Fresh Lime Helps You Quit Smoking

Millions feel helplessly addicted to smoking cigarettes, without knowing that a natural aid for quitting can be found not at the local pharmacy, but at the fruit stand of our grocery store.

The compelling reasons to quit smoking far outnumber the ways to do it. Even with the recent revelations that tobacco is contaminated with the highly carcinogenic radioisotope polonium-210, the addictive chemical grip of the 599 industrial pyrazines added to it binds millions of smokers around the world to the cigarette, even though they already know it causes premature death and cancer. The addiction is far stronger than the desire for health.

That is why natural, effective interventions for quitting smoking are so needed today. Here is a new study featuring a solution you can find not at your local pharmacy, but at the fruit stand of your local grocery store.

In a compelling study published in the Journal of the Medical Association of Thailand, titled “Efficacy of Fresh Lime for Smoking Cessation,” researchers from the Department of Medicine at Srinakharinwirot University, Thailand, examined the effectiveness of fresh lime as a smoking cessation aid compared with nicotine gum.

100 regular smokers aged 18 and over who were willing to quit were enrolled in a six-month randomized controlled trial, receiving either fresh lime (47) or nicotine gum (53) during the study. Reduced smoking was confirmed by measuring exhaled carbon monoxide (CO), with the measurements at weeks 9-12 as the primary outcome. Craving severity was also measured using a visual analog scale.

The results of the trial showed no significant difference in abstinence rates between the groups during weeks 9-12, although they observed that “the 7-day abstinence at week 4 of fresh lime users was statistically significantly lower than that of nicotine gum users (38.3% vs. 58.5%; p = 0.04).” They also found that fresh lime users tended to report more intense cravings than the nicotine gum group, but the number of cravings was found not to differ significantly between the groups.

The report concluded that fresh lime can be used effectively as a smoking cessation aid, although it is not as good as nicotine gum at reducing cravings.

Lime is an accessible, non-toxic alternative to the average synthetic nicotine gum loaded with additional toxins, and physiologically it has several “side benefits,” including alkalizing the tissues, which in tobacco users are usually more acidic to begin with. It is also an anti-infective agent, having been shown to have significant antimicrobial activity against multiple drug-resistant strains of E. coli and to inhibit the survival of Vibrio cholera, the pathogen that contributes to cholera, in foods, another nice “side benefit” considering that smokers often have compromised immunity.

Sources:

[i] Suthat Rungruanghiranya, Chatchai Ekpanyaskul, Chanin Sakulisariyaporn, Prapada Watcharanat, Kunyanit Akkalakulawas. Efficacy of fresh lime for smoking cessation. J Med Assoc Thai. 2012 Dec ;95 Suppl 12:S76-82. PMID: 23513469