 What is it?
Smoking a cigarette involves inhaling a complex set of elements including gases and tars. Nicotine seems both to aid concentration and relax the user.
Nicotine is one of the most powerfully addictive drugs, and smoking cigarettes and other products is directly linked with a substantially increased risk of a range of serious chronic health problems, including lung and heart disease, and cancer.
What's in cigarettes?
Many of us worry about the alarming number of additives, colourings, preservatives and other ingredients that are added to our food. But how many of us know what is in cigarettes - apart from the obvious - or what's produced when they're smoked?
Some cigarette flavorings include childhood favorites such as cocoa, vanilla, liquor, sugar and even honey. However, more than 4,000 chemicals can be found in cigarette smoke, some of which are very familiar. Here's just a few:
Ammonia - found in toilet cleaners.
Acetone - found in nail varnish remover.
Cadmium - a highly poisonous metal used in batteries.
Vinyl chloride - used to make PVC.
Napthtalene - used in moth balls.
Carbon monoxide - lethal gas in your car exhaust fumes - a poisonous gas that is produced when things burn and is commonly given off by exhausts and gas fires as well as cigarette smoke. In large amounts, such as from a faulty gas fire, it is rapidly fatal, while in small amounts, as when someone smokes a cigarette, it will cut down the efficiency of the smoker's breathing.
Tar - the stuff cigarette smoke deposits in your lungs and clogs them up. Once inhaled, smoke condenses and about 70 per cent of the tar is deposited in the lungs. Condensed tar is a sticky brown substance that stains fingers and teeth a yellow-brown colour.
Nicotine - the powerful and fast-acting drug behind addiction. When tobacco smoke is inhaled, nicotine is absorbed into the bloodstream. Immediate physiological effects include increased heart rate and a rise in blood pressure.
Cyanide - used in the gas chambers.
Formaldehyde - used to preserve dead bodies.
Arsenic - poison.
Did you know ... ?
Addiction to nicotine is usually established in young smokers within about a year of first experimenting with cigarettes, in many cases before reaching the age at which it is legal to buy cigarettes.
How to assess the level of nicotine addiction?
If you want to help someone assess the extent to which a cigarette smoker is addicted to nicotine, you need ask just two key questions: how long after waking do they smoke their first cigarette and how many cigarettes do they smoke a day? The shorter the time and the more cigarettes smoked reflects how addicted they are.
The Fagerstrom Test is the most widely used assessment procedure for seeing how addicted to nicotine someone is. Try completing it now for yourself or for someone else.
Test for Nicotine Dependence
1. How soon after you wake up do you smoke your first cigarette?
After 60 minutes (0)
31-60 minutes (1)
6-30 minutes (2)
Within 5 minutes (3)
2. Do you find it difficult to refrain from smoking in places where it is forbidden?
No (0)
Yes (1)
3. Which cigarette would you hate most to give up?
The first in the morning (1)
Any other (0)
4. How many cigarettes per day do you smoke?
10 or fewer (0)
11-20 (1)
21-30 (2)
31 or more (3)
5. Do you smoke more frequently during the first hours after awakening than during the rest of the day?
No (0)
Yes (1)
6. Do you smoke if you are so ill that you are in bed most of the day?
No (0)
Yes (1)
How did you do?
If your score is below 4 points, your addiction to nicotine is not all that severe and you should be able to stop smoking fairly easily. If you score above 7 points your nicotine dependence is high. For your situation, the best strategy is to consult your doctor about stopping. |
