TWENTY years ago it was deemed one of the hardest issues to tackle when it came to the health effects surrounding smoking.

But now researchers at British American Tobacco in Southampton believe they may have reached the holy grail in efforts to make nicotine inhalation safer for millions of smokers across the globe.

Sitting in a plush top-floor office at BAT’s £17m research and development centre off Waterhouse Way, the firm’s group scientific director David O’Reilly revealed the city is at the forefront into the study of producing safer cigarettes for consumers, and said attitudes towards tobacco and smoking must change to embrace “harm reduction”.

He revealed the tobacco manufacturer has been working with life science ventures to produce a brand of discrete electronic cigarettes, as well as lobbying the Government to overturn a European ban on a tobacco substance popular in Scandinavia.

Its impressive centre was opened in 2010, five years after it moved its manufacturing arm abroad to Korea and Singapore.

A further £6m will be spent updating its existing laboratory facilities and office spaces to further stamp the city’s dominance in tobacco and cigarette research.

It employs more than 1,000 members of staff – more than it did during its production period – to work on a variety of group research and development techniques.

The firm’s aim is to focus on developing “superior and innovative products” in its world class science facility.

More than 300 people are employed in this area in specialisms covering biology, chemistry, biochemistry, genetics, toxicology and biotechnology, while other staff members fill roles in finance, IT and HR.

Its labs are filled with scientists wearing white coats and safety glasses as they test a wide range of cigarettes produced by the manufacturer.

Daily Echo reporters witnessed how one machine tested the quality of cigarette and the varying substances emitted when inhaled.

A staff member placed a lit cigarette into a contraption before it automatically inhaled the tobacco.

The smoke would travel through to an attached machine that simulates the human lung before the results are checked through graphs automatically compiled on computers.

Over the past three years, BAT has ploughed £23m into ensuring work such as this is at the top level in research and development, ensuring the firm and the city plays a vital role in developing ways of reducing the rates of smoking-related deaths.

It was first launched in the city in 1956 – 43 years after its manufacturing branch was built – following the discovery that smoking cigarettes could lead to lung cancer.

It’s the research they carry out in Southampton that leads to the worldwide distribution of cigarettes from two regional supply chain hubs in western Europe and eastern Europe, and Africa and the Middle East.

Mr O’Reilly said that while there were 50 million smoking-related deaths in the 20th century, it is expected to reach a staggering one billion in the 21st century.

He said: “We have made a lot of progress in the better understanding of finding related diseases.

“The number of smokers on the planet will rise due to population growth and we are looking at ways that smokers can take nicotine safer.

“We are looking at cigarettes using technology to reduce the harm of consumable cigarettes.

“We are looking at heat not burn products. We have much cleaner aerosols and more recently there has been a big interest in clean nicotine products.”

He highlighted a product called snus, a form of powdered tobacco that is placed under the top lip, as a form of consuming nicotine without smoking.

BAT produces the product but snus is banned in the EU – apart from in Sweden and Norway where it is extremely popular.

Although Sweden joined the EU in 1992, it is exempt from forbidding consumers from buying snus under a compromise agreement.

And despite anti-smoking campaign groups and health research linking smoking with deaths, Mr O’Reilly said attitudes need to change in helping people give up cigarettes.

He said: “The world would be a poorer place without nicotine. It has helped people through world wars, the stress of everyday life, and it is helpful for people suffering from Parkinson’s and dementia.

“It’s a wonderful drug but it’s only in the last few years that it has been used in a dangerous way.

“I would say attitudes need a rethink on current policies, they are out of date and ineffective. It’s time to embrace harm reduction.

“I always wonder how we are seen in this city and I hope the citizens of Southampton view us positively.

“When I meet people and they ask what I do, they are surprised to hear there is a world-class facility like this in the city that’s dealing with one of the biggest health challenges of the 21st century.

“There has been £23m invested and I think there will be more people on site in the future.”