Metaform Ventures to invest $2 million to conduct research, build capacity in tobacco cessation in India

The objective is to provide empirical data, evidence to encourage new harm reduction tools, cessation techniques, products for tobacco-free India

Metaform Ventures, led by Nilesh Jain, has committed to invest $2 million in its India Centre of Excellence, to conduct research on tobacco cessation and harm reduction, with focus on smokeless tobacco (SLT) products like jarda, ghutka, khaini, etc. The objective is to provide hard empirical data and evidence to encourage new harm reduction tools, cessation techniques and products for a tobacco-free India. Smokeless tobacco use accounts for 90 per cent of oral cancers in India or a total of about 300,000 deaths a year. Studies suggest that regular users have a significantly overall higher death rate compared to non-users, and experience increased risks for low birth weight and stillbirths in children of women who use SLT during pregnancy. They also increase risks of tuberculosis (TB) and heart disease.

“Innovative thinking and profound changes within this sector can contribute significantly to public health. Leading new research, supported by government-led policy interventions, can help deploy technology options to reduce risks and transform core SLT products,” added Jain. “This harm reduction research programme complemented by efforts to stimulate innovation in the cessation market can make toxic SLT history and in the process save hundreds of thousands of lives.”

With an objective to perform the characterisation of harmful and potentially harmful constituents in Indian smokeless tobacco products, the project is to test several smokeless tobacco products across India. The data generated through this research will be useful for regulators and product innovators, and will help create capacity for independent research in India. Secondly, provided users with more options to choose from, thereby motivating them to move towards safer options and reduced harm.

This highlights new research data to enable clinicians, regulators and researchers with valuable information for considering the potential health effects that may result from the use of Indian SLT products and evaluate other harm reduction efforts via cessation techniques or THR products like SNUS.

“Our approach is very simple – to generate robust, credible data that will not only fill the current gap in research but also spur interest across the research community to become proactive in setting up lab testing infrastructure for Indian SLT product characterisation and building research capacity. This focus on HPHC SLT characterisation would not only massively improve the innovation of cost-effective SLTs but also help researchers to reduce some of the highest oral cancer death rates and tobacco-related disability stated, ” Jain.