A growing cohort of influencers aligned with Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Make America Healthy Again movement has found a new health hack to evangelize: nicotine pouches. Products like ZYN and VELO — tobacco-free oral nicotine products that entered the U.S. market in 2016 — are being reframed by biohacking content creators not as tobacco alternatives, but as legitimate wellness tools.
The pitch goes something like this: nicotine, stripped of cigarette combustion, is a natural compound with cognitive benefits the mainstream medical establishment has unfairly demonized. Advocates point to supposed parallels with peptides, raw milk, and beef tallow — other fringe-to-mainstream wellness products that have been embraced by the MAHA movement.
High-Profile Promoters
Dave Asprey, the self-described “father of biohacking” with more than 1.3 million social media followers, has claimed nicotine can increase cognitive function, reverse Alzheimer’s disease, and extend lifespan. Fitness personality Jillian Michaels has also made positive statements about nicotine as a natural compound. The U.S. Health Secretary himself has been photographed carrying a tin of nicotine pouches and has described such products as “probably” the safest way to consume nicotine.
The claims have found a receptive audience. Nicotine pouch sales have grown substantially in the U.S. in recent years, and the MAHA-adjacent wellness framing is one factor researchers believe is accelerating adoption among adults who would not previously have considered a nicotine product.
What the Science Actually Says
Medical experts are pushing back hard. The CDC is unambiguous: there are no safe tobacco or nicotine products, and youth, young adults, and pregnant women should not use them under any circumstances. Nicotine harms brain development through age 25, can accelerate addiction pathways to other substances, raises blood pressure and heart rate, and may harden arterial walls in ways that increase heart attack risk.
Dr. Adam Leventhal from the University of Southern California, who studies nicotine addiction, has been among the most vocal critics, emphasizing that there are no proven health benefits to nicotine consumption and that the risks of addiction are real and rapid — symptoms can develop even in first-time users.
The MAHA influencer push puts regulators in an awkward position. The FDA is still in the process of reviewing premarket applications for most nicotine pouch products, and the agency has repeatedly stated that pouches should not be promoted as safer alternatives without authorization. As the biohacking-nicotine crossover continues to grow online, the gap between what influencers claim and what regulators have authorized may prove increasingly difficult to bridge.
