“The Bear” season 3’s best guest star? NRT gum

Season three of the Emmy-winning comedy “The Bear” features cameos by John Cena, Jamie Lee Curtis, Olivia Colman, and many others. But the best guest star may just be nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) gum.

In the show’s first two seasons, main character Carmen “Carmy” Berzatto — played by Jeremy Allen White — was often shown smoking, but the latest season finds him quitting with the help of NRT. This FDA-approved treatment comes in several forms including nicotine gum, lozenges, or the patch. Decades of research, as well as a 2020 report from the Surgeon General, confirm that NRT is a safe and effective tool for quitting tobacco products.

Rarely does Hollywood show what it’s like to quit tobacco. In fact, on-screen smoking is common despite well-established research that such depictions make young people more likely to start using tobacco products. Youth e-cigarette use in particular remains a serious public health threat, with the latest National Youth Tobacco Survey showing that 1.63 million middle and high school students use e-cigarettes, with 38.4% of them – about 620,000 teens – vaping frequently.

Nicotine harms developing adolescent brains and may make young people more susceptible to addiction later in life. Nicotine addiction can also increase stress and intensify feelings of depression and anxiety, a growing concern given the Surgeon General’s report about the worsening national youth mental health crisis.

Lights, Camera, Tobacco?

A Truth Initiative report found that top streaming shows among 15- to -24-year-olds in 2022 exposed an estimated 25 million young people to on-screen tobacco imagery. FX — which produces “The Bear” — more than doubled the number of tobacco depictions from 2021 to 2022, the report found. The series also won the 2023 Emmy for Outstanding Comedy Series, an award that can garner prestige, media attention, and increased viewership, amplifying the negative impact of on-screen tobacco use on young viewers.

White, the main star of “The Bear,” previously appeared in “Shameless,” which contained the most tobacco depictions among shows most popular with 15- to 24-year-olds in 2021. Young fans of White may have followed him from “Shameless” to “The Bear,” making the show’s decision to cut back on smoking depictions and introduce a nicotine-quitting storyline encouraging progress in protecting young people from the influence of on-screen smoking.

Snuff out on-screen tobacco

To truly address youth exposure to tobacco imagery, Truth Initiative calls for a comprehensive set of policies to curb tobacco depictions on screens, including:

• Increasing awareness and outreach: Educating the industry and its various stakeholders about the risks of portraying tobacco on screen is vital.
• Developing and publicizing anti-smoking policies: Studios should develop and publicly announce policies that restrict tobacco content in youth-rated films, similar to those in effect among members of the Motion Picture Association.
• Including anti-smoking messages and resources to quit when tobacco imagery is present: Anti-tobacco and anti-vaping ads are successful at reducing tobacco use and should appear before and after content that contains tobacco imagery. Proven-effective resources to quit smoking, vaping, and using other tobacco products should also be shared.