The Indians are the ones who taught the whole world to smoke. The sailors from Christopher Columbus's expedition have brought the first leaves of tobacco given to them by the Indian chief to Europe. They were unlikely to gain such popularity though if not for the legend about their healing power. The gullible Europeans started to use tobacco as a remedy for headache, fatigue, irritability. Not only was it smoked, but also chewed and sniffed. The first scientific description of the healing powers of tobacco has been produced by the hand of the French ambassador Jean Nicot in the middle of XIV century (afterwards the main component of this plant has been named after him – nicotine). Soon the world saw a thick compilation of recipes, the main component of which was tobacco. And even though just half a century later there was a warning published about the dangers of tobacco and tobacco smoke for human body, by that time only a few people could say no to cigarettes.

Most of the smokers justify their habit by the supposedly calming effects of a cigarette. But psychologists strongly disagree with that opinion. According to them, the calming effect is caused not by the influence of tobacco smoke and nicotine but by the sucking reflex. Just think about it: a newborn baby calms down as soon as he gets Mom's breast or a binky. The adults who want to quit smoking are not advised to regress back into childhood, there is a different recipe for them. Doctors advise those who suffer from emotional overexcitement and insomnia to drink a glass of warm milk or other liquid through a straw. Calmness and sound sleep are guaranteed.

The American scientists are trying to give a status of a medicine back to nicotine. They came to a conclusion that this substance can be beneficial if used correctly and in accurate dosage. They have noticed that smokers suffer from depression 50% less often and have tried to cure the non-smoking patients from this illness with the help of a nicotine patch. After 8 days the depression started to give ground. The American Journal of Psychiatry has published the results of the research confirming that nicotine's reaction with oxygen forms a nicotinic acid. This new derivative does not represent the poison any more, but rather the vitamin PP. Its effects on the human body are versatile: it calms you down and improves your mood, as well as stimulates the brain activity, motor function, and memory. Vitamin PP in the form of injections has been used by doctors to treat neurological patients. In other words, the scientists have concurred that the nicotine molecule should be modified in such a way that its effects are preserved but at the same time it did not cause a painful addiction such as smoking.

The medical dictionary describes the term nicotine as an alkaloid contained in plants of the solanaceous family – primarily in tobacco, as well as in tomatoes, potatoes, eggplants, green bell peppers although in much smaller quantity. However none of the dietitians to this day have raised the subject of these vegetables quantities being potentially harmful for our health if consumed in large. Scientists have come to a conclusion that it's not the nicotine or tobacco overall that is harmful, but the tobacco smoke. When it enters the body and cools down, it turns into resin, which accumulates in airways and paralyzes the cleansing process. Doctors specializing in lungs’ diseases consider this the main reason of oncological and many other illnesses - the lungs get more and more clogged and practically do not get cleansed. Therefore passive or second hand smoking - inhaling of the cigarette smoke - is no less dangerous than active smoking.

The doctors have a term "the face of the smoker": deep lines leading from nose to lips, a net of small wrinkles in the corner of the eyes, hollow dry cheeks, sharp-cut cheekbones, and yellow-grey complexion, as well as the same yellowish color eyes and teeth, brittle hair with split ends. Of course such signs do not appear right away, but after several years of regular smoking. The recent twin studies (25 pairs where one twin smokes and the other one doesn't were selected) showed that the skin of smokers is 25-40% thinner than those of non-smokers. The more you have been smoking, the less collagen (the main protein of connective tissue) and elastin (a protein in connective tissue that is elastic and allows many tissues in the body to resume their shape after stretching or contracting) it contains and the worse its ability to restore. However the scientists reassure us at the same time: if you drop the harmful habit, the face complexion and the hair condition improves. The main thing is not to delay the decision making process, since the longer a person smokes, the longer the period of the reverse transformation.

According to the psychologists, the heavy smokers can be put into a special category of people – adventure seekers. Consciously, and very often unconsciously, they want to get a charge of adrenalin, disregarding the potential danger. By the way, the cigarette manufacturers don't mind playing on it: a lot of cigarette commercials are related to extreme sports. No matter how serious and presentable the smoker seems on the outside, on the inside he or she is an eternal teenager. Therefore, when you chose them as a partner in life, think twice: do you really need this perpetual child with big ambitions and demands and reluctance to think about tomorrow?

Those who smoke the so-called "light" cigarettes are genuinely convinced that they harm their health less by doing so. The amount of nicotine in light cigarettes is indeed lower than in the regular ones, but our body experiences the same burden as from smoking regular tobacco. The reason for that is that the manufacturers of tobacco actively use various chemicals that are contained in each cigarette. They are hard and sometimes impossible to be excreted from our body. The resistance of some of them is simply impressive. For example, the chemical called dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane (DDT) was widely used on tobacco plantations at one time. The ban of its usage has been passed almost 30 years ago, however up until now the remaining of this substance is still found in the soil and dried out tobacco leaves.

The very few of the future moms are ready to give up the harmful habit for the health of their baby. For example, in the US, where more than 2/3 of women older than 15 years of age smoke, even among those of them who are getting ready to become mothers, the majority are the smokers - 52-55%. In Great Britain 43% of pregnant women smoke, in Australia this number is 33-40%. Only 9% of the European women say that they are ready to give up the cigarettes if they find out that they are pregnant. Meanwhile, a smoking pregnant woman deprives her child daily of the considerable portion of oxygen and nutrients. Therefore even still in mother's womb the baby lags behind other kids when it comes to height and weight, besides smoking poses a threat of the baby being born prematurely.

The doctors have been talking about the harm of passive smoking for a very long time. According to the data of various researches, diseases like dust and pets fur allergies, food allergies, stomach illnesses and even teeth cavities can be caused by the kids inhaling cigarette smoke. After many factors were analyzed - the kid's age, gender, place of residence, the family's financial situation, nutrition - the scientists have come to a conclusion that the kids of those parents who smoke even if they were born healthy, later on in life suffer from the above mentioned illnesses as often as those kids who have genetically inherited them.

We can count over a thousand of advices and methods on how to quit smoking. However those who suffer from this problem are not too lazy to constantly add to the list. The original method has been proposed by one of the English designers - an ashtray that can wean you from cigarettes. It can weigh the ash that goes into it and based on it display a sinister number - a number of days lost because of smoking. According to the creator, this method is based on the principle of saving just like with money: the less you have, the more careful you are about spending it. With the only difference that the health resources are not that easily replenished.