Smoking speeds up the ageing process - study/Now smokers can zap the craving...

July 7, 2005

Smoking speeds up the ageing process - study

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1 & click_id=31 & art_id=qw1118666522146B243 June 14 2005 at 07:24AM

By Patricia ReaneyLondon - Obesity and smoking speed up the ageing process, researchers said on Tuesday.They showed that people who smoke cigarettes or are obese have shorter telomeres, the caps on chromosomes that prevent them from fraying, which makes them biologically older than their non-smoking, leaner counterparts."Our findings suggest that obesity and cigarette smoking accelerate human ageing," said Dr Tim Spector, of St Thomas' Hospital in London.Telomeres shorten each time a cell divides. The loss is associated with ageing which is why telomeres are thought to hold the secrets of youth and the ageing process.As telomeres get smaller, the chromosomes can become unstable and increase the risk of mutation."Obesity and cigarettes cause oxidative stress to increase and this cumulative damage over time causes the loss of these telomeres, which we believe is a marker of accelerative ageing and accounts for why these people get heart disease, diabetes, osteoarthritis and other age-related disease," Spector told a news conference.Oxidative stress is damage to cells and DNA caused by free radicals - charged particles found in the environment and produced by processes in the body.Spector and scientists at the University of Medicine and Dentistry in New Jersey compared telomere length from blood samples of 1 122 British women between the ages of 18 and 76.Nearly 120 of them were obese, 531 had never smoked, 203 were smokers and 369 had quit. The research is published in The Lancet medical journal.The scientists found a decrease in telomere length that corresponded to the more obese the women were and the amount of cigarettes they had smoked.There was a difference between being obese and lean which corresponded to 8.8 years of ageing. Being a current or ex-smoker equated to about 4.6 years and smoking a pack a day for 40 years corresponded to 7.4 years of ageing."Our results emphasise the potential wide-ranging effects of the two most important preventable exposures in developed countries - cigarettes and obesity," the researchers said in the journal.Obesity, which affects about 300-million people worldwide, increases the risk of diabetes, heart disease, stroke and other illnesses.Researchers have shown that cigarette smokers die on average 10 years earlier than non-smokers but that kicking the habit can halve the risk. Smoking is a leading cause of lung cancer and COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease), which includes emphysema and chronic bronchitis. It also increases the risk of heart disease.

Now smokers can zap the craving...

June 10 2005 at 07:12AM

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1 & click_id=31 & art_id=qw1118378347922R131

Singapore - A laser treatment to help smokers quit will start in Singapore in September, its first use in Asia since starting in Britain eight years ago, a programme manager said on Friday.The treatment, which involves three sessions lasting an hour each over three consecutive days, helps people cope with withdrawal symptoms."When people quit, they can go bouncing off the walls," Nita Tripp, senior manager of the Laser Stop Smoking Limited Programme, told The Straits Times.An invisible laser beam stimulates energy points on the ears, nose, hands and wrists, helping to promote the release of endorphins, the body's own pain relievers. The results help counter the sudden drop in endorphin levels smokers experience when they quit. The treatment has no known side-effects.For the laser treatment to be successful, Tripp said potential clients must have the proper attitude."If they don't want to stop smoking, then nothing is going to help them anyway," she added. - Sapa-dpa