Smoking Stats in the UK for 2009 are Quite Encouraging

The smoking statistics in the UK for 2009 as revealed by the NHS for the Health and Social Care Information Centre is quite encouraging. The report shows hopeful trends in the behaviour and attitudes of people towards smoking following the smoking ban in public places. According to the 2008/09 statistics, amongst the 16 year olds and over in Great Britain, 67% of the current smokers want to give up smoking, while 75% have even tried to give up smoking at some point in the past. Around 69% of adults report that they do not allow smoking at all in their home. This figure shows an increase of 61% as reported in 2006. The majority of people, 81% agree with the smoking ban in public places. However, there was a drop in the number of smokers who want to quit smoking in 2008/2009 to 67% from 74% in 2007. These trends show growing awareness amongst people about the harmful effects of smoking. It indicates that people are more than willing to quit smoking. A little encouragement and support can help them to become ex-smokers.

One of the biggest challenges that people face while trying to stop smoking is their addiction to nicotine. Just after a few hours of quitting, you may experience nicotine withdrawal symptoms that will weaken your determination to quit and you’ll be tempted to go back to smoking again. Nicotine withdrawal symptoms are one of the key reasons why many people fail to quit via the cold turkey method.

How to break the nicotine habit?
These days, a lot of quit smoking aids are available that can help you break nicotine addiction and stop smoking forever. For instance, you may make use of nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) based lozenges, chewing gum, inhalators or patches to break your nicotine addiction. This therapy aims at providing nicotine to your body externally so that the craving for nicotine is taken care of and you can work on breaking the psychological habit of smoking. Besides, you can take help from quit smoking medications such as Champix (varenicline). Developed by Pfizer pharmaceuticals, Champix is by far the most popular quit smoking aid. It not only helps you break your nicotine addiction, but it also makes cigarette smoking less pleasurable for you so that you are not tempted to smoke again. Studies show that Champix quadruples your odds of quitting as compared to quitting via the cold turkey method.

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