There's no way around it. Smoking is bad for your health. Smoking harms nearly every organ of the body. Cigarette smoking causes 87 percent of lung cancer deaths. It is also responsible for many other cancers and health problems. These include lung disease, heart and blood vessel disease, stroke and cataracts. Women who smoke have a greater chance of certain pregnancy problems or having a baby die from sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). Your smoke is also bad for other people - they breathe in your smoke secondhand and can get many of the same problems as smokers do.
Quitting smoking can reduce your risk of these problems. The earlier you quit, the greater the health benefit.
National Cancer Institute
Key Points
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Tobacco use, particularly cigarette smoking, is the single most preventable cause of death in the United States. Cigarette smoking alone is directly responsible for approximately 30 percent of all cancer deaths annually in the United States (1). Cigarette smoking also causes chronic lung disease (emphysema and chronic bronchitis), cardiovascular disease, stroke, and cataracts. Smoking during pregnancy can cause stillbirth, low birthweight, Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS), and other serious pregnancy complications (2). Quitting smoking greatly reduces a person’s risk of developing the diseases mentioned, and can limit adverse health effects on the developing child.
- What are the effects of cigarette smoking on cancer rates?
- Are there any health risks for nonsmokers?
- What harmful chemicals are found in cigarette smoke?
- How does exposure to tobacco smoke affect the cigarette smoker?
- How would quitting smoking affect the risk of developing cancer and other diseases?
- What additional resources are available?
Cigarette smoking causes 87 percent of
lung cancer deaths (1). Lung cancer is the
leading cause of cancer death in both men
and women (3). Smoking is also responsible
for most cancers of the larynx, oral cavity
and pharynx, esophagus, and bladder. In
addition, it is a cause of
kidney,
pancreatic,
cervical, and
stomach cancers (2, 4), as well as
acute myeloid leukemia (2).
The health risks caused by cigarette
smoking are not limited to smokers. Exposure
to secondhand smoke, or
environmental tobacco smoke (ETS),
significantly increases the risk of lung
cancer and heart disease in nonsmokers, as
well as several respiratory illnesses in
young children (5). (Secondhand smoke is a
combination of the smoke that is released
from the end of a burning cigarette and the
smoke exhaled from the lungs of smokers.)
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA), the National Institute of
Environmental Health Science’s National
Toxicology Program, and the World Health
Organization’s International Agency for
Research on Cancer (IARC) have all
classified secondhand smoke as a known human
carcinogen—a category reserved for
agents for which there is sufficient
scientific evidence that they cause cancer
(5, 6, 7). The U.S. EPA has estimated that
exposure to secondhand smoke causes about
3,000 lung cancer deaths among nonsmokers
and is responsible for up to 300,000 cases
of lower
respiratory tract
infections in children up to 18 months
of age in the United States each year (5).
For additional information on ETS, see the
NCI fact sheet Environmental Tobacco
Smoke, which can be found at
http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/Tobacco/ETS
on the Internet.
Cigarette smoke contains about 4,000
chemical agents, including over 60
carcinogens (8). In addition, many of these
substances, such as carbon monoxide, tar,
arsenic, and lead, are poisonous and
toxic to the human body. Nicotine is a
drug that is naturally present in the
tobacco plant and is primarily responsible
for a person’s
addiction to tobacco products, including
cigarettes. During smoking, nicotine is
absorbed quickly into the bloodstream and
travels to the brain in a matter of seconds.
Nicotine causes addiction to cigarettes and
other tobacco products that is similar to
the addiction produced by using heroin and
cocaine (9).
Smoking harms nearly every major
organ of the body (2). The risk of
developing smoking-related diseases, such as
lung and other cancers, heart disease,
stroke, and respiratory illnesses, increases
with total lifetime exposure to cigarette
smoke (7). This includes the number of
cigarettes a person smokes each day, the
intensity of smoking (i.e., the size and
frequency of puffs), the age at which
smoking began, the number of years a person
has smoked, and a smoker’s secondhand smoke
exposure.
Smoking cessation has major and immediate
health benefits for men and women of all
ages. Quitting smoking decreases the risk of
lung and other cancers, heart attack,
stroke, and chronic lung disease. The
earlier a person quits, the greater the
health benefit. For example, research has
shown that people who quit before age 50
reduce their risk of dying in the next 15
years by half compared with those who
continue to smoke (3). Smoking low-yield
cigarettes, as compared to cigarettes with
higher tar and nicotine, provides no clear
benefit to health (2). For additional
information on quitting smoking, see the NCI
fact sheet Questions and Answers About
Smoking Cessation, which can be found
at
http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/Tobacco/cessation
on the Internet.
For additional information about cancer
or tobacco use, call 1–800–4–CANCER or visit
the NCI’s Web site about tobacco at
http://www.cancer.gov/cancerinfo/tobacco
on the Internet.
For help with quitting smoking, call NCI’s
smoking cessation quitline at 1–877–44U–QUIT
or visit NCI’s smoking cessation Web site at
http://www.smokefree.gov on the
Internet.
Information about the health risks of
smoking is also available from Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention’s Office on
Smoking and Health (OSH) at 1–800–CDC–1311
(1–800–232–1311) or via their Web site at
http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco on the
Internet.
Selected References
- Ries LAG, Eisner MP, Kosary CL, et al. (eds).
SEER Cancer Statistics Review, 1975–2001,
National Cancer Institute. Bethesda, MD,
2004 (http://seer.cancer.gov/csr/1975_2001).
- U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services. The Health Consequences of
Smoking: A Report of the Surgeon General.
Rockville, MD: U.S. Department of Health and
Human Services, Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention, National Center for Chronic
Disease Prevention and Health Promotion,
Office on Smoking and Health, 2004.
- American Cancer Society. Cancer
Facts and Figures 2004. Atlanta, GA:
American Cancer Society, 2004.
- U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services. Targeting Tobacco Use: The
Nation’s Leading Cause of Death.
Atlanta, GA: U.S. Department of Health and
Human Services, Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention, 2003.
- U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
Respiratory Health Effects of Passive
Smoking: Lung Cancer and Other Disorders.
Washington, DC: U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency, 1992.
- U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services. Report on Carcinogens: Tenth
Edition. Research Triangle Park, NC:
U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services, Public Health Service, National
Toxicology Program, 2002.
- International Agency for Research on
Cancer. Tobacco Smoke and Involuntary
Smoking. IARC Monographs on the
Evaluation of Carcinogenic Risks to Humans,
Vol. 83. Lyon, France, 2004.
- Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention. Tobacco Use in the United
States. Retrieved September 30, 2003,
from:
http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/overview/tobus_us.htm.
- U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services. Nicotine Addiction: A Report
of the Surgeon General. Rockville, MD:
U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services, Public Health Service, Centers for
Disease Control, Center for Health Promotion
and Education, Office on Smoking and Health,
1988.
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Related Resources
Publications (available at http://www.cancer.gov/publications)
- National Cancer Institute Fact Sheet 10.17, The Truth about “Light” Cigarettes: Questions and Answers
- National Cancer Institute Fact Sheet 10.18, Secondhand Smoke: Questions and Answers
- National Cancer Institute Fact Sheet
10.19,
Questions and Answers About Smoking
Cessation
National Cancer Institute (NCI) Resources
- Cancer Information Service (toll-free)
- Telephone: 1–800–4–CANCER (1–800–422–6237)
- TTY: 1–800–332–8615
- Online
- NCI’s Web site: http://www.cancer.gov
- LiveHelp, NCI’s live online assistance: https://cissecure.nci.nih.gov/livehelp/welcome.asp
