Controversial suggestion: Lobelia Extract in E-Juice?

[Moriah]

The only time I've used lobelia was when I was iced in, in the Ozark Mountains, with pneumonia. No way to get to the doctor. Fortunately we had two herbal concoctions at the house made the previous year -- usnea lichen tinctured in vodka, and lobelia seeds tinctured in vinegar.

I was dosed with 1 shot of the usnea tincture every hour I was awake as an antibiotic -- it's very effective against staph and strep. Every two hours I was awake and at least twice during the night I just barely moistened my lips with the lobelia seed tincture and swallowed what got on my lips. It immediately induced a coughing fit, tears streaming down my cheeks, running nose, etc -- in other words, major expectorant -- so I would cough up as much as I could then go back to resting. They also gave me liberal doses of cough suppressant so I could actually rest -- otherwise I couldn't *stop* coughing.

Two weeks later I was better, the roads unthawed, and I went to the doctor. He confirmed by chest x-ray that I'd had pneumonia (we thought it was just really bad bronchitis at the time) and said that my lungs sounded very good. I still took a course of real antibiotics later, but ....

I wouldn't be all that interested in inhaling lobelia. I cough enough as it is. Then again, lobelia seeds tinctured in vinegar is *very* strong and designed to extract exactly the alkaloids that make you expectorate (and if you have more than the amount I had, it will make you hurl -- so it was also kept around as an emergency syrup of ipacec).

[Unperson]

The only time I've used lobelia was when I was iced in, in the Ozark Mountains, with pneumonia. No way to get to the doctor. Fortunately we had two herbal concoctions at the house made the previous year -- usnea lichen tinctured in vodka, and lobelia seeds tinctured in vinegar.

I was dosed with 1 shot of the usnea tincture every hour I was awake as an antibiotic -- it's very effective against staph and strep. Every two hours I was awake and at least twice during the night I just barely moistened my lips with the lobelia seed tincture and swallowed what got on my lips. It immediately induced a coughing fit, tears streaming down my cheeks, running nose, etc -- in other words, major expectorant -- so I would cough up as much as I could then go back to resting. They also gave me liberal doses of cough suppressant so I could actually rest -- otherwise I couldn't *stop* coughing.

Two weeks later I was better, the roads unthawed, and I went to the doctor. He confirmed by chest x-ray that I'd had pneumonia (we thought it was just really bad bronchitis at the time) and said that my lungs sounded very good. I still took a course of real antibiotics later, but ....

I wouldn't be all that interested in inhaling lobelia. I cough enough as it is. Then again, lobelia seeds tinctured in vinegar is *very* strong and designed to extract exactly the alkaloids that make you expectorate (and if you have more than the amount I had, it will make you hurl -- so it was also kept around as an emergency syrup of ipacec).

I don't know how to respond to your comments. You used lobelia mixed with vinegar while you were sick (which I've never done). I don't dispute what you said. I just don't know if your circumstances made it cause a different reaction.

As mentioned in the OP, I ingested pure lobelia several times a day. I placed about 5 or 6 drops in an 8 oz glass of water which I drank 3 or 4 times within a 24 hour period over several days. I didn't feel nausea, experience coughing, or anything, actually. I was using it as a trial method for quitting smoking. It didn't worked in that capacity.

Thank you very much for your input. It does make me realize I need to dig deeper into this.

[Moriah]

I don't know how to respond to your comments. You used lobelia mixed with vinegar while you were sick (which I've never done). I don't dispute what you said. I just don't know if your circumstances made it cause a different reaction.

As mentioned in the OP, I ingested pure lobelia several times a day. I placed about 5 or 6 drops in an 8 oz glass of water which I drank 3 or 4 times within a 24 hour period over several days. I didn't feel nausea, experience coughing, or anything, actually. I was using it as a trial method for quitting smoking. It didn't worked in that capacity.

Thank you very much for your input. It does make me realize I need to dig deeper into this.

The reaction I had was the one needed -- I needed something to help me cough up the junk in my lungs. It was certainly effective. Hence why I'm not dissing it as a poison or truly dangerous. It does have a medical use.

Did you use an OTC lobelia tincture? If so, it may have been very lacking in potency. Most store-bought tinctures have so little active ingredient in comparison to fresh tinctures that they are nearly worthless. And I wouldn't be surprised if unscrupulous vendors were just selling colored water/glycerin/etc.

botanical.com - A Modern Herbal | Lobelia

That describes the method of making the lobelia seed tincture in vinegar. However, when you look at the doses that are mentioned there, remember that is based on only tincturing the seed for 7 days. The herbalist I knew who makes it does not strain out the seeds before bottling -- so the longer it sat in the refrigerator, the stronger it got. It was at least a year old. Hence why it worked so well for what was needed in such a low dose.

[Mammal]

Aha, thought I saw this thread... I should be asleep but I can't resist throwing my 2 cents in.

Anecdotally, I once met someone who claimed to have success using lobelia together with tobacco. IIRC the method was to roll a flower or two into a tobacco cigarette, and the lobelia alkaloids were said to potentiate the nicotine and have a much longer half-life. (Note that my recollection is particularly hazy on their opinion of dosage, and they also made note of the expectorant/emetic effects at higher doses, so do not trust me on this.) They claimed to be getting by on one such cigarette a day, down from some unspecified number prior.

I only had the opportunity to try it once, plucking a shriveled flower off a lobelia plant and wedging it in the end of a standard factory cigarette. It maybe did a little something to make the 'fix' last longer, but it could well have been placebo effect. Unfortunately lobelia immediately becomes deer food around here and I've never had another one survive long enough to bloom.

... of course, it came to mind as I went out on the porch to 'vape' (still not liking that term, but I better go with the flow to be understood) and realized the nicotine was just waking me up without whatever other component - the carbon monoxide? MAOIs? - made burning leaves a satisfying thing to do to wind down for bed. Obviously I should just get out of that habit ("chew some valerian root"), but maybe the right amount of lobelia would make a satisfying 'whole-herb' extract.

Not sure I'd expect China to have the last word on mixing it up, if so. Does it have much history of use there? I thought it was a New World kind of thing.

[Mammal]

Note the difference in parts used - seeds, roots, and flowers can often have very different concentrations of substances, and sometimes they're even unique to one part of the plant. The fuss around kava kava / Piper methysticum comes to mind as one insidious example - traditional use of the root never caused much trouble, but indiscriminate whole-plant extracts in western supplement regimes ("take 2 daily") were an untested case, cost a few people their livers, and led to equally-indiscriminate bans in some places. [Another reason to hope Ruyan knows what they're doing...]

[voltaire]

Nhaler.com already offers e-liquids with lobelia among other herbs.
6ML Lung Juice Samplers - Assorted Strength - NHaler

[thunderbolt885]

would it be possible to extract an herb by making a tincture and mixing it with something and be able to vape it?

[CES]

Lobelia is a little strange. It binds to the same receptors that nicotine binds to and can result in dopamine release. It can also inhibit nicotine binding. So if you use it by itself it can mimic the effects of nicotine. If you use it with nicotine, it could decrease or block the effects of the nicotine.

Competitive Neuronal Nicotinic Receptor Antagonists: A New Direction for Drug Discovery ? JPET

[driptip]

You can put about anything in e-liquid I just do not know how it would affect your lungs in the long or short term. Electronic Cigarette | E Cigarette | E Liquid - Healthcare E-Liq

[Altmed]

Please read...
http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/_src..._FAR_Final.pdf

This has GOT to be, by FAR the most hysterical bunch of BS I've ever read...

McD's and every household with ketchup beware!

by the time you get to page 14, THE DOCUMENT FINALLY STATES, "5. Relevant Issues 5.1 Safety assessment of nicotine
A detailed report on the safety of nicotine is provided at Attachment 2."

... I NEVER FOUND ATTACHMENT 2, LIKELY BECAUSE EITHER THEY DISCOVERED WHAT ANY HERBALIST COULD HAVE TOLD YOU, THAT DUH! THERE IS NICOTINE IN A LOT OF OUR FOODS! OR THAT THE SO-IMPLIED 'SCIENTIFIC DATA' IN THIS REFERENCE IS JUST AS PSYCHOTIC AS THE REST OF THE REFERENCED ABOVE DOCUMENT!
(sorry 'bout the caps guys.. long night & lost this after 2 hours of typing... grr.. shoulda backed it up! GRRR!!! My fault!)

Interesting data on page 15 though... That's a must-read for ANYONE!!!

Table 1. Nicotine content (μg/kg) in tomato, potato, eggplant, cauliflower and peppers
Food source
nicotine (μg/kg)
Castro and Monji,
1986
Davis et. al., 1991 Domino et. al.,
1993
Siegmund et. al.,
1999
Potato not included Potato flesh:
15.3±1.7 (n=6)
Potato peel: 4.8±0.8
(n=6)
7.1±5.9 (n=11) Raw potato:
4.5±2.2 (n=6)
Processed potato not included not included not included French fries: 11.5
and 6.9
Tomato 6.0±2.4 (n=6) market tomato,
5.1±0.8 (n=3)
fresh tomato,
9.6±2.7 (n=6)
4.1±1.8 (n=8) 2.4±1.2 (n=7)
Unripe tomato 42.3; 14.2; 8.9; 25.3 not included not included 16.1; 8.2; 6.8; 8.5;
6.8; 8.7; 7.0
Processed tomato
products
peeled tomato, 52;
tomato paste, 11;
tomato sauce, 3.
not included not included tomato paste, 5.3;
tomato sauce, 4.5;
tomato ketchup, 7.3
Eggplant 100 n.d. (n=6) not included 1.9±0.7 (n=4)
Cauliflower not included 16.8±7.8 (n=6) 3.8±2.2 (n=16) not included
Green pepper 5.7±0.0 (n=2) n.d. (n=6) not detected 3.7; 5.8; 6.1
Yellow Pepper not included not included not included 9.0 (n=1)
Red pepper not included not included not included 5.9 (n=1)
Green Pepperoni not included not included not included 8.7; 6.3 (n=2)

And from page 16...
Table 2: Nicotine concentrations (μg/kg) in tea leaves (Siegmund et. al., 1999)
Sample nicotine (μg/kg) ww nicotine (μg/kg) dw
Earl Grey – black tea 381 404
Ceylon Orange Pekoe – black tea 164 174
Assam –black tea 1593 1696
Darjeeling – black tea 812 864
China Fancy Gunpowder – green tea 317 337
Earl Grey – green tea 358 380
Formosa Gunpowder – green tea 470 499
Temple of Heaven – green tea 337 353

Check the page if you can't read through the formatting issue here...

Basically, there's quite a bit of nicotine in foods & in the pesticides used on them... I guess these people are just now figuring that out...

And basically, if I buy a "food additive" in New Zealand, I can put 99.999% nicotine on my cornflakes, and in AU down under, I can use it to "treat animals" (DUH! Someone figured out nicotine has medicinal value... at least for animals! This has been known before "modern medicine" ever came around!)

Smokers are quitting in the US, but cancer rates are sky high... higher than before and darn it if the cosmetic, food or oil or any other industry is going to take it on!

Time to take off the gloves people!

Write your congressmen & senators, write the president!

If nicotine becomes over-regulated, this is going to be like prohibition was all over again & people are going to get hurt trying to make their own in garages & other unsanitary places with food products!

Have you ever seen the museums where "Hooch" was contaminated with lead?

This will be a similar situation...

I've already seen some well... interesting ideas about handling extremely toxic , potentially deadly doses of nic on some boards...

If this becomes banned, the cig tax it too high, people will do what they want to do when there is ridiculous regulations put upon them.. it WILL go black market, and fast!

Also, there is a reference on Wikipedia RE ... for use of "nicotine withdrawals".

This should be interesting... If they outlaw cigarettes, then any food with nicotine in it, then try to go after eCigs, they're going to have to go through the food lobby, thus references in the article omitting "food additives" from the "toxic nicotine"! Boo! Scary huh!

Regulations are being made are purely on scare tactics! The areas where smokers have quit have seen higher, not lower cancer rates, so these people seem to feel they need to take it out on someone!

This is psycho communism at its worst... And I thought I might like to go to New Zealand or Australia... Hmmm... Guess not!

Where in God's green earth do these idiots come from anyhow?

I've ye to see a SINGLE study that actually shows a link between even smoking & cancer, or that shows nicotine is addictive or a "strong psychotropic drug!

I've also yet to see a single study that excludes those who have been exposed to carcinogens, or worse, exposed to carcinogenic additives in cigarettes!

IF nicotine is so darned "addictive, psychotropic", and whatever babble, then EVERY grocery store, farmer's market, fruit stand, school, etc. that sells tea or anything in the brassica or nightshade families ought to be paying for all these studies.. Oh, and worse, those food additive companies... but then New Zealand seems to think nicotine as a food additive and AU thinks to use it on nimals is perfectly OK.. but don't people eat those animals?

All those years we were taught to "eat your veggies" down the tubes... guess Solient Green might just become a reality in New Zealand? Let's NOT let it take hold here!

Oh, guess we can't eat OR breathe!


I guess we just have to take ... or smoke ........ (as was stated by a researcher on Wikipedia), starve & die...

Ridiculous BS!

-Altmed

Have companies label their stuff as properly as possible, then let US decide!