What's in a cigarette?

Last Updated on Monday, 15 March 2010 14:35

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Nicotine is one of thousands of chemicals in cigarettes. It's addictive and causes most of the withdrawal symptoms you feel when you first stop...

Two hours after you stop smoking all the nicotine is out of your system, and the nicotine by-products are gone in two to three days.
But even when the nicotine has gone it's the addiction, the habits, and the feelings that make you want to keep smoking.

So what’s in cigarettes that make us feel this way?

When you smoke you inhale more than 4,000 chemicals and heavy metals including:

Acetone (paint stripper)

Ammonia (toilet cleaner)

Methanol (rocket fuel)

Naphthalene (moth balls)

Carbon monoxide (car exhaust fumes)

Formaldehyde (preservative)

Cyanide (rat killer)

Toluene (industrial solvent)

Arsenic (ant poison)

Butane (lighter fuel)

DDT (insecticide)

Cadmium (car battery metal)