On one hand, you can compress that to once per minute and get a reasonable amount of sleep. A quick and guilt-inducing search informs me that one Matthew Tybor smoked a cigarette in a mere 36.44 seconds, so I guess that's plausible if we ignore the carbon monoxide?

On the other hand, nicotine is a stimulant, so maybe you wouldn't need to?

50 packs a month may be what they meant (about the average for chain smokers at more than 1 pack per day.) Or they did imply hyperbole.