New Stop Smoking Pills Approved by FDA

Smoking is one of the leading causes of preventable deaths. As a matter of fact, it causes one out of five deaths in the United States each year. Around 1,200 Americans die because of smoking everyday. Aside from the scare that people get from these mind-blowing figures, a lot of smokers would like to quit in order to look better. Cigarette smoking does have adverse effects such as premature aging, tooth decay, and hair loss. Some people would also like to have a better fitness level.

Whatever the reason is for quitting, there are now many support systems available in the market that can help a person to quit smoking. One of them is the stop smoking pill that is available in the market.

The New Stop Smoking Pill in The Market

A new stop smoking pill was approved by the Food and Drug Administration. This is the second nicotine-free quit smoking pill that has gained federal approval, adding to the limited pool of effective drugs for smoking cessation.

Varenicline was shown to help more than one out of five smokers to stop smoking after using it for a year. This stop smoking pill inhibits the feelings of pleasure that smokers feel when they light up a cigarette as well as the withdrawal symptoms associated with quitting. This product will now be available to the public under the brand name, Chantix. This new stop smoking pill should be taken twice a day for a minimum of twelve weeks in order to be able to quit smoking.

The First Nicotine-Free Stop Smoking Pill

The first stop smoking pill that was approved by the FDA in 1997 is Zyban, the brand name for a sustained-released tablet form of bupropion hydrochloride. Bupropion hydrochloride is the same drug that is used as an anti-depressant. This is sold under the name of Wellbutrin SR.

By boosting the levels of dopamine and norepinephrine in the body and inducing the same feelings that are brought about by the flow of nicotine in the body, this stop smoking pill can take away the need for a cigarette. Because this product can give a person a sense of energy and well-being, it's very effective in reducing withdrawal symptoms and weaning people out of their nicotine addiction.

This stop smoking pill only works after the person has taken it for a week and has accumulated a sufficient amount of the drug in his body. It should be taken twice a day for a week before a person stops smoking. Most smokers tend to take this pill ten to twelve weeks longer in order to fully give up smoking.

Although the pills that are mentioned above are great for people who want to stop smoking, they should not be taken by women who are pregnant and breast-feeding. They can also be bad for people with a history of eating disorders like anorexia nervosa and bulimia. For these reasons, these stop smoking pills should only be taken with a doctor's prescription.
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Understanding Stop Smoking Pill Work

Your resolution to stop smoking habbit is just a pill away—that's how some of the drugs manufacturers advertise their products. The main enemy for the quit smoking researchers is nicotine. How to dealing this greatest killer factor.

In the recent past, drugs manufacturers have developed many stop smoking drugs, claiming that they have almost made it, but soon many unanswered questions cropped up. Is it really possible to stop smoking by taking recourse to pills? . Nicotine's chemical reaction on the body is their main target. Having known this, will they succeed to mimic or block nicotine's destructive powers? Researchers have also found out that certain quit smoking pills have within them the in-built double-benefit scheme! They help you stop smoking and drop weight!.

A revolutionary medicine is being developed, which when hits the market on a commercial scale, could be in the form of potion or pill. It is called Methoxsalen. This stop smoking drug is also developed on the scientifically accepted fact that cigarette smoking is an addiction developed by human body's earnest desire, obsession for nicotine.

Curb the desire, say the scientists who developed this drug; elimination of this craving is possible, the researchers fervently believe! They have great hopes on this new discovery, which they hope, will produce precedent-shattering results!

It is the brain that does the duty of producing happy and enjoyable sensations when you smoke. When the brain stops giving such signals, what will the poor addict do? He is now not interested in lighting another cigarette at all, and at the end of the day he finds that the packet is almost in tact.
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Stop Smoking Pill in the market

To stop addictive effect of smoking happening, many stop-smoking pills such as Zyban and Chantix was developed and already out in the market for the cessation of smoking, along with nicotine patches and gums. stop smoking pills works by targeting and relieving the same receptors in the part of the brain that demands for nicotine.

Gradually quit smoking with ordinary way of limiting cigarettes consumption per day would naturally cause withdrawal symptoms that usually last for several times. However, manufacturers say that with the quit smoking pill, there will be no withdrawal effect since the pill would be recognized as substitute for nicotine by the brain.

After a year of taking stop-smoking pill, it yields thrice more effectiveness of a smoker quitting than other ways of stop smoking treatment. The craving for nicotine, of course, does not happen quickly.

Although clinical results prove it to be significantly effective, a smoker must still have the will and determination to cease the habit and follow it through responsibly. Experts may consider this as the magic bullet for smoking, but still place emphasis on the importance of the individual's mentality.

Aside from the health risks that come with smoking is the drain on the wallet. The quit smoking pill stands a good chance for an individual's healthier future. Herbal quit smoking aids have also become popular recently as they do not have side effects of stop smoking drugs.

These new stop smoking supplements can help a smoker quit smoking as well as stop smoking drugs.
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Pfizer Varenicline Stop Smoking Pill Approved by FDA

A Pfizer drug shown to help more than one in five smokers stop smoking received federal approval on Thursday, adding another option to the limited pool of effective stop-smoking prescription medicines.

Varenicline is only the second nicotine-free smoking cessation drug to gain FDA approval. Pfizer Inc. plans to market the twice-daily tablet as Chantix stop smoking pill.

Varenicline works in two ways, by cutting the pleasure of smoking and reducing the withdrawal symptoms that lead smokers to light up cigaret again.

Most other stop-smoking pills are various nicotine-replacement therapies, sold by prescription and over the counter in gum, patch, lozenge, nasal spray or inhaler form. In 1997, the FDA approved bupropion, an antidepressant already sold as Wellbutrin but rebranded it as Zyban, an anti-smoking drug.

The approved course of Chantix pill treatment is 12 weeks, a period that can be doubled in patients who successfully stop to increase the likelihood they will remain smoke-free, the Food and Drug Administration said.

Other clinical trials show the drug's effect is more pronounced in the short-term: 44 percent of patients quit smoking following a 12-week course of treatment with Chantix, compared to the 30 percent of Zyban patients who quit, according to Pfizer. However, smoking cessation experts said the longer-term data are more applicable, given the difficulty of quitting the habit for good.

"It's not going to be a revolution, it's going to be a substantial step forward," Thomas Glynn, director of cancer science and trends at the American Cancer Society, said of varenicline. Glynn added that the greatest value will be for smokers who have tried Zyban or nicotine-replacement therapy but failed to quit.

"My bet is that it will work as well as they do and, from the look of things, a little bit better," he said.

Varenicline latches on to the same receptors in the brain that nicotine binds to when inhaled in cigarette smoke, an action that leads to the release of dopamine in the pleasure centers of the brain. Taking the drug blocks any inhaled nicotine from reinforcing that effect.

The drug also slows the release of dopamine, which cuts the craving to smoke that occurs when nicotine's effect wears off, said Pfizer research chemist Jotham Coe, who invented the drug.

"It's a shield and at the same time, it stabilizes you and prevents you from having the lows, which lead to craving and withdrawal, but at the same time, it shields you from the highs," said Coe, a former 2 1/2 pack-a-day smoker who quit smoking a first time cold turkey and then a second time with the help of nicotine gum.

One in five American adults, or nearly 45 million people, smoke. An estimated 32 million of those smokers would like to quit, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Smoking kills nearly 440,000 Americans a year.

"Tobacco use, particularly cigarette smoking, is the single most preventable cause of death in the United States and is responsible for a growing list of cancers, as well as chronic diseases including those of the lung and heart," said Dr. Scott Gottlieb, the FDA's Deputy Commissioner for Medical and Scientific Affairs.

Quitting, as any smoker will tell you, isn't easy. Fewer than one in 20 smokers can do so without help, Schroeder said. With help, whether it's a drug, counseling or both, the success rate rises at most to roughly one in five, he added.

Both the FDA and European regulators recently shot down attempts by Sanofi-Aventis to gain approval for rimonabant, or Accomplia, as a stop-smoking aid. Both have recommended that the drug, which blocks the same pleasure centers in the body activated when pot smokers get the munchies, be approved for weight loss.

And at least two vaccines are being developed that could block nicotine from ever reaching the brain.

The FDA does not recommend that Chantix be used with other smoking-cessation products. Its most common side effect is nausea.

Pfizer hopes to start selling the drug, for use by adults only, in the second half of the year. The New York-based company did not immediately release its price.

Pfizer had predicted annual sales of $1 billion. Analysts said that may be possible but were more conservative, given the lackluster performance of other stop-smoking aids.

"One billion in sales is plausible but I'd rather be conservative," said Barbara Ryan, an analyst at Deutsche Bank who is predicting $500 million in annual sales by 2009.
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