In 1925, the French word "éclatement" (referring to a tire blow-out) is used graphically to describe the effect of nicotine (significant cellular level destruction) on the brain.

          In October 1980, this web writer published that fact in a national anti-drug magazine in the context of the massive costs to society of smoking; and in November 1980, repeated it in The Macomb Daily.

          In 1986, even North Carolina agreed that to prevent nicotine addiction (euphemism for brain damage) in children, a school smoking ban was acceptable!! The case went all the way to the North Carolina Supreme Court! Craig by Craig v Buncombe County Board of Education, 80 NC App 683; 343 SE2d 222 appeal dismissed, 318 NC 281; 348 SE 2d 138 (1986).

          In 1989: "Nicotine is a psychoactive drug . . . the pharmacologic and behavioral processes that determine nicotine addiction are similar to those that determine addiction to heroin and cocaine. . . . A puff of smoke results in a measureable nicotine level in the brain in seconds. With regular use, nicotine accumulates in the body during the day and persists overnight. Thus, smokers are exposed to the effects of nicotine 24 hoursa a day. Nicotine readily crosses the blood brain barrier where it acts as an agonist on specific cholinergic receptors in the central nervous system." H. Thomas Milhorn, Jr., M.D., Ph.D., "Cigarette Smoking: More Than a Habit," 30 J Mississippi State Medical Ass'n (9) 281-286 (September 1989).

          In 1989: "The mean ages of reported first use . . . ranged from age 12.0 for cigarettes and 12.6 for alcohol, to age 14 for marijuana . . . cigarettes were the drug with the youngest . . . age of onset . . . Use of cigarettes was shown to significantly increase the likelihood [of] using other drugs (e.g., beer, marijuana) two years later . . . [When youths] start with one substance, that substance will most likely be cigarettes, not marijuana or alcohol." Fleming, R., Levanthal, H., Glynn, K., and Ershler, J. "The Role of Cigarettes In The Initiation And Progression Of Early Substance Use." 14 Addictive Behavior 261 (1989).

          In 1994: "Among addictive behaviors, cigarette smoking is the one most likely to become established during adolescence . . . Tobacco use is associated with alcohol and illicit drug use and is generally the first drug used by young people who enter a sequence of drug use that can include tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, and harder drugs. . . . Tobacco use in adolescence is associated with a range of health-compromising behaviors, including being involved in fights, carrying weapons, engaging in higher-risk sexual behavior, and using alcohol and other drugs. . . . The initiation and development of tobacco use among children and adolescents progresses in five stages: from forming attitudes and beliefs about tobacco, to trying, experimenting with, and regularly using tobacco, to being addicted. . . . Illegal sales of tobacco products are common." U.S. Dept of Health and Human Services, Preventing Tobacco Use Among Young People: A Report of the Surgeon General (1994).

          Note three smoker behavior patterns related to sex harassment: "being involved in fights, carrying weapons, engaging in higher-risk sexual behavior." The Surgeon General is simply rewording published findings.

          In 1998: the lawsuit of United States v Dominic L. Miller, Case 97-3669 (CA 8, D South Dakota, 11 Aug 1998), involved a mentally ill smoker in a half-way house, not taking his medication, and a concerned staff member checking on him, doing a search.

          But the public still doesn't know anything about it!! The media doesn't tell them much beyond the false word "habit," indeed, often contains pro-tobacco disinformation.

          Governments and religions had desperately fought tobacco. The Holy Inquisition arrrested the first smokers in 1493 and jailed them for seven years. Pope Urban VIII condemned smoking in the 1640's. So did King Murad IV (Turkey) in 1642. And so did the Surgeon General (Benjamin Rush, M.D.) under President George Washington (1798) here in the U.S.

           But the public doesn't know any of this. Preventable mental disorder keeps on occurring. Millions are dying. And other evils are involved:

          The media's wide-spread censorship of tobacco-facts, to the extreme of printing of gross disinformation, is not new. It has been cited since at least 1930, see Charles M. Fillmore, Tobacco Taboo (Indianapolis: Meigs Pub Co, 1930), pp 88-89; Lennox Johnston, "Cure of Tobacco-Smoking," 263 The Lancet 480, 482 (6 September 1952); and George Seldes, Never Tire of Protesting, (New York: Lyle Stuart Inc, 1968), Chapters 7-10, pp 61-99. (Seldes founded www.infact.org). When something is published on the subject, the tobacco taboo goes to the extreme of widespread refusal "even to read any book or article which refers to the harmfulness of tobacco . . . or in any other way exposes the evils of the drug." See Frank L. Wood, M.D., What You Should Know About Tobacco (Wichita, KS: The Wichita Publishing Co, 1944), p 63.

           "Addiction to tobacco, like addiction to opium, is a specific disease . . . . Its protracted course, the enormous numbers affected, and spreading infection making smoking one of our most serious diseases." Lennox Johnston, "Cure of Tobacco-Smoking," 263 The Lancet 480, 482 (6 September 1952).

           "Overwhelming clinical evidence supports characterizing smoking as a physical addiction, one that persists even though the addict knows it subjects him to serious risk of death. Both medical and legal authorities now recognize such a condition as a disease." "Nicotine exerts physiological effects on heart rate, metabolism, and (as would be expected from its addictive influence) on the brain." Comment, "Deducting the Cost of Smoking Cessation Programs Under Internal Revenue Code Section 213," 81 Michigan Law Review 237, 240 (November 1982).

           As a matter of medical background, "the pharmacology of nicotine has been studied in considerable detail since Langley [19th century] first showed that nicotine stimulated then paralysed ganglion cells." A. K. Armitage, G. H. Hall, C. F. Morrison, 217 Nature 331-334 (27 Jan 1968), referencing J. N. Langley, W. L. Dickinson, 46 Proc Roy Soc (1889).

"Nicotine is one of the most powerful of the 'nerve poisons' known. Its virulence is compared to that of prussic acid. . . . . It seems to destroy life not by attacking a few but all of the functions essential to it. . . . A significant indication of this is that there is no subsrance which can counteract its effects. . . . the use of tobacco in even the smallest amount impairs the functional action of the liver on the blood passing through it, and that the abnormal state of the blood thus caused will manifest itself by disturbance in the brain." "Thus the nerves are under the constant influence of the drug and much injury to the system results." C. W. Lyman, 48 New York Medical Journal 262-265 (8 Sep 1888).

          "It is also of relevance that the absorption of Nicotine through the lungs is extremely rapid and efficient and reaches the brain more rapidly than after intravenous injection. The arm-to-brain circulation time averages 13.5 seconds, whilst the lung-to-brain time is about 7.5 seconds." M. A. H. Russell, 212 The Practitioner 791-800 (June 1974).

          Worse, "some 90% of the nicotine delivered to the lungs goes directly to the brain, and it gets there in only 7 s," "much faster than a heroin rush from a peripheral vein." W. A. Check, 247 J Am Med Ass'n (#17) 2333-2338 (7 May 1982).

"Heavy cigarette smokers thus appear to be true addicts, showing not only social habituation but . . . physiologic withdrawal effects. . . . concerns about the dangers of smoking, latent but readily mobilized in our population, are effectively masked by denial and related psychic defenses." A classic symptom of "severe brain damage" was evident: "distorted time perception," e.g., "time moving slowly." Thus, "our evidence at least is consistent with the existence of 'chronic intoxication' in the heavy smoker, which is harmful to the smoker himself." Peter H. Knapp, Charles M. Bliss, Harriet Wells, "Addictive Aspects in Heavy Cigarette Smoking," 119 Am J Psychiatry 966-972 (April 1963).

           "Tobacco is a narcotic . . . an addicting substance [with] fatal implications." Lt. Col. Carles T. Brown, "Tobacco Addiction: A Suggestion as to Its Remedy," 50 Texas St Journal of Medicine 35 (Jan 1954).

           "Original research on the physiologic effects of carbon monoxide was completed in the 19th century." "The smoker of cigarettes is constantly exposed to levels of carbon monoxide in the range of 500 to 1,500 parts per million when he inhales the cigarette smoke." G. H. Miller, 72 J Indiana St Med Ass'n (12) 903-905 (Dec 1979). "The action of carbonic oxide" was thus long known, e.g., "Autopsies have revealed large foci of softening in the brain, hæmorrhages into the meninges, and capillary apoplexies in the brain substance." George W. Jacoby, 50 New York Med J 172-174 (17 Aug 1889).

           This effect arises as tobacco smoke is quite radioactive, see E. A. Martell, "d-Radiation dose at Bronchial Bifurcations of Smokers from Indoor Exposure to Radon Progeny," 80 Proc Nat'l Acad Sci, U.S.A. 1285-1289 (March 1983), and "Tobacco Radioactivity and Cancer in Smokers," 63 American Scientist 404-412 (July-August 1975), specifically, the fact that "Irradiation of endothelial cells of the artery wall has been shown to render them highly permeable to the passage of red cells," p 410. Smoker's brains foreseeably leak blood, thus cerebral hemmorhages and strokes foreseeably result.

           Such effects are depressing! So are the many dread conditions smoking leads to. Naturally smokers are more depressed than nonsmokers. See

Glass, RM, "Blue Mood, Blackened Lungs," 264 J Am Med Assn 1583-1584 (1990);

Hall S, Munoz R, Reus V, and Sees K, "Nicotine, Negative Affect and Depression," 61 J Consulting and Clinical Psychology 761-767 (1993); and

Lerman C, Audrain J, Orleans T, et al., "Investigation of Mechanisms Linking Depressed Mood to Nicotine Dependence," 21 Addictive Behaviors (#1) 9-19 (1996). The latter study found depression at a rate three times that among nonsmokers, with depression among 30-40% of smokers seeking smoking cessation aid.

"Anywhere from 40 percent to 90 percent of glial cells—the brain's support cells—were gone."

Such cells are needed to "provide growth factors and nutrients to neurons."

The observed brain damage occurs "in the prfrontal cortex called the anterior cingulate."

Another observed effect is "a signficant decrease in blood flow in this region."

"The anterior cingulate has been associated with emotional processing, specifically how a person decides whether a certain behavior, thought or felling will be rewarding. People with mania, for instance, can be impulsive. One theory is that they don't know what effect their behavior may have on themselves or others, Drevets said."

"[G]lial cell loss contributes to the loss of brain volume noted on brain scans, causing an abnormality in the brain's ability to process emotional tone."

Emphasizing the need for prevention, as per the Iowa 1897 example law, data showed that "anywhere from 40 percent to 90 percent of glial cells—the brain's support cells—were gone [and the brain damage] condition "'didn't go away with treatment . . . something in the anatomy was causing the problem.'"—Jamie Talan, Newsday, "Missing Cells Tied to Depression," The Detroit News (27 Oct 1997), p 2E. See also

Wayne C. Drevets, "Neuroimaging Studies of Mood Disorders," 48 Biol Psychiatry (#8) (Oct 2000), pp 813-829;

Wayne C. Drevets, "Neuroimaging and Neuropathological Studies of Depression: Implications for the Cognitive-Emotional Features of Mood Disorders," 11 Neurobiol (#2) (April 2001), pp 240-249; and

Wayne C. Drevets and D. S. Charney, "The Cellular Neurobiology of Depression," 7 Nat Med (#5) (20 May 2001), pp 541-547.

           Truly it was said in 1889, "The action of the brain is impaired thereby, the ability to think, and in fact all mental concentration is weakened. . . . John Powers, 11 years of age, was taken to the insane asylum at Orange Farm today a raving maniac, caused by excessive cigarette smoking," in the 11 April 1889 Committee Report to the Michigan House of Representatives.

           Smoking foreseeably worsens psychiatric conditions, confuses and clouds reasoning, and treatment for it, and impairs mental health, say P. Newhouse and J. Hughes in "The role of nicotine and nicotinic mechanisms in neuropsychiatric disease," 86 British Journal of Addiction 521-526 (1991).

           Recall that with scurvy, doctors knew WHO was suffering the effects; they did not know WHY until two centuries later, with the discovery of vitamins. Here, doctors observed smokers' brain dysfunction due to carbon monoxide, and a second reason for the bleeding in the brain (radioactivity) became known a century later.

          The massive quantities of carbon monoxide (500-1500 ppm) result in an impaired oxygen supply to the brain, i.e., "cerebral anoxia," cell by cell, year after year, and when to any cell, "the oxygen supply is cut off, then damage to neurones occurs after a few minutes. Some neurones die." Anthony Hopkins, Epilepsy: the facts (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1981).

         This obective medical data refutes the myth that smoking is merely a "habit." Officially, that myth was refuted long ago. Myths die hard; there are some people who still think the earth is flat!! even though that myth was also refuted long ago.

         Tobacco is an addiction, not a habit, see Ronald M. Davis, M.D., (a health authority during Gov. John Engler's first term), "The Language of Nicotine Addiction: Purging the Word 'Habit' From Our Lexicon," 1 Tobacco Control 163-164 (1992), opposing the "Big Tobacco" myth that smoking is merely a habit.

           "Smokers show the same attitude to tobacco as addicts to their drug, and their judgment is therefore biased in giving an opinion of its effect on them." Lennox Johnston, "Tobacco Smoking and Nicotine," 243 The Lancet 742 (19 December 1942). Tobacco-induced brain damage explains this long-observed adverse impact on smokers' reasoning.

           "Most psychiatrists have noted that there is a higher frequency of smoking in their patients than in a general population." See the DHEW NIDA book, Research on Smoking Behavior, Research Monograph 17, p 5 (December 1977), supra.

           Seventy-four percent (74%) of schizophrenics smoke, whereas only 25% of the general population smokes, Glassman, A, "Cigarette Smoking and Implications for Psychiatric Illness," 150 Am J Psychiatry (#4) 546-553 (1993).

           Smokers are disproportionately mentally ill significantly more than nonsmokers; among smokers, the most common mental disorder is schizophrenia, Kitch, D, "Editorial: Where There's Smoke . . . Nicotine and Psychiatric Disorders," 30 Biol Psychiatry 107-108 (1991).

           Due to their brain dysfunction, anosognosia, smokers do not recognize these propensities in themselves, nor respond to normal stimuli such as warnings that smoking is dangerous. Such data is consistent with that on "those persons who are psychotic (insane in the legal sense of the term) . . . sufffering from a real derangement . . . so severe 'that they do not respond to and are not motivated by normal stimuli,'" Lyle Tussing, Psychology for Better Living (New York: Wiley Pub, 1959), p 345.

By 1907, there was "a full . . . knowledge of the effects of tobacco on the nervous system. . . . A variety of substances have been found in tobacco aside from nicotine. Some of these are pyridin, picolin, tulidin, parvolin, collodin, rubidin, varidin; also carbolic acid and marsh gas." The result is that tobacco "registers a permanent and definite impression in nervous structures when it is used for months or years." "Tobacco is a powerful depressant to the motor or efferent nerves, acting primarily upon their peripheral filaments. . . . The sympathetic ganglia are first stimulated and then depressed by nicotine. . . . In chronic poisoning there is more or less gastroenteritis of a hemorrhagic nature. Ecchymosis occurs in the pleura and peritioneum. Hyperemia of the lungs, brain and cord is found. . . . Coarse lesions have been found in the brain and spinal cord." L. Pierce Clark, M.D., 71 Medical Record (26) 1072-1073 (29 June 1907). The above-cited DSM-III shows the rapidity of obvious symptoms, after a mere "at least several weeks."

           So within two years, Michigan acted, with a law MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216 that bans cigarettes, but the public does not know that either. Nor that Michigan Governor Engler and staff have been supportive of action to enforce that law, issuing five pertinent memoranda:

           Over the years, a number of nonsmokers have asked smokers not to smoke in their presence. Such nonsmokers were unaware of smokers' mental disorder. So the smoker reaction to them has often been hostile. In essence, the reaction of a metally disordered person to such a request, is to react with hostility, as they feel that they can do whatever they please.

           The above-cited Dr. James Tracy in 1917 described smokers' mental disorder leading to that typical reaction, as tantamount to insane delusions of grandeur, leading to the belief of no need to respond politely to polite requests.

           Smokers tragically do receive as a result of exposure to cigarettes' vast toxic chemicals a disproportionate amount of brain deterioration such as Alzheimers' disease and mental disorder. So as hostility to control is a typical symptom of the this type of mental disorder, smokers do typically react as various nonsmokers have experienced. The web writer has personally observed the same.

          In fact, smokers' behavior of this type has been so widespread as to have been published repeatedly. Here are just a a few of the many examples that can be found at any good law library.

           Mentally disordered smokers can indeed be quite dangerous, cause fires, kill nonsmokers, etc. See, for example, the lawsuit of Rum River Lumber Co v State of Minnesota, 282 NW2d 882 (Minn, 1979). An insane smoker had escaped from the St. Peter's mental hospital. A pyromaniac, he then proceeded to set fire to an area lumber yard!! The destroyed lumber yard sued the mental hospital operated by the State, for negligence in letting the mentally ill smoker escape!! When such smokers are allowed to run loose, said the lumber yard in court, they are likely to cause fires; so it is negligent to let such foreseeably dangerous mentally disordered smokers escape. The jury agreed, and told the state to pay for the damages that arose from the asylum's negligence in letting the insane smoker escape. The state mental hospital appealed to the State Supreme Court. But since smoker's known disproportionate mental disorder and dangerousness, including their causing fires disproportionately, is medical fact, the state lost the appeal.

           In the case of Commonwealth v Hughes, 468 Pa 502; 364 A2d 306 (1976), Hughes started a fire at a chemical factory. Firemen trying to put out the fire were killed on the job in the process of putting out the smoker-caused fire. The smoker was arrested for manslaughter in the two deaths. He appealed all the way to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, but lost. Smokers—contrary to lay beliefs—do not have a right to start fires that kill people.

           In the case of Shimp v New Jersey Bell Telephone Company, 145 N J Super 516; 368 A2d 408 (1976), smoker coworkers (having been negligently hired) were bringing canisters of toxic chemicals (canisters known as cigarettes) onto company property, and spraying the toxic chemicals into the air, including impacting their nonsmoker coworkers. The company allowed this, except on the company telephone equipment!! Mrs. Shimp politely asked them to cease and desist. They refused. So Mrs. Shimp requested a poison control / nuisance abatement injunction to get herself treated as having at least the same rights as inanimate phone equipment. She won an injunction. Employers must treat nonsmoker humans no less well than employer equipment.

           A nearly identical case is that of Paul Smith v Western Electric Co, 643 SW2d 10 (Mo App, 1982).

           In another case of a smoker committed to a state mental hospital, the smoker was violating the no smoking rule, causing a hazard. In that case, the state hospital workers were careful (unlike those in the Minnesota case, supra) to not be negligent, not let the smoker cause a hazard. They forcibly restrained the mentally disordered smoker (Mr. Jacobs). He thereupon sued, charging the workers with assault and battery. Their defense was, they were preventing the mentally disordered smoker from causing harm! . (Prevention is better than waiting until your place is burned down, or you are killed!) The court dismissed the smoker's case pursuant to the legal doctrine of "sovereign immunity." The case is Jacobs v State of Michigan Mental Health Department, 88 Mich App 503; 276 NW2d 627 (1979).

           The bottom line is that governments and constitutions were established, generally speaking, to protect the public from violence such as unlawful killings and arson. As long as cigarette controls are not enforced, incidents of fires and deaths do arise. The resultant litigation, except in the amazing Jacobs case, shows that smokers' doing harm is typically not prevented before the fact, only dealt with after it is too late, after the harm smokers had caused had already occured.

           This site advocates that you write to officials urging more of them to follow the Jacobs precedent, and control smokers, and prevent smoking, before more harm is caused.

           Of course, the preferable solution is a smokers' rights law such as Michigan has, a safe-cigarettes law. Please write to officials urging adoption of such a law state-wide, nation-wide, and worldwide. TCPG advocates this, but offers both alternatives here for your choice.