Nicotine as a Means for Weight Control Essay -- Smoking Tobacco Diet P

Nicotine as a Means for Weight Control: Tobacco drieth the brain, dimmeth the sight, vitiateth the smell, hurteth the stomach, destroyeth the concoction, disturbeth the humours and spirits, corrupteth the breath, induceth a trembling of the limbs, exsiccateth the windpipe, lungs, and liver, annoyeth the milt, scorcheth the heart, and causeth the blood to be adjusted." Tobias Venner Via pecta ad vitam Longam, 1693 (Fielding, 1992) Introduction: Since around the 1950's-60's, smoking has been a target of attack for the scientific community and rightly so. Smoking, as well as other forms of tobacco use, has been proven to be linked with serious health problems and diseases such as lung cancer and emphysema. Research has become so extensive that actual causal and not simply correlational relationships have been proven. Yet, smoking remains the number one preventable cause of premature death and disability in theunited States (390,000 death per year.) (gopher:flminerva.acc.Virginia:70/00/p ... ubstancetfacts/substance/drucl/tobacco.txt.) So after all the negative evidence of smoking and other uses of tobacco products, why do people insist on continuing? The presence of a substance called nicotine partly answers this question, Nicotine effects in tobacco products are associated with addiction, tolerance, and motivation reasons for use. One motivation less focused on but none the less very important is the use of nicotine as an ap petite suppressant. Many people, especially young women, associate nicotine with weight loss and dietary control. Two questions arise: Is the claim that nicotine as a means to control weight grounded in factual evidence, or rather the product of an image portrayed by the tobacco industry?... ...nce Abuse, 5, 391-400. Richmond RL- Kehoe L-, & Webster IW. Weight change after smoking cessation in general practice. Medical Journal of Australia, 158, 821-2. Schwid SR., Hirvonen MD., & Keesey 13E. (1992). Nicotine effects on body weight a regulatory perspective. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 55, 878-84. Seah Mi., Raygada M., & Grunberg NE. (1994). Effects of nicotine on body weight and plasma insulin in female and male rats. Life Sciences. 55, 925-31. Winders SE., Dykstra T., Coday MC., Amos JC., Wilson MR>, & Wilkins DR. Use of phenylpropanolamine to reduce nicotine cessation induced weight gain in rats. Psychopharmacology, 108, 501-6. Winders SE., Wilkins DR. 2d, Rushing PA., & Dean JE. (1993) Effects of nicotine cycling on weight loss and regain in male rats. Pharmacology, Biochemistry & Behavior, 46, 209-13.