Many of us worry about the alarming number of additives, colourings, preservatives and other ingredients that are added to our food. But how many of us know what is in cigarettes - apart from the obvious - or what’s produced when they’re smoked? Some cigarette flavourings include childhood favourites such as cocoa, vanilla, liquorice, sugar, and even honey.

However, more than 4,000 chemicals can be found in cigarette smoke, some of which are very familiar. Here’s just some a few:

• Ammonia - found in toilet cleaners.
• Acetone - found in nail varnish remover.
• Cadmium - a highly poisonous metal used in batteries.
• Vinyl chloride - used to make PVC.
• Napthtalene - used in moth balls.
• Carbon monoxide - lethal gas in your car exhaust fumes - a poisonous gas that is produced when things burn and is commonly given off by car exhausts and gas fires as well as cigarette smoke. In large amounts, such as from a faulty gas fire, it is rapidly fatal, while in small amounts, as when someone smokes a cigarette, it will cut down the efficiency of the smoker’s breathing.
• Tar - the stuff cigarette smoke deposits in your lungs and that clogs them up - once inhaled, smoke condenses, and about 70 per cent of the tar is deposited in the lungs. Condensed tar is a sticky brown substance which stains fingers and teeth that familiar yellow-brown colour.



• Nicotine - the powerful and fast-acting drug behind addiction. When tobacco smoke is inhaled, nicotine is absorbed into the bloodstream. Immediate physiological effects include increased heart rate and a rise in blood pressure.
• Cyanide - used in the gas chambers.
• Formaldehyde - used to preserve dead bodies.
• Arsenic - poison.