Drugs Can Help You Quit Smoking

Only 5% to 10% of smokers who try to quit succeed. For the rest, the quick onset of withdrawal symptoms—craving, irritability, hunger, and headache—is too much; the brain begins to raise hell and demand a fresh dose of nicotine, which binds to certain receptors and causes the pleasurable release of dopamine.

In the face of 40 years of public-health drumbeating, smoking bans, and social pressure, that's an amazing failure rate. The profound power of nicotine addiction made it logical to search for ways to chemically intervene. According to the U.S. Public Health Service, antismoking meds can double or even triple your chances of being able to quit. (If you smoke less than 10 cigarettes a day, you're probably not addicted, and you should talk to your doctor about another course of action to deal with the habit.) Doctors now recommend that heavy smokers take prescription drugs such as bupropion (an antidepressant) or varenicline (a "nicotinic receptor partial agonist").

The idea of relying on a drug to kick a drug habit can make people nervous. Some fear unpleasant and well-publicized side effects; others fear that one addiction will replace another. But given the severity of the tobacco addiction and the likelihood of health damage, experts at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the American Cancer Society (ACS) say it's a straightforward cost-benefit decision. “If you weigh the options—taking medication versus continuing to smoke—the evidence for using drugs is overwhelming,” says Thomas Glynn, MD, director of cancer science and trends at the ACS. “You should do whatever you can to quit.”

That said, smoking-cessation drugs are hardly a magic bullet. A doubling or tripling of success rates is great, but remember how low the success rate normally is: 5% to 10%. There is no "cure" for smoking; it's more like managing a lifetime condition.

“Smoking is a chronic disease,” says Matthew McKenna, MD, director of the CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health. “When you use these medications, it is not like taking penicillin for syphilis. The success rates are still relatively modest.”

The good news is that your chances of succeeding increase with each attempt—a phenomenon that Dr. Glynn likens to learning.