ABC's Peter Jennings has lung cancer

[Dr Mordrid]

http://www.cnn.com/2005/SHOWBIZ/TV/04/05/jennings.cancer/index.html

Not a very good prognosis in general.

Dr. Mordrid

[xortam]

Read that earlier ... put me off the idea of finally lighting up one of my stogies (been months). Mr. Jennings reportedly stopped smoking years ago. How many times have I heard of such things happening?!

[Dr Mordrid]

The problem is that even after you stop smoking there are lingering effects beyond the carbon monoxide and nicotine.

One is organic tars left over from combustion. These chemicals are mutagenic.

Worst is that a lot of tobacco is fertilized with naturally mined phosphates. The phosphates themselves aren't a real problem, but what the phosphate deposites are typically found in close proximity to is: radium 226 and its decay byproducts, one of which is polonium 210.

When these fertilzers are used the polonium 210 gets taken up by the tobacco plant and gets deposited in the leaves and stems. More can attach to the sticky surface of the tobacco leaves as the decay products also collect in the dust around the plant. When the plants are harvested and hung inverted the absorbed deposits then migrate by gravity into the leaves, increasing the concentration polonium 210 in them. The dust stays stuck to the leaves surface.

Polonium 210 is an alpha emitter, meaning it emits high speed helium nuclei. Once inhaled particles of polonium 210 gets stuck in the branches of the lungs bronchi (the smallest airways) where they sit and bombard the adjacent lung tissue with alpha particles, mutating its DNA and very often causing cancers over time.

It's been estimated that the total accumulated alpha radiation exposure of 1 pack/day indoor smoker is 38 to 97 rads by age 60. 2 pack/day smokers often accumulate143 rads or more.

The lowest estimates say each rad/year results in a 1% increased risk of lung cancer. Others put this figure much higher.

In addition some polonium 210 gets dissolved into the bloodstream, whereupon it migrates into other organs to cause even more trouble including diseases of the liver, bladder cancer, stomach and leukemia.

Once long ago we took the tobacco from a pack of cigarettes and placed it on some sensitive radiology film for a few days. When developed the film showd a nice image where the radiation had hit the film.

Dr. Mordrid

[xortam]

So is there no hope to rid the body of these deposits?

[Dr Mordrid]

Not that I'm aware of.

More stuff in cigarettes;

http://www.fha.state.md.us/ohpetup/school/html/incigs.html

Sweet, eh?

Dr. Mordrid

[Technoid]

Not that I'm aware of.

More stuff in cigarettes;

http://www.fha.state.md.us/ohpetup/school/html/incigs.html

Sweet, eh?

Dr. Mordrid

Ghack......

Amazing that they are even allowed to be produced.....

[KvHagedorn]

Not at all.. they make so much money their Washington lobby is very well funded. This is the biggest argument yet against any sort of legalization of recreational drugs. The tobacco companies are just legalized druglords.

[xortam]

Luckily I never smoked cigarettes ... at least I never inhaled. I always knew about the crap they threw into cigarettes and the tobacco is the garbage part of the tobacco plant to begin with.

[xortam]

... This is the biggest argument yet against any sort of legalization of recreational drugs. ...

MaryJane is much worse than cigarettes as far as tar content. I believe pot has something like twenty times the tar of cigarettes. An MD told me that one Churchill cigar is as harmful as about one pack of cigarettes (I believe he was speaking of tar content) and that the problem is the toxins are carried through the mucus so you're at risk even if you don't inhale ... and then there is the second-hand smoke to consider.

[Wombat]

Not at all.. they make so much money their Washington lobby is very well funded. This is the biggest argument yet against any sort of legalization of recreational drugs.

It is?

Alcohol is a recreational drug, and doesn't have this problem. I think cigarettes are the exception. I'm sure that if pot were legalized there would be some large companies spring up, but there'd probably still be plenty of homegrown. Just like with beer, it ranges from megacorp crap (Coors/Bud), to smaller but good breweries, to microbrews, to homebrews.

[xortam]

... if pot were legalized there would be some large companies spring up, but there'd probably still be plenty of homegrown. ...

It has been essentially legalized in CA. You basically just need to pay for a license and you can buy it at a "pharmacy' or grow your own.

[Brian R.]

Once someone makes a serious research effort, these heavy metals/nucleides can be eliminated from the body.