Smoking Kills

Smoking kills more Americans than AIDS, drug abuse, car accidents and crime.

Did you know that 390,000 Americans die each year from cigarette smoking? Smoking tobacco causes 1 out of 6 deaths. Smoking can also cause some very serious diseases. Some people become addicted to smoking.

Lung cancer has caused more deaths in women than breast cancer. If a pregnant woman smokes, she has a greater chance of medical problems with her baby.

Cigarette smoking is the number one cause of cancer death in men. Male smokers over the age of 35 are more likely to die from smoking-related diseases like lung cancer.

Many children start smoking before they reach high school. They run the risk of smoking most of their lives. They could die of smoking-related diseases.

Junkie, burn-out, addict, drug abuser, drunk, alcoholic, smoke-a-holic

Some people would argue that smoke-a-holic is just a cute euphemism which should not be compared to what they consider degrading syndromes. Contrary to this belief, nicotine addiction can be equally as strong and deadly as any of these other conditions. In fact, if you total the number of people who die yearly of all these other conditions combined, they would not add up to the number of premature deaths attributed to cigarette smoking.

Until recent times, the idea of nicotine being a physiologically addictive substance was controversial in the world-wide medical community. For a drug to be considered addictive, it must meet certain criteria. First, it must be capable of inducing physical withdrawal upon cessation. Nicotine abstinence syndrome is a well documented, established fact.

Second, tolerance to the drug usually develops. Increasingly larger doses become necessary to achieve the same desired effects. Smokers experience this phenomenon as their cigarette consumption gradually increases from what probably was sporadic occasional use to a required daily consumption of one or more packs.

The third criterion is that an addictive substance becomes a totally consuming necessity to its user, usually resulting in what is considered by a society as anti-social behavior. Many have argued that cigarette smoking fails to fulfill this requirement. True, most smokers do not resort to deviant behaviors to maintain their dependency, but this is because most smokers do manage to easily obtain the full complement of cigarettes they need to satisfy the addiction. When smokers are deprived of easy accessibility to cigarettes, the situation is totally different.

During World War II, in concentration camps in Germany, prisoners were not given enough food to fulfill minimum caloric nutritional requirements. They were literally starving to death. A common practice among smoking prisoners was to trade away their scarce supplies of life sustaining food for cigarettes. Even today, in underdeveloped countries, such as Bangladesh, parents with starving children barter away essential food for cigarettes. This is not normal behavior.

During the "stop smoking clinics" I conduct, numerous participants admit to going through ashtrays, garbage cans and, if necessary, gutters looking for butts which may still have a salvageable value of a few puffs when their own supplies are depleted due to carelessness or unforeseen circumstances. To them, it is sick to think that they ever performed such a grotesque act, but many realize that if they were currently smoking and again caught in a similar predicament, they would be fully capable of repeating the repulsive incident.

Nicotine is a drug. It is addictive. And if you let it, it can be a killer. Consider this when you get the urge for a cigarette. One puff can and most often will reinforce the addiction. Don't take that chance. Remember - NEVER TAKE ANOTHER PUFF!

"He Wanted You To Know"

Bryan Curtis started smoking at 13, never thinking that 20 years later it would kill him and leave a wife and children alone. In his last weeks, he set out with a message for young people.

ST. PETERSBURG -- Cigarette smoke hangs in the air in the room where Bryan Lee Curtis lies dying of lung cancer.

His head, bald from chemotherapy, lolls on a pillow. The bones of his cheeks and shoulders protrude under taut skin. His eyes are open, but he can no longer respond to his mother or his wife, Bobbie, who married him in a makeshift ceremony in this room three weeks ago after doctors said there was no hope.

In Bryan's emaciated hands, Bobbie has propped a photograph taken just two months ago. It shows a muscular and seemingly healthy Bryan holding his 2-year-old son, Bryan Jr. In the picture, he is 33. He turned 34 on May 10.

A pack of cigarettes and a lighter sit on a table near Bryan's bed in his mother's living room. Even though tobacco caused the cancer now eating through his lungs and liver, Bryan smoked until a week ago, when it became impossible.

Across the room, a 20-year-old nephew crushes out a cigarette in a large glass ashtray where the butt joins a dozen others. Bobbie Curtis says she'll try to stop after the funeral, but right now, it's just too difficult. Same for Bryan's mother, Louise Curtis.

"I just can't do it now," she says, although she hopes maybe she can after the funeral.

Bryan knew how hard it is to quit. But when he learned he would die because of his habit, he thought maybe he could persuade at least a few kids not to pick up that first cigarette. Maybe if they could see his sunken cheeks, how hard it was becoming to breathe, his shriveled body, it might scare them enough.

So a man whose life was otherwise unremarkable set out in the last few weeks of his life with a mission.

*****

Bryan started when he was just 13, building up to more than two packs a day. He talked about quitting from time to time, but never seriously tried.

Plenty of time for that, he figured. Older people got cancer. Not people in their 30s, not people who worked in construction, as a roofer, as a mechanic.

He had no health insurance. But he was more worried about his mother, 57, who had smoked since she was 25.

"He would say, "Mom, don't worry about me. Worry about yourself. I'm healthy,' " Louise Curtis remembers. "You think this would happen later, when you're 60 or 70 years old, not when you're his age."

He knew, only a few days after he went to the hospital on April 2 with severe abdominal pain, how wrong he had been. He had oat cell lung cancer that had spread to his liver. He probably had not had it long. Also called small cell lung cancer, it's an aggressive killer that usually claims the lives of its victims within a few months.

While it seems unusual to the Curtis family, Dr. Jeffrey Paonessa, Bryan's oncologist, said he is seeing more lung cancer in young adults.

"We've seen lung cancer earlier and earlier because people are starting to smoke earlier and earlier," Paonessa said. Chemotherapy sometimes slows the process, but had little effect in Bryan's case, he said.

Bryan also knew, a few days after the diagnosis, that he wanted somehow to try to save at least one kid from the same fate. He sat down and talked with Bryan Jr. and his 9-year-old daughter, Amber, who already had been caught once with a cigarette. But he wanted to do more. Somehow, he had to get his story out.

When he still had some strength to leave the house, kids would stare.

"They'd come up and look at him because he looked so strange," Louise Curtis said. "He'd look at them and say, "This is what happens to you when you smoke.'

"The kids would say, "Oh, man. I can't believe it,' " Louise Curtis said.

In the last few weeks, Bryan's mother has been the agent for his mission to accomplish some good with the tragedy. She has called newspapers and radio and television stations, seeking someone willing to tell her son's story, willing to help give him the one thing he wanted before he died. Bryan never got to tell his story to the public. He spoke for the last time an hour before a visit from a Times reporter and photographer.

"I'm too skinny. I can't fight anymore," he whispered to his mother at 9 a.m. June 3. He died that day at 11:56 a.m., just nine weeks after the diagnosis.

Bryan Lee Curtis Sr. was buried at Memorial Park Cemetery in St. Petersburg on June 8, a rare cloudy day that threatened rain.

At the funeral service at nearby Blount, Curry and Roel Funeral Home, Bryan's casket was open and 50 friends and relatives could see the devastating effects of the cancer.

Addiction is more powerful.

As the graveside ritual ended, a handful of relatives backed away from the gathering, pulled out packs of cigarettes and lit up.

Smoking Kills

Smoking kills. There's no two ways about it. The question is, what are you, as parents, doing to prevent your children from smoking. Today, on No Tobacco Day, let's take a look at the dangers of indulging in this habit.

Children are constantly subjected to peer pressure - from the time they begin school, till the time they leave college or maybe beyond, friends and acquaintances will yeild significant influence over their decisions - whch may sometimes cause them to take the wrong steps. The role of parenting is crucial as far as peer pressure is concerned, because if a parent instills self-esteem and confidence in a child, he would be able to say NO to his peers without any fear of ridicule. And today, on No Tobacco Day 2002, let's teach our children the harmful effects of tobacco, and to say NO to a friend offering a cigarette.

However, practice what you preach. Do you smoke? Perhaps it's time you quit. You say you only smoke 3-5 cigarettes a day… so that's an acceptable number. When you consider that there are those who smoke two packs a day, 5 cigarettes are fine - your body can handle it, right? Wrong. Dead wrong.

With every cigarette you smoke, you're causing damage to your health. So if you smoke a few cigarettes a day, you'll be causing less damage to your lungs than someone who smokes a pack or two a day, but you WILL be causing damage. And by watching you smoke, you children will also get the idea that it's okay to smoke. After all, daddy smokes and if daddy can do it, so can I. Some role model you turned out to be, huh? And if you stick to those 4 a day and feel your health is fine - when your kids start smoking they might not be so particular, and those 4 cigarettes a day could turn into 40. Scary, isn't it? If you're still having second thoughts about quitting, it always helps to make an informed decision rather than an ignorant one. So if you choose to smoke, make your choice an informed one. Here's the lowdown of the fag.

Every cigarette you smoke reduces your lifespan by 11 minutes. The earlier calculation estimated 5 minutes, but with the life-span of non-smokers increasing, this figure has grown to 11 minutes.

A non-cigarette smoker will live a healthier life, subject to fewer diseases.

Take a look at just some of the 4000 chemicals that are in a cigarette.

• Formaldehyde - used to preserve dead bodies
• Lead
• Mercury
• Benzene - used in dyes
• Cadmium - used to make batteries
• Nicotine - the chemical that gives you a 'hit' and makes cigarettes addictive
• Tar - transports other chemicals to your bloodstream, gets deposited in your lungs and stains your teeth.
• Acetone - used in nailpolish remover
• Carbon Monoxide - hardens the arteries and causes heart problems

By smoking, not only are you harming yourself, but you are harming others around you by producing secondhand smoke, which will be inhaled by those around you.

However, if you have been smoking for many years and suddenly quit, don't expect yourself you bounce back into the pink of health. That's not going to happen. The nicotine would have already caused substantial and possibly irreversable damage to your body and your lungs, so have realistic expectations. But this doesn't mean that quitting won't have any benefits at all. It's never to late to quit and no matter when you quit, your body will thank you for it. You will notice:

• An improvement in your sense of smell
• An imporvement in your sense of taste
• Your breath will smell cleaner and fresher
• Blood circulation will pick up
• Risk of contracting cancer and heart disease will improve
  

Cigarette Smoking and Emotions

Nicotine is one of the fastest-acting drugs known to man. When a smoker inhales tobacco smoke, the nicotine is absorbed into the bloodstream and the effects are felt almost immediately.

Conversely, levels of nicotine drop quickly to about one-quarter within one hour after finishing a cigarette; hence most smokers will think they need a cigarette every hour on average.

There are people who has smoked 40 cigarettes a day for over 50 years and lived to be 80. Indeed, people in this category rarely had a day's illness in his life. He would never have entertained the idea of becoming a non-smoker. Do not be fooled into thinking that you'll get away with this too. Such people are the exemption.

Excuses, Excuses...

When you are a smoker it is very easy to find excuses for why you smoke and to believe that it is the answer to all your problems. When you are unable to concentrate, you are convinced that you will be able to concentrate when you light up a cigarette.

When someone irritates you, you are convinced that you will feel more relaxed when you light up a cigarette. When first you become a non-smoker, everything that goes wrong is blamed on the fact that you are not smoking.

Your partner urges you to buy some cigarettes because you are irritable and no longer a pleasure to be with. Do any of these scenarios sound familiar?

The fact is, smoking never made anyone perfect. Even smokers get irritable, have trouble concentrating and are not always a pleasure to be with. You can't pin these or any other problems on the fact that you are a non-smoker.

You have not changed, your personal situations have probably not changed, you will still get cross, but it is very easy to blame these emotions on being a non-smoker because we are constantly bombarded with information about how smoking relaxes you and releases stress. We tell ourselves that it does seem to be a consensus of opinion so it must be right!

Smokers are always on a roller-coaster with their emotions, agitated when they cannot get a cigarette if they want one and at the same time agitated when they smoke. This is due, to a large extent, by the very nature of the habit and the frustration caused by being controlled by an outside force, something that feels beyond your control.

Cigarette Smoking Statistics

Yet most smokers continue to find excuses to put off the day they'll become non-smokers. Smokers also act under the illusion that the innumerable statistics written about the dangers of smoking are overstated. But if you truly do your research, you will find alarming statistics that should frighten anyone who smokes.

You might even think that these smoking statistics alone are enough to frighten anyone into either becoming a non-smoker or never to start smoking in the first place. Well, smokers do not want to know about the statistics until they decide to become non smokers.

If they really believed that cigarettes were going to kill them, give them cancer or be instrumental in the amputation of a leg, would they smoke another cigarette?

Don't Let Your Guard down Just because you’ve Stopped Smoking for a While

After you have successfully stopped smoking for a while, you may feel quitting has been easier than you expected. Not that it's been easy altogether, but it still has not been as hard as you feared. You may now go for several hours, maybe most of the day or evening, without even thinking about a cigarette.

Here's the downside of feeling too confident: You're at a party. You're feeling good. Maybe you've had a drink or two. Someone offers you a cigarette. You think, "I'm not having any trouble. I'll have a couple tonight and go back to non-smoking tomorrow. Maybe stay with
a routine of only smoking at parties."

One of the first times I quit, I decided I'd only smoke on weekends. Soon, I was trying to convince myself that the weekend begins on Wednesday evening and ends the following Wednesday morning!

Vigilance - that's the word for the next few months. You don't have to spend every waking moment managing your quitting, but you do have to stay on your toes, vigilant, alert to the temptations or situations that can mess up your plan. Give your nonsmoking the vigilance you would for anything else that is very important.

Source: http://www.stop-smoking-tips.com/articles/cigarette-smoking-emotions.html

hose Who Smoke Cigarettes the Most are Often Mentally ill

The rate of tobacco smoking is much higher among those with mental illness than among the general population, and those who are mentally ill also smoke more cigarettes and have more trouble quitting, according to a Washington Post editorial by Steven A. Schroeder, director of the Smoking Cessation Leadership Center.

In the United States, between 50 and 80 percent of all people with mental illness are smokers, whereas only 20 percent of the general population smokes. Those with mental illness also smoke more cigarettes per day than other smokers, and are more likely to smoke cigarettes all the way down to the filters. The combination of these two factors means that 44 percent of all cigarettes sold in the United States are sold to people who are mentally ill.

Those who are mentally ill also have more trouble quitting, succeeding at less than half the rate of the general population.

The high rate of tobacco use among the mentally ill is thought to contribute substantially to the lowered life expectancy among that population; people with mental illnesses die an average of 25 years sooner than the general population.

Among the general population, smokers die an average of 10 to 15 years earlier than non-smokers. Approximately 440,000 people die of smoking-induced causes in the United States every year.

According to Schroeder, part of the reason for the prevalence of smoking among the mentally ill is that mental health hospitals have a long tradition of using cigarettes as a way to control patients, proffering smoking breaks as rewards and withholding cigarettes as punishment. This trend is in the process of changing, however, and more than 50 percent of all mental health institutions in the United States are now entirely smoke-free.

In March 2003, 28 organizations came together to form the National Mental Health Partnership for Wellness and Smoking Cessation, of which the Smoking Cessation Leadership Center is a member.