Read this! Dr Michael Mosley. Not hooked!

[Oliver]

Is there someplace where we can watch the show? Or has it not been broadcast yet?

I'm not sure when the show is due to broadcast, but it's not happened yet. The Times article is clearly pre-publicity though, so I imagine soon.

 

[Robino1]

I think some of what happens here is that as smokers, we were self medicating for whatever reason. Nicotine has been established as helping for certain conditions.

Bear with me as I think this through on what I know as of now.

Non cigarette users, so far, do not get addicted to nicotine on it's own. Cigarette users become more sensitive to an addiction.... but is it to cigarettes? or Nicotine in the cigarettes? That is the million dollar question. As we are already addicted to cigarettes, we don't quite qualify to be studied.

Caffeine is an addictive substance. My lack-of-caffeine headache tells me when someone decides to switch out my caffeine laced coffee with some gawd awful decaf. Caffeine is not vilified (as of yet) so caffeine addicts don't have the 'Addict' stigma attached to them, as nic users do at this point in time.

Anyway, back to my original sentence..... Could the 'addiction' start because our minds and bodies actually need nicotine to treat whatever it is our body is lacking?

 

[Eskie]

Anyway, back to my original sentence..... Could the 'addiction' start because our minds and bodies actually need nicotine to treat whatever it is our body is lacking?

And that's the million dollar question. There are already receptors in our brain for nicotine, and they were there before we started smoking. The same is true for other drugs. Is it that we're "replacing" something that we have a lack of, or are the nicotine receptors in those of us who became regular smokers simply different than those in other people?

 

[Maytwin]

I'm not sure when the show is due to broadcast, but it's not happened yet. The Times article is clearly pre-publicity though, so I imagine soon.

22 May - 9.30 p.m. (BST) on BBC2 I'm going to try and watch but it's the one Sunday I've got a visitor staying !

 

[Big Me]

22 May - 9.30 p.m. (BST) on BBC2 I'm going to try and watch but it's the one Sunday I've got a visitor staying !

You can always watch it on iPlayer afterwards

 

[skoony]

I was addicted to cigarette smoking for 38 years. Now I am not.
I haven't had a cigarette in almost 3 years. I haven't a clue what
in the smoke that was addicting but I do know that 30% of cigarette
smokers develop a dependency to smoking cigarettes. This dwarfs
the dependency rates from cigar/pipe smoking and smokeless tobacco
which deliver nicotine in comparable rates depending on consumption.
I believe if the nicotine in my e-liquid did anything it acted as a placebo
that my body recognized as a component of cigarette smoke and fooled
itself into thinking I was still smoking. I vape now significantly less than when
I started. This was not a planned reduction. It just happened. IMHO I believe
that a lot of people talk themselves into believing the nicotine in their juice
has them addicted because,nicotine is addictive,right?

Even if nicotine was as addictive as we have been told 70% of those that
claim to be addicted couldn't be. Only 30% of smokers develop a dependency.
If you are vaping or smoking for the nicotine buzz and still getting this buzz
in all likelihood your not dependent. A characteristic of smoking dependence
is not smoking for the buzz. You no longer get a buzz. You smoke to keep from
going into withdrawals.

Regards
Mike

 

[bigdancehawk]

Bear with me as I would just like to touch on a few topics in this post.

"And please don't be so quick to believe that nicotine alone is addictive. There is mounting scientific evidence that nicotine is no more addictive than caffeine."

Actually, caffeine withdrawal in a heavy coffee drinker is well known and established. Based on personal experiencing, it's also quite unpleasant, with real physical symptoms (I'm down to 2 to 3 cups a day, way better than I used to be)

Sure, your body becomes accustomed to it and so it can be unpleasant if, as with any stimulant, you suddenly stop using it. But caffeine doesn't cause significant physical harm, break up families, cause intoxication, or threaten to destroy your career like addictive substances do. Your definition may differ, but that's my notion of an "addiction." It's significantly harmful. It messes you up.

"If it's so addictive, where are all the nicotine gum addicts, nicotine patch addicts, nicotine lozenge addicts?"

Well, I was a gum addict/nasal spray addict, and every time I tried to stop using them, I ended up back on cigs. Of course, there were other factors that made cigarettes more appealing, primarily so I would not have to address the fact I couldn't get off the damn things.

Again, of course you can define "addict" as you please, but getting off of nicotine gum or nasal spray and going back to smoking doesn't strike me as a sign of addiction to the gum or the spray. If "trying" to stop using nicotine gum made you miserable, and if the gum was addictive, why not go back to using the gum rather than taking up smoking again? Sounds like you were addicted to cigarettes rather than the gum.

"There have been numerous studies involving lab animals trying to get them to show a dependence response to nicotine, similar to the response to ......., etc. Researchers have found that nicotine doesn't produce that kind of response. The animals are "meh" when it comes to nicotine."

There have been numerous studies published in medical journals documenting the effects and physical withdrawal syndrome in both rats and mice. Here's a link to a nice review paper that contains information on nicotine dependence models in both human and mouse models published in the N.Y. Academy of Science in 2014, which has about 300 citations to articles demonstrating this. Here's a link Mouse models for studying genetic influences on factors determining smoking cessation success in humans

Right, they repeatedly inject a number of substances in genetically conditioned rodents over a period of time (Nicotine hydrogen tartrate salt and mecamylamine hydrochloride--the latter to simulate withdrawal), and, as you say, the mice show signs of withdrawal. But, as I said, the mice don't exhibit the kind of dependence response observed in experiments with certain controlled substances that shall not be named here. Yet we've heard it repeated again and again that nicotine is just as addictive or more so than those substances.

I am thrilled that vaping has finally given me a way to stop smoking cigarettes after all this time in a manner that is more satisfying than gum/patches/nasal spray, probably because it best mimics the actions of smoking, including draw and "smoke", than the other methods of delivery. I think there is a solid basis to recognize that e cigs and vaping provide smokers with a better and seemingly more effective method to stop using cigarettes. But I believe it is unproductive to not recognize the varying addicting effects nicotine can have.

Well, the FDA sorta seems to disagree: "The changes that FDA is allowing to these labels reflect the fact that although any nicotine-containing product is potentially addictive, decades of research and use have shown that NRT products sold OTC do not appear to have significant potential for abuse or dependence." Funny the way they phrased this. It sounds like they're implying dependence is worse than addiction. Sort of like, "Well it may be addictive, but at least it doesn't induce dependence." Huh? Of course, they're incapable of completely backing away from what they've been saying for decades: that nicotine is "highly addictive." Thus, we have to suffer this strange bureaucratic misuse of the English language. Nicotine Replacement Therapy Labels May Change

For example there are people who can "social" smoke, have occasional cigarettes in what used to be a social setting (not much social anymore about standing outside the bar/restaurant to have a cig) and be quite comfortable going days or weeks without a cigarette. Other people can have a cigarette and find themselves becoming a "regular" smoker in a short period of time (see the twin studies for a human model as mentioned in the article above). Using one person's experience with vaping does not establish lack of risk for nicotine addiction.

Everybody reacts differently to stimulants. But your examples pertain to smoking cigarettes, not consumption of nicotine without smoke. That's why I'm slightly irritated when the words "addict" and "addicted" are casually thrown about. I imagine we've all heard or read, "You haven't really quit. You're still addicted. You've just traded one addiction for another."

I don't want to see vaping products, or even crappy cig-a-likes that have allowed lots of folks, including me, to stop inhaling burning tobacco removed from the market. For that matter, I am strongly in agreement with the recent Royal Society of Medicine position paper to accept vaping and cig-a-likes as a means to help people stop smoking and reduce the medical consequences and burden of cigarette use. But, IMO, failure to recognize the potential for nicotine dependence in an individual isn't the best approach to improve the acceptance of vaping.

"Recognize" it? You mean hang our heads in shame and confess to it, like at an AA meeting? Or just quietly slink away like lepers? I fail to see how people will be more "accepting" of vaping and vapers if we self-acknowledge dependence.

ETA: The remainder of my response is in blue, interlaced with Eskie's post.

 

[Eskie]

"Recognize" it? You mean hang our heads in shame and confess to it, like at an AA meeting? Or just quietly slink away like lepers? I fail to see how people will be more "accepting" of vaping and vapers if we self-acknowledge dependence.

Not at all. There should be no feeling of shame. There is certainly nothing to confess. However, I believe most of us came to vaping from cigarettes. As in anything there are rarely if ever absolutes. If you look at most vapers who use liquid containing nicotine, they usually got there from cigarettes. I doubt there are many regular vapers who do not have some experience with tobacco. Maybe there are occasional vapes who simply do it for the flavor, but most of us do rely on it to keep from going back to smoking.

Consider how many people who stop vaping believing they are past the need to vape who end up going back to cigarettes. The harm reduction with vaping instead is huge. Just look at this site. Over 250,000 people, many of whom were smokers but are now vapers, who would be harmed by eliminating the availability to vape. I know if I stopped vaping at some point I would go back to tobacco. I once stopped for 5 years after a year on Nicotrol nasal spray, only to go right back to a pack and a half a day after sitting after dinner with friends and thinking "only one cigarette won't be a problem". For me, it was.

Every person is different, with different brain wiring and different reactions to using any substance. I know there are folks here who have reduced the amount of nicotine in their liquids to almost, if not absolutely no nicotine. But as a smoker, regardless of nicotine content, that suck on something and see "smoke" is satisfying in and of itself that the decades of habit can be changed away from tobacco to get that same satisfaction. I don't see how acknowledging that is harmful, and if anything, reinforces the argument to allow the sales and marketing of vaping products and that overaggressive regulation like these Deeming regs will damage public health, which the exact opposite of what was intended when the Tobacco Act was initially passed.

 

[DebbieNY]

Back in February, I had a bad sinus infection which caused a sore throat. I couldn't vape any juice I had comfortably, so I just stopped because my throat hurt too much to vape. About a week and half later, after the infection had almost gone, I realized that no one was ever in danger of my 'nicotine addicted' wrath... So, I concluded that it's not the nicotine in tobacco cigarettes that had me craving a cigarette. There is definitely other chemicals in there that I would put the blame on, but damned if I know what they were.

 

[Netop]

I don't know what in the cigarettes is addictive to what degree and I don't want to downplay the effects of all the crap that gets added to them, but at least for me, Tobaaco is addictive.

For me, nicotine is addictive, but not as viciously as combusted tobacco. At least that's what I believe from experience. I've smoked mainstream brands of cigs, fancypants brands like Nat Sherman, which avoids additives, high end rolling tobacco as well as a shag that was sold technically as pipe blend (I think to avoid extra taxes in that state). They all did the trick. And they all would let me know if I hadn't had one in an hour.

Like most folks here, I had to get over that "something missing" phase when I switched. A year and a half vaping, and my body and brain still let me know that it's time to vape. Again, not as hard as cigs, but I can still feel the lack of nic.

Just my

 

[7sixtwo]

When I put the analog cigarettes down in favor of vaping, interestingly enough, I found I was addicted.

Addicted to a mysterious chemical in which I was always told was nicotine.

However I soon found out that considering I had nicotine going in to my body, through ecigarette liquid, yet still had a severe craving for that 'something'. That something is what at that time and continues to strike a bit of mental fear in me. What in the blazes was I putting in my body!?

After a short time, while continuing to use the ecigarette, maybe one month give or take a few extra weeks, I no longer had the drastic 'I must have a cigarette' feeling, yet this craving continued sporadically for many months. Until I completely forgot about it.

The question here, again, is what is being put into the 'tobacco' slurry, which is addicting enough to keep an analog cigarette user entranced. Find this chemical, and we find the real death dealer.

People have been addicted to smoking tobacco since long before Big Tobaccy companies started cranking out the current line of garbage marketed as cigarettes. Completely natural and organic tobacco is still quite addictive.

So, that "something" that your brain craves after quitting smoking is not some "mysterious chemical", or artificial, modern additive. Although I've no doubt that BT does put more #$%& in their products to make them even more addictive, that's not the major factor at play here. Exact details of that "something" could be isolated by scientific research geared toward discovery of how tobacco addiction actually functions.

It's already clear that a major factor in tobacco addiction are the additional chemicals inhaled when the leaf is burned. That's where the "something" is. The actual killers are poisons like tar, carbon monoxide, etc, which are byproducts of combustion and have little to no addictive properties themselves.

There's little doubt that nicotine has some addictive properties, but I think that further objective study will show that it's similar to caffeine, and nowhere near the level of drugs like alcohol and powerful painkillers, (both illicit and prescribed). Abundant anecdotal evidence of that is provided by all the e-cig users who have cut down on and/or eliminated nicotine from their e-juice, all on their own, without rehab or professional help.

It's well past time to end the abject demonization of nicotine.

 

[Big Me]

Article about the forthcoming programme.

Smoke and mirrors: the truth about vaping

 

[DC2]

Well, I've been saying this for years.
Not only saying it, but insisting on it you might say.

Anyway, back to my original sentence..... Could the 'addiction' start because our minds and bodies actually need nicotine to treat whatever it is our body is lacking?

This was posted by Stormfinch on another thread...
Does smoking tobacco fulfill a nutritional need? - Health Supreme

I haven't read the whole thing yet so I won't comment on it...
Other than to say it's pretty darn fascinating...


As for me, I switched from vaping 12mg liquid every day for over six years...
To vaping zero nicotine liquid...

Overnight.
No withdrawals, no nothing.

That was about five months ago.
Still using zero nicotine and never think twice about it.

BUT THAT'S JUST ME.
And I would not doubt that some ARE quite addicted to nicotine.

After all, if there is anything we have all learned here...
It's that we are all different in nearly every way...

 

[DaveOno]

I agree with a lot here.

I smoked Winston, which is supposedly just 100% tobacco, no additives. And they were still very addictive. I think it is the combustion process, all the other chemicals in the smoke, and that the smoke is much finer particles as opposed to vapor.

The main point for me is I have no idea how much nic I was intaking with cigs. Or the relative nic levels of various brands. Or how the level would change per my smoking habits. Hitting it too often, hot-boxing, smoking almost to the filter, etc.

But with vaping, I know EXACTLY how much is being used. (not sure how much I ingest, but still, I imagine that to be fairly constant.) Started with 24mg, now at 5 for mtl on a 1.6ohm Naughty mini, or 2 or 3 subohm.

And I feel my "addiction" is fully under my control, and I could end it. (if I wanted to, but I gotta vape up all this liquid I've got on hand, lolol)

I could not say this about cigs. Also, I notice Marlboro smokers were addicted not to cigs, but to Marlboros. Other cigs don't fix the urge. This is the additives in "boros".

The other amazing thing is how many otherwise educated people today still believe that nicotine is carcenogenic.

 

[evan le'garde]

For a few months now i have been thinking that with all the chemicals there are in tobacco cigarettes that any combination of a small number of those chemicals could be addictive to one user. Then, a different combination of a few of the other chemicals could be addictive to someone else. So therefore the number of permutations of addictive combined chemicals would be so high that anyone and everyone could become addicted to cigarettes once they've started smoking. If that is probable then vaping nicotine wouldn't be addictive to non smokers and would only be psychologically addictive to most ex smokers. Then the only demographic left are those who actually can become physically addicted to nicotine alone.

 

[evan le'garde]

It's due to air on Sunday 22nd May @ 9.30 GMT on one of the BBC channels.....

Horizon 9.30PM gmt - BBC 2 Sunday 22nd May.

Michael Mosley investigates the dramatic rise in e cigarettes and what "vaping" really does to your health.

 

[element77]

Wow! What a read!
I am constantly amazed at the discoveries and research that gets buried throughout history in the attempt to mold the present social agenda.
I enjoy exploring and questioning all of our everyday assumptions, but I'm keenly aware that my viewpoint is not shared by many outside of the forums I seek out.
Thank you for an enlightening find from sources more interested in causation not predetermined conclusions.

 

[mudmanc4]

People have been addicted to smoking tobacco since long before Big Tobaccy companies started cranking out the current line of garbage marketed as cigarettes. Completely natural and organic tobacco is still quite addictive.

So, that "something" that your brain craves after quitting smoking is not some "mysterious chemical", or artificial, modern additive. Although I've no doubt that BT does put more #$%& in their products to make them even more addictive, that's not the major factor at play here. Exact details of that "something" could be isolated by scientific research geared toward discovery of how tobacco addiction actually functions.

It's already clear that a major factor in tobacco addiction are the additional chemicals inhaled when the leaf is burned. That's where the "something" is. The actual killers are poisons like tar, carbon monoxide, etc, which are byproducts of combustion and have little to no addictive properties themselves.

There's little doubt that nicotine has some addictive properties, but I think that further objective study will show that it's similar to caffeine, and nowhere near the level of drugs like alcohol and powerful painkillers, (both illicit and prescribed). Abundant anecdotal evidence of that is provided by all the e-cig users who have cut down on and/or eliminated nicotine from their e-juice, all on their own, without rehab or professional help.

It's well past time to end the abject demonization of nicotine.

I might have gone for that at one time. As addiction can mean many things, one of course is anything we enjoy and seek.

I've used cigars, they do not contain this malicious additive. I've used leaf tobacco from the farm. This also does not qualify as that substance which grabs hold.

These ....-plugs who take leaf tobacco, and turn it to a slurry adding everything under the kitchen sink, boiling it, cracking it, reconstituting it and cutting it to appear as tobacco, are in my opinion and experience mass murderers. They are producing something so un natural and feeding it to people claiming it is one thing when it's nothing of the sorts.

Takes a short search to find a few detailed videos as to how this is done. Sure, tobacco is addictive, nicotine is as well, so is bubble gum, no I joke not. But when you take a product and turn it into some primordial sexual inequivalent to be inhaled in the form of a tube, calling it tobacco, this is a completely different realm of obscurity.

This is the reasons we are seeing these people falling to insane restrictions. Money and power, it cannot be about anything else in this matter.

 

[Susan~S]

Looking forward to seeing the broadcast. I often share this video regarding nicotine.

 

[crxess]

Looking forward to seeing the broadcast. I often share this video regarding nicotine.

Added to my FB timeline