One year after Health Canada’s ministerial order limited sales of Zonnic—the only approved nicotine pouch for smoking cessation—to pharmacy counters, Imperial Tobacco Canada reports that the policy has backfired.
While legal Zonnic sales have collapsed, cigarette purchases have climbed 2.8 %, and more than 500 million unregulated nicotine pouches have entered the black market.
Eric Gagnon, Imperial Tobacco’s vice-president of corporate and regulatory affairs, slammed the policy as “punishing innovation”, warning that it has instead “fueled the black market.” He added: “Zonnic wasn’t the problem. It was and is the solution for many Canadian smokers.”
The illicit pouch surge isn’t simply a regulatory glitch—it represents a serious public health risk. Many of the unregulated products contain nicotine far above legal limits and are easily accessible to both youth and adults, via both street-level and online channels.
Additionally, the pharmacy-only restriction has deepened inequities in cessation support. Rural and remote smokers, who previously relied on convenience stores, now face unnecessary obstacles in accessing Zonnic. The policy has also imposed heavy administrative burdens on pharmacists, pulling them away from patient care.
The economic fallout is equally stark. Convenience retailers—vital to local economies—are losing sales, placing approximately 200,000 related jobs nationwide in jeopardy and threatening the viability of small businesses.
Imperial emphasizes that Zonnic had been both a Health Canada–approved Natural Health Product and endorsed by leading institutions like CAMH (Centre for Addiction and Mental Health). Areas offering Zonnic in convenience stores had previously seen double-digit declines in cigarette sales, demonstrating its effectiveness as a cessation aid.
Looking forward, Imperial urges a return to evidence-based, multi-channel access to cessation tools. Gagnon expressed the company’s willingness to “work with Health Canada to ease the burden on pharmacists and help more adults quit smoking for good.”
The company also reaffirmed its alignment with Canada’s goal of reducing smoking prevalence to under 5 % by 2035, warning that such ambitious public health targets require convenient access to innovative tools—not additional barriers.
