DENVER - One way tobacco companies are combating the reduction in smokers is by introducing new products, including nicotine toothpicks, breath mints and dissolvable strips, the Denver Post reports. Now the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment is holding a special hearing on these new forms of smokeless tobacco products.

Tobacco firms point out that these products cater to smokers who have limited options for lighting up in public. Cigarette smoking has declined, but tobacco companies have seen a spike in "spitless" tobacco pouches and dissolvable tobacco products.

R.J. Reynolds Tobacco, which is testing some of its dissolvable Camel products in Colorado, said its Camel products "are made for and marketed to adult tobacco consumers. As a matter of fact, we developed the products in response to adult tobacco consumers who told us they were interested in products like our Camel dissolvables," said company spokesman Richard Smith. "It is a guiding principle and belief at R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company that youth should not use tobacco products."

Some see Colorado as the proving ground for smokeless tobacco products, as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has the authority to regulate tobacco but the agency has yet to determine which categories that control encompasses. The agency is under congressional direction to study the health effects and marketing of dissolvable tobacco and submit a report in March 2012.