Health and Smoking

You probably already know that smoking is seriously bad for your health. The decision not to smoke is the single biggest contribution you can make to your own health and long life. If you – or anyone near you needs convincing, read on.

Cigarette smoke hits the immune system hard. In the airways, it harms the immune cells that protect us against inhaled pollutants and viruses that cause colds, coughs, sore throats and bronchitis.

Smokers are more prone to these illnesses, but they also cause damage to the health of the immune cells in other parts of the body as well.

This is why smoking is associated with an increased risk of cancer, not just of the lungs, but also the mouth, larynx, oesophagus, bladder, pancreas and cervix. Smoking is linked to increased levels of rheumatoid factor and other auto-antibodies in the blood, and increases the risk and severity of arthritis.

Arthritis is more common in women, and there is increased evidence that women are more susceptible to tobacco related diseases. Smoking also advances the menopause by two to three years, erodes the bones, and increases the risk of osteoporosis and bone fractures, a major cause of disability and pain in later life.

In younger women who smoke during pregnancy, cigarettes increase the risk of miscarriage by over 25 per cent. Recent evidence also indicates that women smokers may be up to twice as likely to get lung cancer as men, even if they smoke less. However men can fare worse in other ways.

What other dangers are there?

A male smoker at the age of 35 can expect to die seven years before a non-smoking male, as heart disease is more prevalent in middle aged and elderly men. Male smokers are also prone to become impotent, due to the degenerative changes in the blood vessels supplying the penis.

You may think that none of this applies to you, because you don’t smoke that many cigarettes and the ones you do smoke are low tar. But one in five smokers will die of their addiction, and the majority of those who die are not the heavy smokers, who are fewer in number to start with, but the light to moderate smokers.

If this isn’t enough to persuade you stub out that last cigarette, consider the following summary.

Cigarettes cause:

• 4 out of 5 cases of lung cancer
• 3 out of 4 cases of bronchitis and emphysema
• 1 in 5 heart attack deaths
• Low immune system – leading to illness and cancer
• Worsening arthritis
• Earlier menopause
• More osteoporosis
• Male impotence
• Greater risk of miscarriage
• A shortened lifespan – smokers on average lose one day of life for every week they smoke.
• One death in every 6

What happens when we smoke a cigarette?

Each puff of smoke you inhale from a cigarette (or joint) contains over 100,000,000,000,000 free radicals. This huge intake uses up the body’s natural anti-oxidant defences, which is why smokers have lower levels of Vitamins C, E glutathione, selenium, and other anti-oxidant nutrients.

Vitamin C is one of the first anti-oxidants to be used up; even passive smoking reduces your vitamin C levels. Once you stop smoking, this has the opposite effect. Within days, the levels of vitamin C and other anti-oxidants in your blood rise towards normal.

Reduced levels of anti-oxidants damage lung tissue, leading to bronchitis and emphysema. They also damage vessel walls and cause cholesterol oxidisation, and increased stickiness in the blood platelets. Nicotine narrows the blood vessels and raises blood pressure – so making it a perfect recipe for heart attacks.

What is a safer way to smoke?

The human body is very resourceful and adaptive and it will boost the body’s response to the insult of smoking – but not by enough. Much of the damage is caused by free radicals, so could taking anti-oxidants help to make tobacco safer?

Smokers who cannot cure their addiction but wish to protect their health as far as possible should eat more fruit and vegetables. This is always a good thing for health, especially in smokers. Smokers on the whole tend to eat less fruit and vegetables than non smokers. As a result this makes the damage to their bodies much worse.

Free radicals cause damage to the DNA of cells, leading to cancer. Anti-oxidant depletion in smokers contributes to reduced sperm counts and low fertility. Vitamin C supplements, at over 1000 mg a day can improve this whilst Vitamin E can reduce platelet stickiness, especially in female smokers. Vitamins C and E can also protect against heart disease

Finally, eating more oily fish (mackerel, sardines, trout, salmon, etc) would seem to be a good thing. This has been shown to improve the health of the lungs, even in smokers, and reduce the risk of bronchitis and emphysema.

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