Nicotine is a poison. Do not try this experiment because you will die. Nicotine overdose kills in much the same way as cyanide poisoning. In the movies when a character takes a cyanide pill they just fall down dead instantly. Well cyanide does not kill that quick and neither does nicotine. Cyanide and nicotine kill by interfering with blood gas exchange. Everyone had red blood and this colour is due to the iron content of the red blood cells. The iron is in our blood to bind to oxygen and transport the oxygen Around the body. When a person takes a breath oxygen binds to the red blood cells and carbon dioxide is released from the blood via the lungs. The problem with cyanide and nicotine is that they bind to the iron in the red blood cells and are in no hurry to be dislodged. Normal gas exchange comes to an end. Someone poisoned with one of these substances will have no problem breathing but they will just start to turn blue because there is literally no room left for oxygen to enter the blood stream. It is exactly the same as having a plastic bag over ones head. The body cannot take oxygen into the blood. Except there is no plastic bag to see and remove. As the cells of the body become more deprived of oxygen then the rate of breathing will dramatically increase but to no avail. Panic will set into the victim and of course everyone around at the time.

Consider this true scenario. A mans wife slipped some cyanide into the Tylenol in the bathroom cupboard and her husband took two of the laced capsules. He died despite being attended by paramedics who rushed him to the emergency department of a nearby hospital. He died because the health professionals had no clue to the cyanide poisoning. If you put oxygen therapy on a person who has been poisoned by cyanide or nicotine then the inevitable death is simply slightly delayed.

Now back to my experiment I mentioned. Please do not try this as I do know what I am talking about. All you need is a packet of thirty cigarettes, a coffee plunger (or teapot) and some boiling water. Take the tobacco out of the cigarettes place them in the said plunger and add boiling water. Leave it to brew for about ten minutes. Allow the infusion to cool and then drink it straight down. If someone was actually dumb enough to do this they may be lucky enough to vomit the lot straight back up. Nicotine is a poison that your body does not want in any way shape or form. Hence the awful taste. However anyone fool hardy enough to try this experiment would most certainly be dead within 15 to 25 minutes. The time lag being simply the time it would take for the nicotine to pass through the stomach into the blood. I repeat do not try this experiment and don’t try to poison someone like this as you will go to Gaol. Extremely high nicotine levels in the blood cannot happen by accident.

Nicotine is a poison. Nicotine was a component of poison gas used in world war one. Nicotine’s function in the tobacco plant is to ward of pests. Thus nicotine has been used as an effective pesticide. When a person smokes a cigarette they only really take in one or two milligrams at a time. But over the course of a day a very heavy smoker can inhale 100 + milligrams. Did I mention that 30 mg of nicotine is all that is needed to kill someone 60 kg and less. Heavy smokers take three times that much of this poison into their systems, every single day, year in and year out. That is why smoking is the biggest cause of death in out society. The nicotine in tobacco causes as much damage as does the tar. So if you are a smoker reading this then have a look at the links associated with this article. I was a heavy smoker and regret the damage that I have done to my health through addiction to nicotine. I will have lost years of my life and hope to regain some of these years. Stop using nicotine. There is help to stop smoking. Seek out and use that help. I bet a smoker would not knowingly smoke cyanide. I am thinking of writing an article about how smokers unwittingly do smoke arsenic. “Quit – Quit smoking today”