Smoking is one of the most unhealthy habits in which someone can partake. It is responsible for millions of deaths every year, particularly in the form of lung cancer or many other forms of cancer of the respiratory system. It also led to the rise of cancers as the number one cause of death in twenty-one states.
While some don’t really care about the long-term effects of smoking, others most certainly do. And while they would want to quit, they just don’t have the conviction, motivation, or willpower to do so. But medicine has developed a lot of different treatments to help people finally kick the nasty habit.
So why aren’t more people using these treatments, you might ask? Well, the answer is that except for psychological treatments and some nicotine substitutes, most anti-smoking medicines were unrightfully banned or black-boxed because of the constant efforts of the tobacco industry to have their clients addicted.
But finally, seven years after they were slapped with the strictest warning in the country by FDA regulators, multiple studies prove that Chantix and Zyban smoking cessation drugs don’t urge suicide. The two drugs were said to cause conditions which turned to be the regular effects of giving up smoking.
Given a black box warning, the two drugs are now in totally different states of production. While Chantix is about to re-enter mass production, this time with a totally different box, Zyban has been available as generic bupropion for almost ten years, and so it hasn’t been actively marketed in quite some time.
The conditions with which the anti-smoking medications were associated include, but are not limited to hostility, aggression, depression, changes in behavior, generally low mood, and suicidal thoughts and actions. While these symptoms scared off many doctors and smokers, they are merely symptoms associated with quitting smoking, regardless of which, if any medication you may be on.
Results were finally published online on Friday evening, resonating with at least forty earlier studies claiming the same thing – that the two drugs were not at all dangerous, certainly incomparably so to the habit users are trying to quit in the first place. Finally, FDA has seen the black-boxing as what it was – a move by tobacco companies to keep promoting their poison.
The study concluded that the negative effects felt when quitting smoking with the help of either of the two drugs were no different than for those using a placebo, and that is in the worst case scenario. One of the developers of the two drugs also wanted to share his story, saying how he was a lifelong smoker until he quit cold turkey after his entire family died one member after another as a result of years of smoking.
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