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Tobacco: Oh! What A Drag…

Posted by SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist in Health.
Mar 10th, 2009 | Comments

During my six-month stay in Adelaide (Australia) last year, I was struck by the fact that more women (as compared with men) smoke in public. While in the US more and more smokers are kicking this addiction. In India an increasing number of women are lighting up. Why? The typical response of all women: Tension! Men don’t give a clear answer!

(Last year, a WHO study revealed that nearly two-thirds of the world’s smokers live in 10 countries led by China, which accounts for nearly 30 percent, and India with about 10 percent. They are followed by Indonesia, Russia, the United States, Japan, Brazil, Bangladesh, Germany and Turkey. See details here…)

The Independent has an interesting article on the subject. “Smoking is at least as addictive as heroin, cocaine or alcohol. It’s the nicotine, a chemical that is less harmful than caffeine, that creates the dependence. But the method of delivery is also part of the addiction.

“The tobacco industry has invested heavily to make the smoke easier to inhale, speeding the nicotine into the bloodstream to hit the brain in around seven seconds. As well as being more harmful and creating greater dependency, this also ensures that other nicotine products – patches, gums and sprays – simply don’t hit the spot.

“Once delivered to the brain, a range of brain receptors are able to use the nicotine to help stimulate production of dopamine, the brain chemical that plays a part in making us feel pleasure. ‘As the effect wears off, you need another cigarette to stave off withdrawal symptoms including anxiety, nervousness, agitation and depression,’ explains Professor Britton.

” ‘What people experience as pleasure or relaxing is really the sensation of going from feeling really crappy to just about normal,’ he says. The brain learns to tolerate nicotine quite quickly, and there are different degrees of addiction, depending on the age you start smoking, how many cigarettes you smoke, and how deeply you inhale.

“Nicotine is undoubtedly a mood-altering drug, and according to clinical psychologist and author Oliver James, has antidepressant properties, ‘probably many times more effective than Prozac’. Back in 2005, he claimed that 80 per cent of smokers are actually self-medicating for depression when they smoke.

“Having a cigarette, he said, is the only way ‘people who find socialising difficult can enjoy company, or those who are easily irritated or shamed can ease negative, paranoid or depressive ideas’.

“Among those diagnosed with a depression or anxiety disorder, around half smoke. The figure is even higher for schizophrenics (around 80 per cent) and those with psychosis living in institutions (70 per cent).” More here…

Photo above courtesy Tom Kelly/Getty.

And here’s poem: “The Last Cigarette”.

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roro80

I don't think I agree with a lot of the statements in this article. First of all, I think we need to lose the often-said meme that cigarettes are as addictive as heroine. No one who has ever known a heroine addict would agree with this statement. Sounds cute, but no way. There are millions of people in this country who smoke the occasional cigarette -- say, 1 or 2 a week -- and then are fine the rest of the week. Heroine just doesn't work like that.

And 80% of smokers are self-medicating? This also sounds wrong. Now, if you're an ex-smoker who has quit, extremely rough times are more likely to get you to pick back up the bad habit, but that goes for a lot of other habits -- over-eating, drugs, alcohol, personal hygeine, dressing in sweats all the time, whatever. Meaning that it's not intrinsic to tobacco per se. Maybe this statistic is closer to true in the US, where it's considered a given that smoking is shameful and self-destructive, but I certainly don't think it's the same in areas (Europe, Asia, South America -- probably other areas too) where smoking isn't considered a moral issue or something a person would only do if they're trying to destroy themselves.

Smoking is bad enough that we don't need to rely on untrue information to make the point.

river

"The Independent has an interesting article on the subject. “Smoking is at least as addictive as heroin, cocaine or alcohol. It’s the nicotine, a chemical that is less harmful than caffeine, that creates the dependence. But the method of delivery is also part of the addiction."

I am glad you are writing about this and hope your post are also made in India. . . .As a ex-smoker, i was able to make the break when i realized just how much poison was going into my body with each inhale. . .Here is a short link to the 599 additive that are used to enhance and deepen the addiction to nicotine. These where made public in 1994 by the six major American Cigarette Companies. Here in the States we have made slow progress, but each time America calls for restriction the Companies just vamp up their seductive sale advertisements and strategies in developing countries. . .I think the way U.S. companies have marketed their death products to developing countries should be viewed as slow murder and severely criminal. . . May each country soon find legal avenues to sue the drug Companies as we have in the States. . .Money is the only thing that will stop this death trade. . .

I am also Native American and we have a long history of tobacco smoking and tobacco was utilized as sacred in ritual and prayer. . .the Old Ones always say; " we never had health issues from tobacco before it was marketed by the Tobacco Industry, and believe it is the additives and their formulation to ensure the most entrenched addiction. . .Truly it is criminal! .

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_additives_...

HemmD

Gee

And I thought I was just depressed because I've been singled out to pay for the S-Chip kids.

You guys on the right, here is an example where I agree with you that the government takes too many liberties with personal rights.

JSpencer

The addictive powers of tobacco will never be underestimated by any ex-smoker who was truly and deeply in it's thrall. I recall hearing one description by a cigarette smoker who was telling of his first encounter with the drug, he said it was like suddenly being able to see in color after living in a world of black and white. Now, I grant you that sounds frought with hyperbole, but it gives some idea of how and why it is so difficult for some people to kick the habit. I quit about seven years ago and still get the itch to light up now and then... not that I would, unless perhaps I was diagnosed with some terminal illness. My point here is that one persons casual dalliance can be another's addiction, and not all personalities experience that the same way, either physiologically or psychologically.

sara123

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sara123

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sara123

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buy prozac

Prozac (fluoxetine) for Depression: I have been taking Prozac for at least 8 years and it helps keep me from being irritated all the time. When I have not taken it for a couple of days, I get what I call "permanent road rage", ready to snap at the world.

CStanley

I know a few women who won't quit because they know that smoking keeps their weight down and they don't want to deal with weight gain. I wonder if that figures into the gender difference.

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