Trends in quitting nicotine

It is no mystery that attempting to drop your smoking habit may be one of the hardest things you ever go through. The fact that tobacco accounts for 5 million deaths a year should be enough incentive to attempt this challenge. Here is a look inside some of the techniques used to pass on your next puff.

• Tobacco will cost governments an estimated $200 billion per year

Nicotine is:

• 1,000 times more addictive than alcohol
• five to 10 times more addictive than cocaine or morphine
• 95% of people who try to quit cold turkey will end up relapsing

Replacement Therapy

Gives you nicotine without the other harmful chemicals in tobacco smoke

• Patches: involves three stages. Has a 14% success rate; 8% of smokers use patches
• Nicotine gum: about 10-15 pieces are chewed per day; has a 10% success rate
• Electronic cigarettes: last five times longer than a pack of cigs; have a 31% success rate

Non-nicotine treatments

• Varenicline (drug): A 12-week treatment that has a 44% success rate. Today, about 2,000 cases are pending in federal court blaming it for neuropsychiatric effects
• Bupropion (drug): A seven to 12-week treatment with a 17.5% success rate. Babies whose mothers used Bupropion medication while pregnant were twice as likely to be born with heart problems.
• Hypnotherapy: Has a 66% success rate and can cost up to $500 for treatment and $100 for the self-hypnosis program

Counseling and support

• 5.9% of smokers used a form counseling
• 3.1% used a telephone quitline
• 2.6% used one-on-one counseling
• 2.4% used a clinic, class or support group
• 30% of smokers who used telephone quitlines had quit after six months

In 2010:

• 68.8% of adult smokers wanted to stop smoking
• 52.4% made an attempt to quit
• 6.2% had recently quit
• 48.3% had been warned by a health professional to quit
• 31.7% had used counseling and/or medications when they tried to quit