Smoking Cigarettes – 5 Things You Should Know About Cigarette Smoke

March 11th, 2010

Cigarette smokers are constantly faced with criticism and health warnings. Here are 5 things that are true about cigarette smoking.

1. Cigarettes Cause Cancer
Smoking cigarettes has been proven to cause cancer. When tobacco is burned, thousands of chemicals are generated. It is these chemicals that are responsible for cancers and cardiovascular diseases. Lung cancer, for example, is the most prevalent type of cancer and is primarily a result of cigarette smoking.

2. Cigarettes Are Expensive
Traditional cigarettes contain filters, papers, and tobacco leaves. With all the advertising, lobbying, and branding thrown into the mix, the cost of putting cigarettes on the market has never been higher before. On top of that, consumers are burdened by heavy tobacco taxes. Sin tax, as some may call it, is considered as a pretty unfair tax in this free country.

3. Second Hand Smoke Affects Children and Newborns
Cigarette smoke Contains 4,000+ chemicals and small particulates, and a good amount of them still get out of your lungs and get inhaled by nearby people. Second hand smoke not only causes cancer, but stunts growth in children and produce birth defects in newborns. In fact, inhaling second hand smoke is deadlier than smoking the actual cigarette. The reason is that cigarette smoke contains free radicals, which induce cellular damage and cause cancer. Because second hand smoke is lower in temperature, the free radicals adhere to the lung tissue better and inflict greater damage to the victims.

4. Cigarettes Stain Teeth
Among the substances in cigarette smoke is the tar and other particulates. These things stick to your teeth and gradually discolor them.

5. Cigarettes Accelerate the Aging Process
Aging is a process of gradual cellular deterioration. Because the chemicals in cigarette also inflict cellular damage, smoking compounds the aging effects. Cigarettes essentially accelerate this natural process and make you a lot older than you actually are.

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Top 5 Reasons to Quit Smoking Tobacco Cigarettes

March 10th, 2010

Cancer

Smokers are much more likely to develop some form of cancer than non-smokers.  Ninety percent of lung cancer cases are caused by smoking.  Smoking tobacco cigarettes can cause all sorts of cancers including mouth, stomach, oesophageal, bladder, kidney and pancreas cancer.  At least half of smokers are eventually killed by their habit!

Lower Life Expectancy

Prepare to be shocked by this one.  Smokers have an average life expectancy 10 years lower than non-smokers.  10 years!  Life is short enough as it is.  If this doesn’t make you seriously think twice, thrice and ten times about quitting smoking, we need to talk!

Emphysema

Emphysema is a chronic irreversible lung disease, primarily caused by tobacco smoking, which gradually destroys the lungs and is one of the most common causes of death from respiratory disease.  In emphysema, the alveoli (air sacs) in the lungs become over-stretched, destroying the elasticity of fibers that open and close the air sacs during breathing.  This results in the smoker having difficulty breathing normally, shortness of breath, difficulty exhaling and wheezing.


Heart Disease

Cardiovascular disease is the most common cause of death and illness in the UK.  If you smoke, you have a higher risk of developing a blood clot leading to a heart attack.  In fact, the majority of people who have a heart attack before the age of 50 are smokers.  Smoking damages the lining of your arteries, leading to a build up of fatty material and a reduced blood flow.  The carbon monoxide in cigarette smoke reduces the amount of oxygen that the blood can carry to your heart and body.


Bronchitis

Smoking causes Bronchitis.  Bronchitis is an inflammation, or irritation of the air passages in the lungs. These airways are called the bronchial tubes, or the bronchi. When these bronchial tubes are irritated by chemicals released from tobacco smoke, thick mucus is formed in them. The mucus clogs up the air passages and obstructs the passage of air into the lungs. This causes bronchitis and can lead to chronic bronchitis.  Symptoms of bronchitis include chronic coughing, breathlessness and tightness and pain in the chest.

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Top 5 Reasons to Quit Smoking Tobacco Cigarettes

March 10th, 2010

Cancer

Smokers are much more likely to develop some form of cancer than non-smokers.  Ninety percent of lung cancer cases are caused by smoking.  Smoking tobacco cigarettes can cause all sorts of cancers including mouth, stomach, oesophageal, bladder, kidney and pancreas cancer.  At least half of smokers are eventually killed by their habit!

Lower Life Expectancy

Prepare to be shocked by this one.  Smokers have an average life expectancy 10 years lower than non-smokers.  10 years!  Life is short enough as it is.  If this doesn’t make you seriously think twice, thrice and ten times about quitting smoking, we need to talk!

Emphysema

Emphysema is a chronic irreversible lung disease, primarily caused by tobacco smoking, which gradually destroys the lungs and is one of the most common causes of death from respiratory disease.  In emphysema, the alveoli (air sacs) in the lungs become over-stretched, destroying the elasticity of fibers that open and close the air sacs during breathing.  This results in the smoker having difficulty breathing normally, shortness of breath, difficulty exhaling and wheezing.


Heart Disease

Cardiovascular disease is the most common cause of death and illness in the UK.  If you smoke, you have a higher risk of developing a blood clot leading to a heart attack.  In fact, the majority of people who have a heart attack before the age of 50 are smokers.  Smoking damages the lining of your arteries, leading to a build up of fatty material and a reduced blood flow.  The carbon monoxide in cigarette smoke reduces the amount of oxygen that the blood can carry to your heart and body.


Bronchitis

Smoking causes Bronchitis.  Bronchitis is an inflammation, or irritation of the air passages in the lungs. These airways are called the bronchial tubes, or the bronchi. When these bronchial tubes are irritated by chemicals released from tobacco smoke, thick mucus is formed in them. The mucus clogs up the air passages and obstructs the passage of air into the lungs. This causes bronchitis and can lead to chronic bronchitis.  Symptoms of bronchitis include chronic coughing, breathlessness and tightness and pain in the chest.

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Giving Up Smoking Using Electronic Cigarettes

March 10th, 2010

I’m having great fun with electronic cigarettes, I feel healthier and think that I’m saving money, but am I living in cloud cuckoo land? We shall see.

Electronic cigarettes are healthier than smoking tobacco, can help you to stop smoking, they save you money. Claims made by e-cigarette companies and users but are they true or false?

Smoking Facts

I found out that normal cigarettes contain over 4,000 chemicals and to my horror approximately 40 that are cancerous and that is a proven fact.

Electric cigarettes contain Nicotine, Propylene Glycol, Water and Flavourings – a bit less than 4,000 chemicals don’t you think!!

I’m already addicted to nicotine so I can’t see that e cigs are more harmful in that respect. Propylene glycol is used to deliver vapourised nicotine and according to Wikipedia is used amongst other things as a moisturiser in medicines, cosmetics, food, toothpaste, mouth wash, and tobacco products. If propylene glycol is so widely used in those other products then it shouldn’t be harmful. Water shouldn’t hurt anybody and flavourings – most of our food contains flavourings.

Looking at those facts and unless electronic cigarettes contain substances that we don’t know about then I can’t see them being anywhere near as harmful as tobacco products. I’m no doctor or scientist, but having scoured the Internet the objections to e cigarettes don’t seem to be about what they contain, more that they are addictive and that young non smokers may turn to them because of different flavours available including chocolate and cherry.

I can see that point and really can’t see why flavours beyond the normal were introduced, except for profit of course.

Giving Up Smoking

I’ve tried many times and in different ways, the most successful was with nicotine patches but obviously as with over 80% who try to stop smoking with patches or gum they didn’t provide a permanent cessation of my nicotine addiction. Whether electronic cigarettes help me to stop permanently or not I don’t know and won’t for at least another year or two.

What I do know is that with patches you have a constant flow of nicotine into your body, some brands even recommend that you use them 24/7. I never smoked 24/7 and was never comfortable that nicotine was being constantly released into my body. With e cigarettes I have more control over my intake and like patches can gradually reduce the nicotine strength until I am smoking no nicotine vapour.

Healthy Or Not

Do I think that electronic cigarettes are healthier? Absolutely, I feel better in myself and although I’ve only been smoking e ciggies for a couple of weeks even after a short time I have noticed a difference in my breathing. I walk up a long steep hill every day – usually slowly and out of breath. Not now, I walk up there quicker and my breathing is easier.

I lay on my back and slept last night for the first time in years. Usually I lay on my side because the strange noises that my chest was making when I laid on my back not only kept me awake but also was frightening.

I stopped waking up coughing a few days ago.

Money Saving

There are claims of saving 80% of the cost of smoking normal cigarettes. I don’t think that’s strictly true. The initial outlay for a starter kit generally containing an atomiser, 2 batteries, charger and 5 or 6 cartridges can vary from about £20 to £100. Some companies claim that 1 nicotine cartridge is equivalent to 20 cigarettes – others say 6. I am finding that the brand I am using is probably about 10 cigarettes per cartridge.

An additional cost that isn’t mentioned on some of the sites selling e-cigs is that atomisers need changing fairly regularly and that you should have a spare one. Even so I estimate the saving that I am making to be at least 50% in money and perhaps far more in health.

I am not a law breaker, but if my government ban e cigarettes as some countries have I would have to strongly consider breaking the law rather than risk of going back to tobacco and certain deteriorating health.

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Electronic Cigarette Versus Regular Tobacco Cigarettes Part 3 – How Cheap?

March 10th, 2010

How Cheap are electronic cigarettes?

Smoking cigarettes isn’t cheap and because they are deemed and indeed proven to be harmful to health, cigarettes are an obvious target for price increases and over the last few years the cost for a smoker has risen dramatically. What about the new electronic cigarette that everyone is talking about? How do they hold in terms of price, against standard cigarettes?

Pretty well it would seem! Manufacturers and especially some distributors claim that smoking electronic cigarettes is significantly more afforadable than smoking tobacco cigarettes.  Some estimate that it could be as much as 80% cheaper to be an e cig smoker. There is no doubt about it, if that is true, then it is a massive saving and leaves the tobacco industry more than a little embarrassed.

One such online electronic cigarette distributor has an e cig price comparison graph that works out how much it would cost to smoke regular cigarettes as opposted to their product. They calculate that if you are a smoker who smokes forty a day, then you could save as much three and a half thousand pounds by switching to the e cigarette.

If any of these statisitics are to be believed then once more the electronic cigarette claims a significant victory over the tobacco industry. Regardless of the swirl of media coverage and controversy that plagues any new product, in an isolated one on one battle with regular cigarettes the case is becoming compelling. Score? Electronic Cigarette, three – Tobacco Cigarette, Zero.

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Questions and Answers about smoking with e cigarettes

March 10th, 2010

E Cigarettes questions and E Cigarettes answers

Another great email

I have been smoking for around 20 years now. I have tried to give up many times with patches, gum and cold turkey. I have been thinking about these e cigs I do not know what to think about them. TV shows talk like they are great deal more healthy and I can see with the hundreds of chemicals tobacco companies put in cigarettes that if you did not breath those additional chemicals seems like it would be a good deal. It also sounds like I will save plenty of money. I could save a car payment a year from what I might figure. I wouldn’t smell like tobacco smoke? Is that true or false. Does it really not have any smell? I want to understand more and also which e cigarettes should I try or buy.

Tim

I relate, I also have been smoking for over twenty years also. It is hard to quit tobacco smoking I also have attempted to give up smoking with everything under the sun. I have quit cold turkey, I have attempted the gum packets and I have attempted nicotineee patches. I even attempted the crazy hypnosis but I still return to smoking. The masses of chemicals in cigarettes could be a extremelyy grave matter. I don’t know if they put masses of toxins in them but I do know that they really get you hooked. I did not know what to consider the e cigs to quit smoking. I know that I get bored of having to go outside at a restaurant or bar to light up. If I am working in a building that’s six stories high I need to go all of the way out to the parking lot. It takes forever and a day. I have not totally quit tobacco smoking but I have found that with my e cigs or the brand I purchased was the Knight stick. I can get the same nicotinee anywhere. I can go to the hallway and have a puff on it and not smell like smoke when I return to the table and they’re cheaper than regular cigarettes. You may save around two to 4 greenbacks a pack varying on where you hail from and you won’t have to worry about can I smoke there or am I able to sit outside. No more folks not wanting me to not light up by them. My mom and dad likes e cigs a load more. I have placed a link right below so you may try what I ordered. They mailed them to me extremelyy fast and I’ve been very happy.
.

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My One Good Way To Quit Smoking Cigarettes

March 10th, 2010

Patches, pills, hypnotism and cold turkey are a few of the ways the smokers have experienced to quit with only limited results. Most do not give the smoker a good substitute that will satisfy his desire to smoke while going through the withdrawal process. All others fail while the electronic cigarette seems to work for the majority of smokers. Most of the world never heard of electronic cigarettes until a few years ago. Today those words plus other synonyms are being used by millions of people all over the globe to discuss this alternative to smoking.

E-Cig started marketing the product in 2004 after first doing R & D in 2003 setting a standard for other electronic cigarette companies. In 2005 E-Cig.com established a world wide web site marketing electronic cigarette products. Before 2005 the electronic cigarette was limited to a single taste and one nicotine amount for each cig. Improvements in technology has resulted in more product choices in sizes from large to tradition, one or 2 pieces for better access to load and a great selection of tastes and nicotine atomized or not for the discerning smoker offered by several electronic cigarette competitors. People will forever smoke differently because of the new electronic cigarettes products. Technology today has created an electronic cigarette that looks like a traditional one but that is where the similarity stops because there is no tar, odorless, nicotine vapor or no cancer producing smoke to hurt your health. I can not believe that, you must show me before I can agree.

There are three major parts, a battery, an atomizer, and a cartridge filled with liquid nicotine that makes the electronic cigarette come alive. Inhaling the cig sends a signal to the atomizer, a heating element inside of the cig. The healthier vapor that appears to be smoke is the result of the atomizer quickly heating up the liquid nicotine solution. The advantage of the safer electronic cigarette greatly outweighs the traditional tobacco burning cigarette health issues. Thousands of deadly chemicals and proven carcinogens that occur naturally in tobacco enter your lungs each puff. A healthier approach is used by the electronic cigarette in vaporizing a liquid nicotine based solution. Because the E Cig produces vapor not actually smoke, the electronic cigarette does not fall into the category of No Smoking Bans. Vaporizing is far safer than smoking and can only be obtained in the new technology of E-cig.

Quit smoking and reducing harmful chemicals are the most important benefits in using E-cig along with several others that add to the value of the device. Reducing the risk of fire is a huge benefit of the electronic cigarette along with odorless, non staining and less expensive make them a real bargain if you must smoke. The way to quit smoking is to join the electronic cigarette vaporizers and reduce the nicotine levels as you overcome the tobacco addiction and at the same time save money, stop staining your teeth, eliminate that awful smell and stop worrying about smoking in bed.

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A Good Use For Leftover Cigarettes After You Quit Smoking

March 10th, 2010

The use of tobacco products is deadly to humans. There’s really no question about it. Every day thinking people all over the world decide to kick the smoking habit. And many of them succeed! But with smoking cessation success comes a small problem; what to do with those leftover cigarettes?

It’s really hard to throw a pack of cigarettes that you paid upwards of four bucks for into the garbage. You sure don’t want to give those leftover cigarettes to your friends who are still smoking; you want your friends to quit smoking, too.

Soâ?¦if you can’t throw them away and you can’t give them away, what CAN you do with those leftover cigarettes after you’ve kicked the smoking addiction?

Here’s a PLAN! The nicotine in those cigarettes is not only deadly to YOU. It’s deadly to other living creatures as well; living creatures like the bugs that plague your garden and your house plants.

Tobacco water has been used as an insecticide since the 1800’s. Tobacco water is absolutely deadly to most garden insects.

Soâ?¦.rather than using those cigarettes to kill yourself, you can use them to kill the bugs that are killing your plants.

Here’s how:

�    Remove the filter and paper from each cigarette and put the tobacco into a large pot of boiling water
�    Add six fresh chopped garlic pods and several crushed pods of the hottest chili you can find.
�    Bring the mixture to a rolling boil.
�    Reduce the heat and simmer for at least an hour. (You should probably do this outdoors or with all of the windows and doors open because there will be a strong and lingering odor.)
�    Next strain the solids out using cheese cloth.
�    Put the liquid in a spray bottle.

Apply it to indoor plants to kill aphids and other insects especially during winter months. You can use it on outdoor plants any time or the year. Spray the trunks of saplings to prevent girdling by larger animals during the winter months. The smarter animals will not come near tobacco which should be a lesson for humans.

KEEP OUT OF REACH OF CHILDREN! This is a highly toxic mixture that is deadly to children, pets and wildlife!

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Smokeless Cigarettes Vs Tobacco, Where’s the Savings?

March 10th, 2010

Tobacco cigarette prices are on the rise and many feel the crunch of this recession, it’s no wonder so many smokers are turning to smokeless cigarettes. A cost-effective option for many reasons and even though many opponents are trying to discredit its effectiveness, we will look at some facts and let you the smoker form your own opinion and decide on what is cheaper. It’s seems obvious that these electronic cigarettes are a much safer and healthier solution but it may premature to make it official.

Before we start, let’s look into some of the information and rumors. There are a number of spurious claims boasted by industry insiders about the unknowns, but experts who are not clamming to the big daddy cigarette industry agree that the risk posed by small traces of chemicals in smokeless cigarette vapor is small, and is much likely less than that of consuming many FDA approved products. Even with the same products containing the exact chemicals the FDA will make it painful for the smokeless cigarette industry to gain credit without first paying its dues.

Ok so let’s take a look to see if this is really an economical choice, we think the proof is there, but smokeless cigarettes are also crafty in the technology presented. Nicotine patches and gums (also more expensive than smokeless cigarettes) are considered nicotine delivery devices but in ways that don’t recreate the same habitual act associated with smoking. People who buy these aids sometimes miss the routines of smoking more than the nicotine. Smokeless cigarettes, which visually resemble a standard cigarette, deliver nicotine through a vapor which is inhaled much like smoke but without many of the drawbacks or the negative effects or smell of standard cigarettes. Additionally, the smokeless electronic cigarette has the hand to mouth effect that smokes are so used to in their habits. This leads to our conclusion that smokeless cigarettes can be an economical choice as well as a mentally sound and socially approved choice.

But the money saved with smokeless cigarettes can be considerable so let’s take a look at some of the cost details. As of August 2009 the average price of a pack of cigarettes was $7.82 up from $2.92 just ten years ago. The average smoker smokes by low estimates smokes 15 cigarettes per day which amounts to $2138.90 per year. Wow, big tobacco is BIG…On average a smokeless cigarette filter is equivalent to 10 cigarettes so that would be 1.5 filters per day on average at a price of $1.59 per filter x 1.5 equals $2.38 which equals $870.00 per year. The doesn’t count in to effect that the average smokeless cigarette will last approximately six months so we will need to add another $59.00 x 2 for a total of $988.00. Now, this does not take into effect that the concept behind the smokeless cigarette is to lean off of smoking and vaporizing all together so there must be some kind of factor there but lets not dig that far just yet.

So there it is, we have given you some facts for you to use in making some sense out of the questions leading you to ponder if it is really right for you…As a fifteen year former smoker who has had great success with the smokeless cigarette and is off of tobacco cigarettes all together, I can say that it has been the right choice for me and the only options of the many I have attempted through the years. Give it a shot, if you are currently a tobacco smoker what is the worst that can happen by trying the smokeless cigarettes when you are removing tar, carcinogens, and hundreds of chemicals from your body?

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Abnormal Blood Pressures In Babies Of Mothers Who Smoke Cigarettes

March 9th, 2010

Researchers found that babies of women who smoke cigarettes have abnormal heart rates and blood pressures as compared to infants of nonsmoking mothers, which gets worse as infants get older according to a recent study appearing in Hypertension: Journal of the American Heart Association. The study was conducted using the tilt table test in which babies of smoking mothers and nonsmoking mothers were tested for circulatory responses. The test measures various bodily responses while the patient or baby in this case is tilted to different angles on a tilt table, usually with head up. The tilt table itself is a padded table or plinth, equipped with a footboard, to which a patient can be strapped for rotation to nearly an upright position. It is mainly used in cases where spinal cord and other neurological disorders are suspected to enhance blood flow to lower limbs. It also aids in muscle training and sense of balance, Dorland’s Medical Dictionary.

The tilt test performed by the researchers examined how the infants’ bodies coped with repositioning during the test. Blood pressure responses were recorded while the babies were being tilted upright during sleep. A very noticeable and dramatic difference in babies born to smoking mothers compared to those born to nonsmoking women was discovered.

According to the study, infants that did not get exposed to tobacco smoke experienced only a 2 percent increase in blood pressure when they were tilted upright at one week of age and later a 10 percent increase in blood pressure at one year of age. Infants of smoking mothers on the other hand, had the opposite effect-displaying a whopping 10 percent increase in blood pressure during a tilt at one week of age and a 4 percent increase at one year of age, the study found. These disparaging results became even more alarming when the infants got older-at three months of age and one year of age, the heart rate response to tilting in the tobacco-exposed infants was even more abnormal as compared to those of nonsmoking mothers, the researchers reported.

This study revealed for the first time that babies of smokers have persistent problems in blood pressure regulation that start at birth and get worse over time. Therefore, early life exposure to tobacco smoke can lead to long-lasting reprogramming effects on people’s blood pressure control mechanism, thus compromising people’s health as long as they live, said the researchers.

The study consists of 19 infants from parents who don’t smoke and 17 infants from women who smoke on the average 15 cigarettes per day. Infants were fed breast milk and had normal weight, the study states. All infants in the study had their blood pressure and heart rates taken when they were asleep. They were tilted up at a 60 degree angle during the first weeks of a three month and one year study. They were then lowered back down to the horizontal position, facing up.

The researchers also found that when tobacco smoke-exposed infants were tilted slightly upright and then back down again, their blood pressures went haywire, functioning in erratic ways. Normally, when a person stands up, that person’s heart rate or blood pressure increases, so blood can get to the brain easily, and if that person lay back down, the heart rate or blood pressure would normally slows down and goes back to normal. If we were to equate this scenario with babies of cigarette smoking mothers, we would get the opposite effect. Their blood pressure would actually increase when they are laid back down after standing up–tilting up. Therefore, if the researchers were to placed these infants from smoking mothers in a tilted positioned again, their blood pressure would become low. This would be the perfect condition for fainting-not enough blood to the brain, Dorland’s Medical Dictionary.

This research will continue until the babies get older, so that the researchers can continue to observe whether or not these infants will develop cardiovascular disease in adulthood, the researchers said.

Identifying early warning signs of heart disease in infants could have great public health significance-possibly leading to early diagnosis, treatment and prevention of cardiovascular disease early in life according to the researchers.

In conclusion, babies of mothers who smoke cigarettes could eventually develop heart disease according to a recent study. The table tilt test was used to test infants of cigarette-smoking mothers and infants of nonsmoking mothers. The findings were staggering-infants of mothers who smoke cigarettes showed abnormal and erratic blood pressures while infants of nonsmoking mothers did not.

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