Heads Up: Real News About Drugs and Your Body - Scholastic

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SODASmoking GunCigarettes are addictive and deadly. So why are teens still smoking?CLOSE UP: NICOTINEBy John DiConsiglioIf you’re looking for the RobinsonRams baseball team during fourth period lunch,don’t bother searching the cafeteria or thepractice diamond. On most afternoons, you’llfind a handful of the top players from RobinsonSecondary School in Fairfax,VA, huddled in a friend’snearby basement. They eatpizza. They play Tony Hawkvideo games. And always—Kevin McNamara, 18SMOKER/TRYING TO QUITalways—they smoke cigarettes.“Kids hanging out. Whetherit’s a party or lunch, there aregoing to be smokes,” says KevinMcNamara, an 18-year-oldRobinson senior and a regularattendee at the basement brunch.Kevin is a star member of theschool’s golf team. He was alsothe Rams’ ace pitcher until hetore a ligament in his knee.And, until recently, hesmoked two packs a day.“Kevin’s story is not unusual,”says Dr. Bill Corrigall, Directorof NIDA’s Nicotine and TobaccoAddiction Program. “Many teensand even pre-teens begin toexperiment with smoking, butsoon find they are smokingregularly—they’re addicted.”“I WANT TO QUIT”“I used to be able to run a milein under six minutes. NowI’m lucky to make it in eight.And I’m wheezing all theway,” says Kevin, who’s cuthis daily use down to tencigarettes. “I want to quit.But it’s not that easy.”More than ever, teensfind that the best way tostop smoking is to never startat all. Teen smoking rateshave steadily fallen since1996, according to a NIDAfundedstudy.That’s the good news. Thebad news, experts say, is thatteen smoking numbers arestill too high. Each day,more than 3,000 childrenand adolescents becomecigarette smokers, notesthe Centers for DiseaseControl and Prevention.That’s more than 1 million teensa year. Roughly one-third ofthem will die from a smokingrelatedillness.“There’s hard evidence thatsmoking leads to addiction,health problems, and death,”says Dr. Eric Moolchan, directorof NIDA’s Teen TobaccoAddiction Treatment ResearchClinic. “Teens have a choice:They can become victims, orthey can stop before they go toofar. Better yet, they never have tostart at all.”“I MUST HAVE BEEN CRAZY”Even those who are well awarethat smoking kills findcigarettes hard to resist. SarahMillermon, an 18-year-old fromStockton, CA, knows thedangers of cancer first-hand.When she was a baby, shedeveloped leukemia, a bloodrelatedcancer. She underwentchemotherapy until she wastwo. And, while she’s beenSarah Millermon, 18FORMER SMOKER4FROM SCHOLASTIC AND THE SCIENTISTS OF THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE ON DRUG ABUSE, NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES
JAKUB MOSUR/AP WIDE WORLD PHOTOS(TOBACCO); ANTONIO M. ROSARIO/THE IMAGE BANK BY GETTY IMAGES(CIGARS); AFP/PRAKASH SINGH/CORBIS(BIDIS); 5W INFOGRAPHICS(DIAGRAM); JAMES STEVENSON/S.P.L./PHOTO RESEARCHERS(LUNG)Ashley Sobrinski, 14NON-SMOKERcancer-free ever since, the prospectof a relapse is never far fromher mind.Still, as a teen, Sarah went on tosmoke a pack a day, putting herselfat risk for cancer of the lungs,mouth, esophagus, larynx, stomach,pancreas, kidney, and bladder.“When you’re addicted tocigarettes, you can rationalizeanything,” says Sarah, who hasn’tsmoked in three months. “I’d tellmyself: ‘Well, I beat cancer once. Ican do it again.’Now I look back andthink I must have been crazy.”“A HORRIBLE THING TO SEE”Unlike Sarah, some teens see theravaging effects of cancer and vownever to pick up a cigarette. AshleySobrinski, a 14-year-old fromOcean City, NJ, watched hergrandfather succumb to lung cancer.“It’s a horrible thing to see,”she says. “The cancer just took overhis body.” He began smoking as ateenager in the Navy. Ashleyunderstands how a teen in the 1940smight have been tricked into takingup cigarettes. But she can’t see howtoday’s teens fall for it.“With all the information that’sout there, with all the people whohave died from smoking, it justpuzzles me that kids keep doing it,”she says. “You know that if you putthat cigarette in your mouth, it mightkill you. But you do it anyway. Thatjust doesn’t make sense.”CIGARETTES: HOW THEY HOOK AND HURTCigarette smoke contains more than 4,000chemicals, including toxins like ammonia. Butthe chief culprit in cigarettes is nicotine, apowerfully addictive drug.With every puff of a cigarette, nicotine alters howyour brain functions. Like cocaine and heroin, nicotinestimulates the release of a molecule called dopamine,located in parts of the brain that are involved inaddictive behaviors. Although a user does not get thehigh from cigarettes that one might get from drugslike cocaine and heroin, make no mistake: nicotineaffects your brain.Nicotine “primes” the brainfor addiction. You can begin tocrave cigarettes more thananything else. “Smokingbecomes your sole focus,” saysBy Any Other NameA post-mortemcancerous lung ofa cigarette smoker.As if cigarettes aren’t bad enough, there areother hazardous tobacco products. Because ofhow they look or smell or how they’re used,some people might think they’re not as addictive orharmful as cigarettes. But here’s the truth:• Chewing tobacco: Spit, snuff, dip, smokeless. Theamount of nicotine in one pinch of dip can be fivetimes as high as in a cigarette. Plus, dip comeswith its own health risks. From the toxins in thejuice created, chewers can develop painful lesionson their tongue, as well as cancer of theesophagus, pharynx, larynx, and stomach.Perhaps worst of all are cancers of the mouthand tongue, which often require surgery toremove parts of a user’s face. These cancersfrom chewing tobacco often occur earlier, ratherthan later, in a user’s life.• Cigars: Cigars are puffed and not inhaled, but thesmoke still gets into the lungs and does just asmuch damage as cigarettes, and cigar smokersDr. Cindy Miner, the Chief of NIDA’s Science PolicyBranch. “Nothing else is as pleasurable as it usedto be.”Indeed, your brain becomes so used to thepresence of nicotine that, when you try to quit, itrebels and craves more.But addiction may be just the tip of the icebergwhen it comes to risks from smoking. When youinhale, cigarette smoke and the chemicals it carriesare absorbed by the lungs and quickly move into thebloodstream, where they circulate through your heartto your brain and the rest of your body.Your lungs fill with chemical deposits.“You’re taking tar into your lungsand there’s no way to clear out allthat debris,” says Miner. “Suddenlyyou find that you are gasping forbreath on the soccer field.”Research suggests that nicotine is even moreharmful to the developing heart, lungs, and brainsof teens. “The younger you start, the more likelyyou will get hooked,” Miner says. “The younger youget hooked, the more cigarettes you will smoke.And the more cigarettes you smoke. . . . Well, weknow where that leads.”risk the same oral cancer and other irritationproblems as people who chew tobacco. Also, acigar delivers nicotine. In fact, it delivers aboutfour times as much nicotine as a cigarette.• Bidis: These hand-rolled cigarettes from India(pronounced “beedees”) are often packaged incinnamon, orange, and chocolate flavors toappeal to kids. But don’t let the taste fool you.Bidis are generally unfiltered and can have 28percent higher nicotine concentration levelsthan cigarettes.ChewingTobaccoBidisCigarsFROM SCHOLASTIC AND THE SCIENTISTS OF THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE ON DRUG ABUSE, NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES 5
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Heads Up: Real News About Drugs and Your Body - Scholastic

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