Essential Explanations to Quit Smoking

There are a lot of explanations to quit smoking, and the most obvious one is because your health is gradually deteriorating. You will also affect those around you by the second-hand smoke you generate, this is a problem for those around family members often.

7 Explanations Why You Should Quit Smoking

1. Deteriorates Your Senses

It will deteriorate your senses, which suggests that you won't be able to taste or smell as you could before.

2. Possibility of Cancer

Tobacco smoke is made up of carcinogens (cancer-inducing substance) which will boost your chance of acquiring cancer, because these will compromise the growth of your cells. Sometimes they will trigger your cells to replicate too rapidly or make them develop abnormally.

3. Carbon Monoxide Content

A large amount of carbon monoxide, a result of incomplete burning of fuels that contains carbon can be obtained from smoking. CO binds to hemoglobin of red blood cells which will then decrease the oxygen that the afflicted cells can transport.

4. Increase Proneness to Diseases

It will weaken your immune system, which will make you more susceptible to diseases especially respiratory ailments.

5. Decreases Antioxidants

It will lower your antioxidants. Antioxidants help restore the body's damaged cells. To improve your antioxidants, drink some tea or coffee.

6. Emphysema

Emphysema is an illness caused by an excessive amount of smoking. This illness steadily decays your lungs, which will then incur bronchitis and heart failure.

7. Smoking Kills

Smoking is accountable for increasing the death rate in the world. A hundreds of thousands of people die from smoke-induced diseases each year; even passive smokers tend to pick up smoke-induced diseases.

3 Basic Tips to Stop the Habit

1. Distract Yourself

By distracting yourself, you won't even feel the wanting to smoke. Try to read some books, socialize with non-smokers, listen to some music, etc.

2. Eat Bananas

Bananas are said to help restrain your craving to smoke. By including this in your daily diet, you will be able to suppress it for good.

3. Create an Oral Replacement

Some smokers smoke just to keep their mouths and fingers busy. Find a appropriate substitute for this, like mints, sweet candies, fruits, gum, etc. Not only will these serve as a replacement for cigarettes, but you will distract yourself from the thought of smoking as well.

In conclusion, it is a harmful and challenging habit to stop. Also, people find it more difficult to stop if there are people who nag them to stop; therefore, only you can truly help yourself quit smoking.

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Why Cigarette Advertising Is Being Banned

The earliest known marketing for tobacco products occurred in New York City during the 1780s. By the 1920s, cigarette advertising was pervasive in cities throughout the country. In the 1950s, the cigarette companies were a primary source of income for Madison Avenue. The advertising included signage, radio spots and television commercials, all inundating people with a pro-smoking message at every turn.

Targeting Children
These days, we take it for granted that cigarette advertising is being banned and heavily regulated. The idea that cigarette companies market to children is revolting, but this is precisely what was occurring, even as recent as the 1980s and 1990s. The cartoon character Joe Camel, which represented the Camel brand, is a famous example. The horrifying goal was to build a bond with potential consumers at a very young age. After all, most people start smoking as teens and children, not as adults.

The Free Speech Conundrum
Although cigarette advertising is being banned and regulated now, the road there was not an easy one. Important legal battles regarding cigarette advertising have been fought on the grounds of free speech. At what point is the government denying the cigarette companies and the consumers their basic rights? In the U.S., the negative effect on children eventually overrode most of the claims to free speech; nevertheless, in many countries, advertising control is severely limited because of this very issue.

Increased Regulation
In the U.S., strict regulation did not occur overnight. It was, and still is to some degree, a slow process benchmarked by small victories. Perhaps the biggest victories came when the tobacco companies began to lose major lawsuits filed by governments as well as smokers and families of smokers. For instance, many companies lost a lawsuit due to inadequate warning labels, and those victories made it much easier to increase regulation for those warning labels.

Cigarette Advertising
Congress passed an act in 1970 that banned cigarette ads on radio and TV. To this day, cigarette advertising continues legally on billboards and in newspapers and magazines; however, a 2003 agreement between major publishers and the cigarette companies put a stop to all advertisement in editions intended for school libraries. There is now also significant government control over warning labels and advertising directed at children. Cigarette companies have also agreed to advertising control as part of their lawsuit losses.

Outright Banning
Although cigarette advertising is being banned and heavily regulated, it will likely never be outright banned in countries like the U.S. In Canada, the cigarette companies have achieved victories due to their law-given rights, and this has impeded regulation considerably. Australia and the United Kingdom have both had success regulating cigarette advertising similar to the U.S. There are some countries, particularly smaller ones, where the advertising is banned outright. In countries like the U.S., this is unlikely to happen, and the ads will only go away entirely when the market eventually withers and dies.

These days, we take it for granted that cigarette advertising is being banned and heavily regulated.

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Nicotine Replacement Therapies Are Simply Not Effective

Before the 1990's, the only ways available to quit smoking involved counseling programs of one sort or another. They were either conducted one-on-one by psychologists who specialized in smoking cessation or commercially available programs that were taught in hotel seminars.

During the 1990's, many pharmaceutical companies introduced various products which introduce nicotine into the body of the smoker in such a way as to not further damage the lungs. Since these transdermal patches, mints, gums,vapors and electronic devices provide the nicotine without the harmful effects normally found in smoking tobacco, they were seen as a 'quick fix' and a relatively easy way to quit smoking.

All of these products are classified by the Food and Drug Administration as "Nicotine Replacement Therapies" (NRT), and, with the exception of the electronic devices, are approved for human use by the FDA. Once thought to be the "magic bullet" to solve the smoking problem, they have seriously failed to live up to the promise

The essential problem with these products is that. while they certainly provide a source of nicotine to satisfy a smoker's craving, they do absolutely nothing for the psychological or habitual aspects of the smoking problem. It is just much more complex than a simple physical addiction to the nicotine chemical!

For this reason, the relapse rate for these products is extremely high! In fact, fewer than 20% of the smokers who use these products are able to effectively quit smoking and remain smoke free for 12 months or more.

An independent study conducted at the Harvard School of Public and published in January of 2012, concluded that Nicotine Replacement Therapy products "are no more effective in long term smoking cessation then quitting on one's own".

Smokers who seriously desire to quit must use a comprehensive solution which addresses the physical nicotine addiction while also managing the habitual and psychological issues at the same time. Only such a comprehensive approach will seriously help a smoker to quit gracefully and to remain smoke free for a year or more.

If you use patches, gums, mints, lozenges, vapors or electronic cigarettes devices to introduce nicotine into your system. you can expect to relapse back to smoking your full quota of cigarettes within a few weeks. You may be unaware of the repetitive usage cycle that NRT products draw you into. As you struggle to quit and remain smoke free, you will probably go through many iterations of NRT use before giving up completely.

These failures to quit are totally unnecessary! In fact, for most smokers they leave you in a "failure state" in which you fail to quit smoking so many times that you naturally come to believe that quitting is impossible for you.

You owe it to yourself to commit to a counseling program to more effectively quit smoking. They are rarely a "quick fix", but they are far more effective. So, do your homework and research the various counseling programs that do not use NRT products or drugs as a "crutch". You will find local programs or several on the Internet which can provide real and guaranteed results. You can Quit Smoking!

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