It's never too late to quit

Smoking, which kills about 4700 New Zealanders every year, is a factor in six of the Ministry of Health's list of top 15 killers, including cancer, heart disease and lung conditions.

Nicotine dependence is a neurobiological addiction and classified as a medical disease, says doctors. Nicotine artificially stimulates the release of chemicals in the brain to create a chemical imbalance.

Addiction to it is powerful and withdrawal symptoms and craving make quitting difficult.

A report by the United States Surgeon General considers nicotine more difficult to quit than heroin or cocaine.

While doctors acknowledge quitting is hard, they say it is one of the healthiest things to do and that it is never too late. For example, if a smoker quits after a heart attack, a year later their risk of a second heart attack has been cut by 50 per cent.

Since November 1 Quitline - which helps smokers stop - has been offering eligible smokers subsidised nicotine patches and gum. The Government has allocated $6.18 million a year for the programme for at least four years.

Up until March 27 the organisation had received more than 100,000 calls from smokers and sent out 40,000 subsidy cards, about two thirds of them to new clients. Quitline was receiving about 500 forms from smokers a day, recording essential information about their smoking patterns.