An Australian Health Survey conducted in 2011-2012, concluded that 3.1 million Australians are smokers. (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2013). This means that 14% of Australia’s population are currently smokers compared to more than 40% in the 1980’s – a dramatic decrease with the smoking rate continuing to decline each year. Now there are many factors that can be considered for this drop such as the rise in prices or maybe less accessibility but another big factor is that it’s no longer seen in the same way socially like it was back in the 1980’s. With more and more anti-smoking products being created it decreases the amount of smokers and I’m going to go into more depth about that later on in the presentation. Nicotine is a parasymphatomimetic alkaloid from the nightshade family of plants called the Solanaceae. A Parasympathomimetic drug is “a drug or poison that acts by stimulating or mimicking the parasympathetic nervous system.” (Dorlands Medical Dictionary, 2013) Nicotine is also a nicotinic agonist. “A nicotinic agonist is a drug that mimics the action of acetylcholine at nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (NCR’s)” (Henningfield, 2006). Nicotine is administered orally. The body reacts as soon as Nicotine enters the body. Nicotine affects two different areas of the body: the adrenal medulla and the central nervous system. The adrenal medulla is part of the adrenal gland found in the kidney. It has an impact on the body’s energy, heart rate and metabolism as it secretes hormones, such as adrenaline and dopamine. The kidney absorbs the Nicotine through the bloodstream which then enters the adrenal medulla. The Nicotine then binds with the nicotinic receptors which causes adrenaline to be released into the body; this causes common symptoms of smoking such as an increase in heart rate and blood pressure. Dopamine is a hormone which is influenced by Nicotine in the body. Dopamine is related to our addiction,