Holy smoke! Chinese city turns cigarettes to medicine

[Osborn F Enready]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060319/..._cigarettes_dc

BEIJING (Reuters) - A city in China, a country that's home to the world's most enthusiastic smokers, is crushing fake cigarettes to make medicine, Xinhua news agency said on Sunday. The northwestern city of Xian is using the counterfeit cigarettes to extract solanesol, a compound found in tobacco which is used to treat cardiovascular disease, it said. "We used to incinerate the fake cigarettes, which is wasteful and causes air pollution," Xinhua quoted Zhou Yaqing, vice director of the provincial tobacco monopoly, as saying. A kilo of solanesol is worth about $200, and 30 tons of tobacco leaf can produce up to 120 kilos, Xinhua added. China is the world's largest cigarette producer, with a growing market of about 320 million. Chinese cigarettes are also among the cheapest in the world -- a packet can cost as little as 8 U.S. cents -- and smoking kills 1.2 million people a year in China, according to the World Health Organization. Fake cigarettes, made of poor quality tobacco and often topped up with wood chips, are commonly sold on Chinese streets.

[SteveA]

So these cheap ass cigarettes I've been smokin' are GOOD for my heart?! #@$!, now I'll have to quit! Maybe I can forget all about this post, except they've probably stopped me from getting various mental diseases like Alzheimers, schizophrenia, dementia and Parkinson's. Can't a guy get a break?

http://www.scienceagogo.com/message_...ages/813.shtml

"Nicotine Studies suggest it helps Parkinson's, Schizophrenia and Alzheimers.

Prof. Levin, chief of the neurobehavioural research lab at Duke University Medical Center, researches nicotine's effects on the brain. Evidence for its beneficial effects is mounting, but he knows his work can be misconstrued and misrepresented. The fight against cigarettes has made smokers pariahs, and by association researchers such as him risk their reputation.

Yet science is on Prof. Levin's side. Studies suggest that nicotine can enhance cognitive functioning. They also suggest that it can help with such brain disorders as Parkinson's disease and schizophrenia. And then there's nicotine's ability to prevent or ameliorate Alzheimer's symptoms, an area on which Prof. Levin focuses.

"Nicotine does a lot of different things. Some are adverse, such as addiction, and others might be beneficial," he says. "I think that it's a pretty promising treatment."

Despite this promise, however, it is possible that doctors may never prescribe nicotine for anything but smoking cessation. Besides the stigma of its association with cigarettes, nicotine cannot be patented, which means that pharmaceutical companies are not investing in or promoting it. They cannot make back what they would need to spend on such things as clinical trials.

Instead, they are working on nicotine analogues and derivatives that can be patented. Studies on these compounds, as well as the curiosity of a handful of scientists, are driving research into nicotine's possible medical uses. And with larger trials likely in the next few years, Prof. Levin and colleagues may soon worry less about the stigma of their work.

The evidence for nicotine's beneficial effects stretches back to the mid-1900s. Prof. Levin says research in the 1960s showed that nicotine improves learning in rats. There has also been evidence that smokers are protected from some cognitive disorders.

But establishing a connection between smoking and brain functioning is complicated. "Part of the problem is that people who smoke naturally have other problems, such as heart disease," Prof. Levin says. "That actually might cloud the picture."

Nicotine's beneficial effects are partly attributed to how it mimics an important neurotransmitter. Quickly distributed through the bloodstream, nicotine can cross the blood-brain barrier in seconds. In the brain, it impersonates the neurotransmitter acetylcholine and binds with a subtype of acetylcholine receptor called the nicotinic receptor. Nicotinic receptors control the release of other neurotransmitters that have an influence on emotion and cognition.
One of nicotine's proven beneficial effects is enhancing cognitive performance. Recording electrical impulses in rat neurons, researchers at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in 1997 found that nicotine has a stimulating effect on the hippocampus, which is important for learning and memory.
Advancements in brain-imaging technology have allowed researchers to probe deeper into the connection between nicotine and cognitive performance.

In October, 2002, researchers from the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse, the Medical College of Wisconsin and the Institute of Psychiatry in London reported using magnetic-resonance imaging to watch brains in action under the influence of nicotine. They gave 15 smokers either a nicotine patch or a placebo and asked them to perform a visual task. Parts of the brain associated with visual attention, arousal and motor activation lit up.
Findings from the study suggest that nicotine helps to focus attention by shifting resources from less-used parts of the brain to parts required for task performance.
But enhancing cognitive performance isn't all that nicotine is good for. Evidence also suggests that by affecting neurotransmitters, nicotine can treat a number of brain disorders.

Among schizophrenics, for example, the prevalence of smoking is about three times as high as in the general population -- about 70 to 90 per cent of schizophrenics are smokers, compared with 25 per cent of non-schizophrenics. Studies have also found that schizophrenics have fewer nicotinic receptors in the hippocampus.
All of this suggests that by smoking they are unconsciously self-medicating.

People with Parkinson's disease could also benefit from nicotine treatment. Smokers have lower rates of Parkinson's disease, and Paul Newhouse of the clinical neuroscience research unit at the University of Vermont has conducted preliminary experiments showing that nicotine patches reduce Parkinson's symptoms.

"There may be some toxin that's responsible for neural damage in Parkinson's that's protected against by nicotine," Prof. Levin says.

Nicotine has also received much attention as a potential treatment for Alzheimer's disease.

In November, 1998, Prof. Levin presented data at a Society of Neuroscience annual meeting showing that nicotine-like compounds can restore learning and memory ability to rats that have brain lesions similar to those in people with Alzheimer's.

He has also been involved in small studies testing the impact of nicotine patches on cognitive impairment.

In one study, eight people with mild-to-moderate Alzheimer's disease wore nicotine patches for two four-week periods and six of them experienced 20 to 80 per cent improved performance on cognition tests.

..."

(You can read the rest of the article from the link)

Here's another link: http://www.forces.org/evidence/carol/carol16.htm

"ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE IS ASSOCIATED WITH NON-SMOKING

Graves' pooled reanalysis found, "A statistically significant inverse relation between smoking and Alzheimer's disease was observed at all levels of analysis, with a trend towards decreasing risk with increasing consumption (p=0.0003). A propensity towards a stronger inverse relation was observed among patients with a positive family history of dementia."

Only three studies have ever linked smoking with AD. The reanalysis, in which the author of one participated, noted, "Since veterans may be expected to smoke more than the general population, and since smokers have been found to respond less frequently to questionnaires than non-smokers, the positive result observed for this study may be spurious."

Contrary to a claim that smokers got AD at a younger age, there was no difference in men. Female smokers were younger among both cases and controls, which proved it to be spurious.

Over 4 million people suffer from AD, and annual costs are over $88 billion. There may be 73,000 excess cases per year among non-smokers, with $17.5 billion in excess costs."

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No wonder education in the U.S. has been going downhill and asian countries have been catching up. They smoke a lot more. (Remember Einstein and his pipe?) ... light 'em up boys, we've got a lot of catching up to do!

Seriously, though I don't recommend smoking it's interesting to see some of this info.

[SteveA]

Obesity will be the new "cigarette" in the U.S. I wonder if the rise of obesity during the drop in smoking is pure coincidence.

http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:...&ct=clnk&cd=10

[Arawn-ap-Hywel]

So inscrutable the chinese, wonder if others would consider utilising other lawfully conviscated items for the public good.

[tman_ndsu08]

Interesting how China is following what the US already did.

Back in the 40's everyone who was anyone smoked.

I wonder if in 20-40 years China will start to balloon up too?

[Jack]

I feel so much better about my future this morning, having read this thread. Thank you Osborn. You've released my soul from over 30 years of guilt. The smoking lamp is lit!

[Osborn F Enready]

Thanks for the info, and link Steve.

LOL @ Isherwood.

[Technosoul]

Doctors nor layman cannot produce any worthy study based on REAL SCIENCE that would or can prove that ciggarette smoking is the cause of heart attacks, cancer, or those other major degenerated illnesses. At most one could experience shortness of breath due to smoking but a daily helping of dark green viggies and a shot glass of olive oil can reduce that problem greatly.

Nearly all the studies are based on surveys. If they find that everyone who had cancer also watched TV three hours a day or more then that would also be a "link" according to such research.

You can presently buy cheap cigars in the USA that contain plants other then just tobacco. In the original days of smoking the Native Americans would sometimes mix sage with tobacco for their pipes. Often called the peace pipe because of it's side effect of reducing stress during meetings where debates about topics were conducted.