The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) wants to make it easier for people to stop smoking. It proposes to do this by lowering nicotine levels in cigarettes. The FDA said lower nicotine levels will make it easier for people to smoke less, and to move toward stopping smoking all together. Scott Gottlieb, the head of the FDA, is a doctor and cancer survivor. Gottlieb said that most deaths and diseases from smoking are a result of an addiction to nicotine, a chemical found in tobacco plants. A smoking addiction means that people feel such a physical need to smoke that they have a very difficult time stopping. He said that nicotine is to blame for this dependency. Gottlieb also called cigarettes the only legal product that when used as intended will kill half of all long-term users. The FDA is taking public comments before deciding whether to put the proposed policy into effect.