Human Trials Of Anti-Smoking Vaccine Begin

Makarand writes "A Nicotine vaccine that may help smokers to quit has made it to human trials. The vaccine is administered as a series of eight shots -- patients receive two shots per visit during four different visits. The vaccine works by stimulating the human immune system to produce antibodies that bind with the nicotine molecules to form a larger complex molecule which cannot pass through the blood/brain barrier to get into the brain. As a result smokers will not feel the 'high' from the cigarettes they light up and lose interest in smoking. Preliminary studies have shown that this vaccine is safe in humans." (Each link goes to a slightly different version of the same wire story.)

They need to get this down to one shot

[RalphBNumbers]

Seriously, people are going to get cold feet after a visit or two to the doctor when they're starting to really feel the pull of addiction, and realize that they are permanently destroying their ability to get a fix.

They need to get this vaccine down to something that can be administered in one visit, so people don't have a chance to get cold feet after the begining.

If they can make this something joe six-pack-a-day can just do one afternoon on an impulse, then I'll be really impressed.

Of course, then how long will it be until cigarette companies come out with anti-vacine cigs?

Lont time smoker's point of view

[c.r.o.c.o]

I have to admit that I have been smoking for the past 9 years. Considering that I'm only 24 years old, that's a very long time. I've tried quitting cold turkey, I've tried the patch, the gum, and they all worked up to a point. Every time I tried quitting smoking, I stopped for a few days, but afterwards, I just had to start again. It wasn't the addiction that much, but simply the fact that I enjoy smoking too much.

Before I get all the replies describing all the side effects of smoking, you should know that I can do 150 push-ups every day, I can ride a bicycle for 30kms in about an hour through Toronto (which has its share of hills). So I'm still pretty healthy. When I'll get older this won't be the case anymore, but that's still a way off, so it doesn't feel like such a threat.

I guess this vaccine might work for me. If I can't derive pleasure from smoking, then I might have a chance of quitting. Because my willpower in this respect sure isn't helping.

Re:There's more than one type of addiction

[Dr Tall]

This vaccine would probably work much better in combination with something to refocus one's cigarette obsession.

Totally. The way it is now strikes me as a forced cold-turkey situation. Certainly these people go through withdrawl symptoms just like any other person trying to quit.

Easy to quit...

[traveyes]

If you WANT to quit, you will. You don't need any drugs, devices, or enemas.

Everyone I know who has tried (and failed) to quit, failed because they did not want to quit smoking. They tried to quit because they just felt they should.

You can quit when you actually WANT too.

Mind over matter, and shit like that....

Re:They need to get this down to one shot

[curious.corn]

Off an Impulse? Hell, I've considered qitting for the past 4 years! If this stuff doesn't develop allergies to tobacco (which would be dramatic given the fact that people smoke anywhere) I for shure would joyously get the shots... all of 'em! You know, if anything I will finally be able to just smoke for the sake of acting cool a Saturday night without getting myself screwed into addiction. From the first day I lit a cigarette I liked it too much... I was hooked since the very start, all I did was increase the dose as the years passed.

Re:bad idea

[corpsiclex]

I disagree. I smoked when i was 13/14 for about a year before I quit. I obviously don't think smoking/drugs is a good thing, but I think that (however ridiculous it may sound) the experience of feeling the effects of different drugs should not be robbed from people without their consent. And it isn't like you can undo the effects of a vaccine once you are (what society considers to be) old enough to responsibly make your own decisions. I think the decision to use drugs or to experiment with feeling high should be made by those that it truly concerns, the individual. Not the individual's parents. I can also tell you that for me, quitting smoking was a valuable experience. I didn't quit for my parents, I quit for me and for my friends and my life, and it really did help me grow up quite a bit.

Re:or..

[IM6100]

The cost to 'the health service' of smoking is complex. Smoking causes a considerable number of people to live shorter lives than they would otherwise. Living shorter lives can actually reduce the cost to 'the health service.'

The whole 'ban smoking' thing sounds pretty fascistic, though. It's a plant that grows naturally. It's an activity that many people enjoy. The fact that other people (busybodies) disapprove isn't really relevant.

Maybe we should ban a whole lot of things that make people less productive to 'the hive.'

Never Smoke - Yummy Ashtrays Full Of Crud!

[BigBlockMopar]

I can deal with the problem of smokers not being able to quit their filthy disgusting habit,

I think you fail to understand the nature of addiction. It must be a nice perspective that you have.

The craving for a cigarette feels every bit as instinctive, internal and hard-wired as the cravings for food, sex, and a trip to the bathroom when the bladder is full.

If you, presumably as someone who has never smoked, wishes to understand the agony of quitting smoking, I suggest that you simply deny yourself peeing for a week. Tell me how it feels. That's exactly what quitting smoking is like.

Most attempts to quit smoking never make it past the first day. The worst for me was always day three.

After a week or so, the brain starts to get over the cravings, but they never really completely go away.

Ever notice what happens when a smoker opens up a fresh pack? The plastic wrap goes onto the ground.

Not mine; even when I accidentally drop it, I pick it up and take it to the trash.

Then, once the smoke is finished, it goes onto the ground too.

That happens because all the anti-smokers ran around, from the depths of their ignorance about the nature of the nicotine addiction, screaming that "If we take the ashtrays out of public places people won't smoke!".

Bullshit. I have been in a situation where I could have sex or I could smoke - this was an ex who told me that we'd have sex if I didn't smoke that evening. Guess which one won out?

So, if flicking a butt on the ground - which is abhorrent to me - is the cost of having a cigarette, then it's a cost I will bear. Again, I've foregone sex for it.

I would use ashtrays if they were around. I'm not putting the butts in the garbage can; I'm sure you can appreciate the risk of fire.

When the pack is finished, it tends to end up on the ground too. In other words, smokers are some of the most sociopathic polluting assholes on the planet! Ever have a look around a typical smoking area around, say, a public building? Butts everywhere, despite the usual presence of buttcans and ashtrays. They don't use them or need them, because they consider the world as their ashtray!

When you smoke outside, you're so accustomed to the lack of an outdoor ashtray that you reflexively toss the butt on the ground. It's unfortunate.

Fucking assholes! These people don't need a vaccine to deal with their smoking problem. They need a simple boot in the ass, or several hundred as the case may be, to teach them a much needed lesson about simple politeness and courtesy!

I agree with the littering, but I wouldn't agree that smokers throw their empty packs or wrappers on the ground any more than the various sasquatches who throw gum wrappers and losing lottery tickets on the ground.

The only way to address the butt litter will be to have more ashtrays in more public places, but that's not going to happen because of all the idiots who will say it encourages smoking. (Heh... looking at an ashtray always grosses me out; if anything, it's a deterrent.)

All before even getting into the usual controversies about polluting the air that I have to breathe without my consent.

Well, for the most part, it will only affect you in a bar or restaurant. Smoking in the workplace is essentially verboten now.

Coping with it is very simple. If you don't like smoke, sit in the non-smoking section of that bar or restaurant. If they don't have a non-smoking section, go to a bar or restaurant which does.

"Quitting smoking is easy; I have done it a thousand times." - Mark Twain.

Smoking is:

• extremely painful and difficult to quit
• simultaneously a stimulant and a depressant
• symptomatic of attention deficit disorder and almost as effective in the treatment of ADD/ADHD as Ritalin or dexedrine (talk to your doctor, don't start smoking for any reason)
• beneficial in the prevention and control of Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases (talk to your docto

Re:There's more than one type of addiction

[CmdrWiggle]

I used to smoke two packs a day - and have "quit" smoking several times. The first time, I quit cold turkey. It was hard, but do-able. The largest contributing factor to my cravings was that my last memory of smoking was good. I loved smoking. After I quit, I constantly craved the feeling that I had when I smoked.

After several years, I started again. In the meantime, I started taking Wellbutrin (Zyban). Even though I didn't take it to quit smoking (I took it for ADD/depression), the Wellbutrin made the cigarettes taste awful. Without trying, I couln't smoke more than three or four a day - and I usually put them out half way through because they were nasty. Then I just stopped. I literally have not had a single craving since. I attribute this to the fact that my last memory of smoking was awful, and I don't want to do it again. And I was a hardcore smoker. At one point, I even considered quitting Wellbutrin just so I could keep smoking (even though it worked wonders for my real problems).

My point is that, if the vaccine makes the cigarettes taste awful, it will break the psychological addiction first, because you simply don't want to smoke. As a result, you smoke less, thus breaking the physical addiction as well.

Re:Only a matter of time before it's mandatory

[Red Rocket]

Whatever happened to freedom?

I'm all for your freedom to smoke whatever you want. I'm all against the tobacco corporations' freedom to sell a product that addicts people and kills 1200 of them each and every day. What kind of civilized society allows corporations to kill 1200 people a day? Even the 9/11 hijackers weren't that bloodthirsty.

Stupid people make stupid things profitable.

Exactly. Like smoking.

Re:Only a matter of time before it's mandatory

[Red Rocket]

I'm all for the tobacco corporations' freedom to sell a product that addicts people and kills 1200 of them each and every day.
I'm all against me having to pay for it in the form of medical expenses for cancer patients who have been life-long smokers, even though they KNEW it would cause cancer.

Thanks for demonstrating the cold, hard, calloused heart of the modern laissez-faire capitalist.

It's fine for a corporation to murderously addict an ignorant segment of the population to their product as long as they're making a profit on human suffering. But screw the victim of their criminal behavior who's only transgression against society was ignorance. Nice philosophy you got there.