Tag Archive
Why do tobacco plants make nicotine?
The short answer is that tobacco plants make nicotine to discourage insects from eating them (it is poisonous to them), so what one really has to do is make a connection between insects and people. Given the huge variety of life, it is often hard to remember that it is all put together in very [...]
Where are you on the smoking spectrum?
An interesting question came up the other day: Is there a difference between being a non-smoker and being an ex-smoker? Some people would define a non-smoker as someone who has never smoked before, and an ex-smoker as someone who has quit smoking. Is there a point of abstinence after which an ex-smoker reverts back to [...]
Can secondhand smoke make you crazy?
“Where there’s secondhand cigarette smoke,” reports Bruce Bower in Science News, “there’s emotional fire.” According to researchers at University College London, people exposed to large amounts of secondhand smoke — which is already linked to asthma, Sudden Infant Death Sydrome, and other conditions — are far more likely to develop psychiatric problems than those who [...]
Nicotine vaccine effective in early tests
A vaccine that could help people stop smoking is showing promise in early clinical trials, researchers announced this week at a national meeting of addiction specialists. The vaccine is designed to stimulate the immune system to generate antibodies that would latch on to nicotine in a smoker’s body and prevent it from ever entering the [...]
How Fast Nicotine Peaks in the Brain?
Traditionally, scientists thought nicotine inhaled in a puff of cigarette smoke took a mere seven seconds to be taken up by the brain, and that each puff produced a spike of nicotine. Using PET imaging, Duke investigators illustrate, for the first time, that cigarette smokers actually experience a steady rise of brain nicotine levels during [...]
To quit, ‘nicotine-free’ smokes as good as lozenges
NEW YORK – Trying to quit smoking? So-called nicotine-free cigarettes may be as helpful as nicotine lozenges, hints a small study. Smokers who used the nicotine-free cigarettes before quitting were as likely not to be smoking six weeks later as those who used nicotine lozenges, authors report in the journal Addiction. (Such cigarettes actually have [...]
Longer use of nicotine patch improves abstinence from cigarettes
New research from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine may help more smokers keep their New Year’s resolution by helping them quit smoking. Extended use of a nicotine patch – 24 weeks versus the standard eight weeks recommended by manufacturers – boosts the number of smokers who maintain their cigarette abstinence and helps more [...]
Public Continues to be exposed to Harmful Second-Hand Smoke
Cigarette smoking and its impact on health has been investigated for many decades. The harmful effects of tobacco smoke are of big interest to a raising number of medical institutions, governmental entities and individuals who seek to inform the general public about the essential dangers of cigarette smoke, not only to the smoker but to [...]
Tobacco kills, but careful of way telling smokers
While a WHO report has confirmed tobacco as the leading preventable cause of death in the world, a survey shows that reminding smokers of the fatal consequences of their habit may actually make them smoke more. More than 94 percent of the world’s people are not protected by laws against smoking, leaving them exposed to [...]
Smokers Inhaling Germs With Each Cigarette
New research provides evidence that the average cigarette is crawling with germs, including bacteria that cause respiratory disease. But as one spokesman for a tobacco company pointed out, the authors of the new study aren’t sure what, if any, hazard the germs pose. And exposure to bacteria is nothing new: Microbes surround us every day [...]
Exposure to lead, tobacco smoke raises risk of ADHD
CINCINNATI — Children exposed prenatally to tobacco smoke and during childhood to lead face a particularly high risk for ADHD, according to research done at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. The study estimates that up to 35 percent of ADHD cases in children between the ages of 8 and 15 could be reduced by eliminating [...]
Removal of lacunas in Anti-Smoking Ordinance urged
Islamabad – Health experts believe that consumption of tobacco in Pakistan is becoming more and more alarming because its incidence is increasing among youth of Pakistan especially in schools, colleges and universities. According to an estimate, Pakistanis smoke away Rs50 billion annually. Around 100,000 persons die every year in Pakistan due to diseases related to [...]
Occasional smoking is increasing
Smoking-cessation programs typically target frequent smokers with fairly hefty habits. But it may be time to also put some focus on occasional and social smokers, according to a commentary released today in the Archives of Internal Medicine. Jjypjync This group of intermittent smokers may not be studied as much as more prolific puffers, but the [...]
Reducing Alcohol and Cigarettes Can Save Billions
According to a new study, thousands of Australian lives can be saved, simply by cutting back on alcohol and cigarettes, including saving the economy over $2-billion in healthcare costs. By reducing the 773-standard drinks per adult which is the average annual intake to 505 drinks a year can save 38-lives and $1.2-billion. The Deakin University [...]
