Nicotine - What Kind of Drug Is It?
What Kind of Drug Is It?
Nicotine is the ingredient in tobacco that causes changes to the brain and behavior. Tobacco, a broad-leafed plant that originated in the Americas, is one of the most widely abused psychoactiveMind-altering; a psychoactive substance alters the user's mental state or changes one's behavior., or mind-altering, substances in the world. In the United States alone, one in four men and one in five women smoke cigarettes, cigars, pipes, or use oral products such as chewing tobacco or snuff. In other parts of the world the percentage of users is even higher.
Nicotine use typically begins among Americans between the ages of eleven and eighteen—an age group too young to buy the product legally. Young users soon discover that nicotine is habit-forming, that all the ways of taking it pose great health risks, and that it can lead to troubles on the job and sometimes an early death.
Movies and tobacco advertisements present nicotine use as a glamorous, rebellious, adult activity. And adults can smoke legally. What the advertisements do not note, however, is the fact that one-third of all smokers live below the poverty level; that the more educated a person is, the less likely he or she is to use tobacco; and that an estimated one billion people will die from tobaccorelated illnesses worldwide in the twenty-first century. Tobacco use is one of the leading causes of preventable death. Its link to cancerOut-of-control cell growth leading to tumors in the body's organs or tissues., emphysema and asthma (lung disorders), and depression (a mood disorder), has been clearly established. Smokers can expect to live seven to ten years less than people who do not use tobacco products.
Popularity Decreases
At the height of tobacco's popularity in the United States in the 1960s, more than half of all adult men and about one in three adult women smoked cigarettes. People smoked in movie theaters and on buses and planes. They smoked at their desks in office buildings and in their beds at night. Famous film and television stars promoted certain brands of cigarettes in commercials and on billboards. Even in those times, however, people knew that smoking could ruin their health.
A half-century later, in the early 2000s, smokers can find it difficult to get a job if they reveal a tobacco habit. Smoking is not permitted on planes, in theaters, in many office buildings, or on public transportation. Many cities have enacted bans on smoking in restaurants and bars.
Studies have proven that secondhand smokeThe smoke from a cigarette user and breathed in by someone nearby., or "passive" smoke, can cause many health problems for the nonsmoker. Pregnant women who smoke endanger the health of their unborn babies. Most Americans are less tolerant of smoking than they used to be. Yet, the "2003 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH)" reported that 40 percent of young adults age eighteen to twenty-five admitted to smoking cigarettes at least once in their lives.
No country that has learned to use tobacco has ever given it up. Nicotine addiction, a physical dependence on the drug due
to repeated drug use, continues to be a global public health issue. It is one of the leading causes of preventable illness in adults. The U.S. government keeps a watchful eye on tobacco companies to ensure they do not target cigarette advertisements to teens for several reasons. First, teens are not allowed to smoke legally. Second, adults over the age of twenty-five rarely—if ever—begin smoking after never having smoked before.
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