Blowing Smoke?

I watched a video called "A New Ending" and was shocked when Marion Burt talked about her husband being prescribed 4 cigarettes a day as a toddler. It was supposed to help with breathing issues! This led to a lifelong smoking habit, which led to COPD and his death. A sad and moving story. Hard to believe (but true) that smoking plant material was once a treatment for asthma.

This brought back memories of my Mom sharing stories about when she was a little girl. She suffered from horrible earaches. She said they were treated with sulfur and with someone blowing smoke in her ears. She was born in 1939 and lived on a farm. I'm not sure how much medical care was available back then, or what antibiotics were on the market. Mom wasn't the only one who was subjected to blowing smoke in the ear, it was a common home remedy.

These 2 stories made me curious about smoking and medicinal use of tobacco. I remember a saying about "blowing smoke up your ass" and wondered if it's just a saying or is this connected to some former medical procedure. Turns out that at one time, it was a medical procedure, often used on drowning victims. It's hard to believe, but there's still places that believe in using the practice of blowing smoke in a patients lungs or ears to cure cancer, autism, and emphysema. 

Tobacco has a long history of being used for medicinal purposes. It was used to disinfect, ward off diseases, and to battle fatigue. It has been used as an ingredient in toothpaste, to treat skin ailments, and treating a long list of physical and mental maladies. Some of those cures had no scientific proof, while other uses of tobacco were and still are being explored for their medicinal properties. Tobacco also has a sacred value to some cultures, and is used for spiritual and medicinal purposes.

Nicotine is one part of the tobacco plant that is being explored for it's therapeutic benefits. That research shows more potential than blowing smoke into the various openings of the human body. Unfortunately, stigmatization over tobacco and nicotine has dampened scientific exploration into the potential of nicotine to reduce human suffering. Modern science shows that many people who smoke are probably self-medicating and don't realize it. We'd be giving them a life saving gift, if we'd stop the stigma and offer them safer delivery methods for the nicotine that seems to be helping them.

Who knew that blowing smoke up someone's rear end or in their ear would someday lead to something that can help people lead a healthier and happier life? Ending stigma means we stop writing the ending to people's stories, and let individuals and science create happier endings to potentially tragic stories.