Tobacco May Keep Us from Catching the Flu

But what about the nicotine in the plant? Isn't it poisonous in large amounts? Or is there no nicotine in it after the leaves are ground up?

I don't understand that.

Doctor - "Well, I have good news and I have bad news. The BAD news is, you have lung cancer. The GOOD news is... I lied. There is no good news."

So....to prevent short term illness I have to get a long term one? Sounds just like all the other ads. Take this for X-sickness and get A thru W, Y & Z side effects. But if it smells like flowers and doesn't come with all the junk as reg. smoking then I'm all for it.

Did the first 3 comments even read the article. First off, it's not the same tobacco plant cigarette companies use to kill people. Second, the plant is only used to grow the protein. Then the protein, just the protein, is extracted from the plant. There is no tobacco or nicotine being inhaled or ingested.

Vii

You obviously didn't read the comments yourself...no one states that its the same commercial plant used for tobacco production. But the Nicotiana benthamiana tobacco plant still contains nicotine and other alkaloids. Or do you think that a plant with the name "Nicotiana" is free of nicotine?

So it still contains nicotine. No where does it say that they filter out nicotine in the article. They extract the protein, but do not state whether they remove anything else inherent in the tissue of the plant.

You assume too much in thinking that nicotine is automatically filtered out. Just because it's the common sense thing to do, doesn't mean that it happens. Unless people ask these sometimes "stupid" or "obvious" questions, there are people who would take advantage of your naïveté to save a buck. And don't think that there aren't unscrupulous people willing to do it, because drug and pharmaceutical companies don't exactly have the sparkling reputation you seem to be giving them.

@ Vii, most idiot that post articles are well... idiots. You're smart enough to read that, "Technicians then grind up the leaves to extract the protein. Injected into a person.."
So to all idiots... You extract the protein, not the nicotine. Plus it is injected!!!! not smoked. Finally, people don't get addicted to a vaccine shot even if it contains nicotine. It's like saying "we're going to die because humans can't breath CO2 and CO2 is produced by cars." Well, I'm sure whoever made earth created trees for a reason.

Added counter argument: YOU ONLY GET THE FLU SHOT A FEW TIMES IN THE YEAR!!!! NOT EVERYDAY, so how can you get addicted to something your rarely get. I'm sure smokers smoke a few cigarettes a day, not 1 or 2 a year

@nhan1st

Why don't you come back when you have a coherent thought and don't post scatterbrain comments.

Your analogy with the CO2 is sorry at best.

No one says you're going to get addicted to nicotine through the shot. It's whether or not they bother to remove the nicotine from the ground up plant matter at all. I'm sure you may be just smart enough to realize that when you grind up plant matter, the cellulose and other insoluble plant fibers gets mixed in with everything else including protein as well as the nicotine and other chemicals already present in the tissues. Its fairly easy to extract protein from this "soup" as the fibers are insoluble but its far more difficult to filter out chemicals and enzymes which are already part of the solvent.

If you didn't already know, nicotine has been used in the past as a pesticide. To show you how deadly nicotine is, try this experiment out:

Take a cigar and drop it into an 8 oz. cup of water. Leave it in there overnight. Next morning, take out the cigar and drink the entire cup of water. Your wife will be making funeral arrangements pretty soon after.

I'm guessing that a single dose of the shot probably wouldn't be lethal, but I wouldn't want to be the first person to try it out. On average, a cigarette contains about 1 mg of nicotine, but its far more toxic than cocaine in comparison.

The effects of nicotine are multiplied when the patient is a child or infant. Their ability to tolerate the effects of nicotine falls dramatically with their body mass.

You don't even know if the shot has nicotine in it or not. You just ASSUME it doesn't and go on your ignorant ways without even asking or caring if it does. Really, it's people like you who are the worst when something bad does happen and you're left wondering "WHY????".

It's because you were too stupid or nonchalant about the matter and didn't bother to educate yourself on things that might affect you. When something does happens, I'll be the first one to say, "I told you so."

Read the article again rprenri. They extract the protein not the nicotine. Second point: The CO2 analogy was an exaggerated one so don't freak out. Finally, why the hell would FDA (is it that? I'm Canadian) knowingly put a toxic chemical in our vaccine when they know at certain quantity it would be lethal to us humans. I got my swine flu shot and currently I'm not dead yet so I trust what the professionals are doing. Maybe you're afraid to get that shot? After you die from swine flu, I'll be first one to laugh on your grave.

P.S If you're going to preach about nicotine, forget it. I'm sure there'e many more dangerous chemicals in cigarette than nicotine.

While one might wish that the world's scientists were
smart enough to at least consider using a more "hearty"
plant species, and something more appropo to human health, like say, the dandelion, rather that the pesticide-propped tobacco plant,
I think the idea of switching from the use of chicken
embroyos (sp) is LONG, LONG overdue..... Outside of ethical
concerns, simply ask anyone who has ever kept chickens or who knows more than just a bit about them, whether the farmer, or for backyard eggs, or simply someone who has them as fun and interesting pets, and you will learn that
chickens CAN carry a host of horrendous pathogens -- at least some of which we KNOW ARE transmittable to humans; chickens can be prone to a host of
bacterial, nutritional, environmental, and genetic flaws passed from both parent contributors, through the egg and to the offspring, some of which may also contribute to problems for human beings with the comsumption and "scientific" uses of chicken and chicken products (Simply feeding them different things displays different results in egg shells, egg sizes, and the chicken's overall health very, very quickly.)

Our long-standing "habit" of growing vaccines in fertilized, and developing chicken eggs....

Never liked the idea myself...... Biggest "turn off" to
vaccines that I can think of.

your all wong. there is nicotiene in the plant.
follow this link to wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotiana_benthamiana

Yes, there are nicotine in the plant and I don't disagree with that but @ncf62 does it hurt to use common sense to remove the nicotine? Or just the protein only? Great idea dott, finally we'll be able to use those pesky weedy dandelions. Imagine how much you could do with G.E grass.

@nhan1st

Why would the FDA allow chemicals in vaccines known to be hazardous to human health???

Why is there mercury in vaccines? Because there are. Maybe not enough to cause damage...but it's still there. Go look it up.

Also, your statement implies the government does no wrong. How foolish you sound. Do you know how many recalls have been issued for drugs and other medication proven to be dangerous? How many lawsuits have there been targeting drug companies for unknown effects? Millions of Americans have been hurt or have died due to unforeseen reactions to these drugs which weren't properly tested first.

The drug companies push out all these "miracle" drugs in such a frenzy to take advantage of the market and make money that they don't take the time to properly test it for safety. They do a small test sample and the FDA just accepts it and it gets FDA approval.

Next thing you know, there's a giant recall and people are having heart, kidney, liver issues because of it. The drug companies spend as much money on litigation as they do on research and development.

I swear, people like you need to read the news every now and then and actually pay attention to what you're reading. Because you obviously sound like you've been living in a fantasy land.

Shut up.