is talking about whether or not nicotine gum and nicotine replacement therapy like patches could be useful to arrest or reduce the probability of you coming down with COVID-19. And why do I have this particular title? Could Tucker Carlson's Nicotine Gum Habit Stop COVID? Well for many of you who follow Tucker Carlson, you may not be aware that for some years he was a very strong advocate of nicotine chewing gum. And I'm going to play you one of the short clips that he did where he was talking about this. And so this is my premise to this show. Just want to show you about a well-known identity and his relationship with nicotine chewing gum. And then I want that to be the foundation for the rest of this show.
Tucker Carlson:
Would you like a nicotine lozenge?
Gavin McInnes:
No, thank you. I've never smoked, never will.
Tucker Carlson:
Really?
Gavin McInnes:
I don't get it.
Tucker Carlson:
You know smoking is not as fun as trying to quit smoking.
Gavin McInnes:
That's fun?
Tucker Carlson:
The nicotine replacement therapy, yeah, it's good.
Gavin McInnes:
There's a variety of tools. You've got your vapes, you've got your f****-
Tucker Carlson:
I've used every one of them. There's not one nicotine replacement therapy I haven't used, from the patch to the vape to the lozenges to the gum.
Gavin McInnes:
... And what's the gum? It's like seven bucks a pack?
Tucker Carlson:
I buy mine in New Zealand on eBay, because it's not childproof. So you can get to it.
Gavin McInnes:
Right.
Tucker Carlson:
It's delicious. It's delicious.
Gavin McInnes:
How much is it?
Tucker Carlson:
It's about maybe 300 bucks a week.
Gavin McInnes:
That is insane.
Tucker Carlson:
Yeah. So it's like a parking space. But unlike a parking space-
Gavin McInnes:
A parking space in the most expensive parking city on earth.
Tucker Carlson:
... Yeah. But, I mean, as compared to a parking space you get a deep sense of satisfaction. Any nagging feelings of self-doubt or self-loathing are ameliorated. I mean it just really it forms the basis of your joy.
Gavin McInnes:
Oh, wow. So it doesn't just cure smoking it cures all ails.
Tucker Carlson:
Well it cures unhappiness, basically. And the question really is, are you ready to be happy? I mean this is the question most people never have to face. They assume, yeah, I want to be happy. But they don't really, they choose unhappiness again and again and again. I by contrast have chosen happiness.
Gavin McInnes:
And that's in nicotine gum.
Tucker Carlson:
That's exactly right. There's no downside that I know of.
Gavin McInnes:
Well the financial part is-
Tucker Carlson:
Yeah, but it's worth it. Why do you work?
So further research done into some of the problems with smoking, because we have to talk about the problems. And again, this was in another paper which was forming a connection between nicotine and the nicotinic cholinergic system. Which is how nicotine is postulated to be useful in reducing the incidents of SARS-COVID-2. And so if we go through some of the reasons why smoking is bad. Well we all know it, we know that it has deleterious or adverse effects on blood pressure and it leads to heart disease.
Many people who smoke will have a persistent cough, which can lead to problems like chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Not to mention the fact that nicotine itself is addictive and it weakens the immune system and can certainly lead to clot formation. Which is just not what we want at all. But if we move forward again to look at this paradox about those individuals who do smoke and then get COVID, because that's another cohort. Because unlike the first graph which showed that there was a beneficial effect in some smokers, a lot of studies have been done now worldwide and there are different publications which have shown the opposite effect.
And scientists have determined that for many people who smoke, the lung damage and the damage to the body is so severe that they end up not benefiting at all from the nicotine in the cigarette. And so furthering my point that I want to make about smoking being bad, in those individuals where there's an adverse outcome obviously smoking leads to blood vessel injuries, arrhythmia. All sorts of problems with heart function can lead to strokes, seizures, cognitive difficulties, and of course loss of taste or smell. And of course, it weakens the immune system.
Is there anything positive though? Because the whole point of this is to show you some of the research which suggests that there is in fact some benefit. Let's look at that data now. And again, I'm quoting from a paper that came out in 2020. And that particular paper is talking about protection against COVID-19 by nicotine. Could it be good for you? Well, what does the research show? They show that those individuals that are offered nicotine replacement therapy show an increase in something called the ACE2 levels. Now many of you are probably familiar with at least the terminology that ACE2 is related to the infectious nature of the virus.
So, nicotine is considered to be a neuroprotectant and it assists with increasing the levels of intracellular calcium. This is really important for how cells are able to not only communicate but how they regulate their osmotic balance. So increasing ACE2 levels in the epithelial cells could potentially prevent kidney damage. It reduces clot formation, reduces platelet aggregation, and importantly it has an antioxidant effect and is very strongly anti-inflammatory. And this can limit this cytokine storm problem that we sometimes see. And that's certainly what the clinicians see with the adverse outcomes of coronavirus infection.
Now how does this work? Well, let's look more closely at that. So again, we're looking at the connection between nicotine and COVID. And I realize this is a complicated graphic taken from a paper in 2021, also focusing on whether nicotine can alleviate the dysregulation of the inflammatory pathway. Because it is the inflammatory pathway in this particular infection which causes all the problems for people. And so down the left-hand side is classic infection with the SARS-COVID-2 virus. It locks into the ACE2 receptors, moves on to cause the SARS-COVID-2 infection, and for some individuals leads to a hyper-inflammatory response, which in turn releases inflammatory problems, interleukin 6, which then go on to cause lung damage, reduce the ability of the lungs to function properly.
At this point, many individuals need supplemental oxygen, and this then leads towards a cascade of problems and severe COVID. However, scientists are aware that nicotine works via something called the alpha-7 nicotinic receptor. And this down-regulates the production of pro-inflammatory cytokines and chemokines. The hypothesis is that alpha-7 nicotinic receptor agonists like nicotine may protect people from having severe symptoms from infection. So is it a good idea or not? I set out to go further than what was in the research journals by reaching out to some of the scientists who are intimately involved. Now, what do I mean by involved?
Well, quoting for the paper I wrote that there are currently five clinical trials underway at various different hospitals in France. And they are investigating the potential protective effect of nicotine patches to prevent adverse outcomes like the need for mechanical ventilation or transfer to intensive care or even as a preventative. And all of this is verifiable on ClinicalTrials.gov., sorry, ClinicalTrials.gov. Now, these studies are active or are recruiting or show as complete, but as yet, no results have been published. Now obviously we all want to know whether this works. And I need to put this in context because a lot of these publications are written by combinations of scientists and doctors.
And we need to recognize that when a clinical trial is undertaken, that is predominantly done by clinical medical researchers or faculty. And the importance of this is that they're actually able to intervene and carry out a trial, that is recruit individuals who are put into an experiment to determine whether or not supplementation with things like nicotine patches is good for you. However, there's a lot of other scientists who already know based on what we know of physiology and chemistry and biochemistry that the probability of this working is extremely high. And we're all waiting for the outcome of these clinical trials.
So what did I do to try to get some, a leg up as it were into whether or not this will work? I reached out to this particular professor, Professor Bertrand Dautzenberg. And this was published recently in the Monaco Daily press in France. And there's been a lot of media at least in Europe about this issue. And I reached out to this particular professor because he's aware of the studies that are currently underway in France. And I asked him a couple of things about what he knew about these clinical trials. And to summarize he said that they're using transdermal nicotine and that they've set up three cohorts, three groups of people. So they want to see where the transdermal nicotine will work as a preventative. And they're tracking patients through for 82 days.
And this is the email with my questions and his answers. And they're also testing out whether or not supplemental transdermal nicotine will be effective for those individuals who end up in hospital with a positive COVID-19 diagnosis. And they're also interested in whether transdermal nicotine will reduce the duration of time spent in intensive care. And they are tracking those patients through for 30 days. So he told me that the study is currently closed. And yet there's been an issue here because those individuals that were going to be receiving transdermal nicotine when they arrived at hospital, who may not have been smokers.
You got to remember that what this experiment is doing is trying to use nicotine to treat people to prevent them from having severe outcomes or reduce hospital stay or reduce the need for mechanical ventilation. And he told me that because of the vaccination accrual of patients, they had to dramatically drop this cohort of people a few weeks after initiation and they had to stop that part of the trial. So what continued? Well, they continued on with using transdermal nicotine as a preventative and tracking people for over two months or 82 days. And they also are determining whether or not those in intensive care, if they give them transdermal nicotine whether they will have an improved outcome.
I asked him for the results, but obviously, he wasn't going to tell me. However, I did push further. And I asked whether or not jumping the gun and giving people nicotine might be beneficial. And all he had to say to me is that the only practical recommendation is to offer complete nicotine substitution in all hospitalized COVID patients. I know he doesn't want to disclose the results yet, and I can't wait to see the publication here, but this is a very interesting response from the professor. I also asked him what he thought about therapeutics versus vaccines and their role in public health messaging. And his quote to me was, "Vaccines are much more active. But it is important to understand everything about COVID-19, including the interaction of the nicotine receptors."
Okay. Okay. That's pretty good. But let's further investigate this. How about talking to some other scientists. What about Dr. Jean-Paul Humair. Now Jean-Paul works in tobacco cessation and addiction therapy, and I had a lot of questions for him as well. And these are the answers that he gave me. So my first question was about the link with other types of nicotine cessation or smoking cessation products apart from nicotine patches. And my question was, will people potentially go out and start self-medicating? And he said, and I quote, "The link between nicotine and infection with COVID-19 is not clearly established and not well understood." Well, okay. He's also not letting the cat out of the bag.
"However," he says, "that it is likely that many people will consider the vaccine as the more effective protection against COVID-19. But opponents to COVID-19 vaccination might be tempted to use nicotine as a protection because the vaccine is not an acceptable option to them." Isn't that an interesting response. Now we have to talk about the addictive nature of nicotine. And of course, I asked him about what are some of the problems with nicotine replacement products. And he confirmed what we all know that, "As nicotine is an addictive product, taking up nicotine or other oral and fast-acting forms of nicotine replacement is likely to create nicotine addiction. However, apart from causing addiction, oral nicotine is not harmful for human health as it does not cause any serious disease."
So that's very important to be aware of as well. My next question and the last and most important one is whether or not he agreed or disagreed with the non-clinical. That is the scientific studies looking at the plausibility of nicotine being beneficial to reduce inflammation. And I quote. He stated, "The relationship between nicotine and COVID-19 infection certainly deserves more research using the appropriate study design to establish the causality between both elements. There are elements supporting this hypothesis, therefore it makes sense to investigate and know better about it. And some might enjoy the fun to have done it.
Now, where are we at? All of you are probably wondering where you can find follow-up information, and I'd suggest that you look into ClinicalTrials.gov and search and read and follow and bookmark these websites. This is just one of the nested series of clinical trials which is on offer. I think it's a really good idea. And I think it's a great potential outcome for a simple and easy to access therapeutic, which may have a beneficial outcome in reducing inflammation. If anyone wants to read the article that I wrote which includes all of the references about nicotine and SARS-COVID-2 and all of the academic studies and papers about this, I recommend you go to trialsitenews.com and look up the article and download it for yourself.
In any case, my name's Dr. Cameron Jones, I'm a Public Health Scientist. I think that this is some really interesting research. Certainly, it has been fermenting online on Twitter. There are some publications that have just come out after I wrote my article that are talking about how Twitter responded to this concept of nicotine for as a therapy. I think all of us should be following this space. All of us should consider the fact that there are therapeutics out there, and you should consider what these are, where to get them, and whether they're suitable for you. I'm a scientist, I'm reporting on what the scientists and medicos have said. And what's in the peer-reviewed literature. In any case, I hope you've enjoyed this. Bye for now. I'll be back next week.
