A couple of years ago, I gave a talk before the officials and employees of Salcon Power Corporation (a government contractor in Southern Philippines) on the health hazards of smoking as a part of the company’s highly commendable campaign for a healthier lifestyle for its personnel. I would like to share with my readers the following startling information which I presented before this group. Hopefully, you and I can save even one life by educating our family, friends and neighbors on the deadly effects of smoking:
• There are 4000 chemicals (600 of them poisons, 69 cancer-causing) in every stick of cigarette, toxic chemicals like those found in paint stripper, toilet cleaner, rocket fuel, lighter fuel, chemicals in moth balls, the poison used in the gas chamber, and other toxins.
• Smoking causes almost 1/3 of all cancer deaths in the world
• Smokeless tobacco – 50 times worse than regular cigarettes
• Passive smoking – responsible for about 6,000 lung cancers among non-smokers and 35,000 deaths from secondhand smoke-related diseases per year
• More than half a million are killed each year in the USA alone by smoking-related illnesses; 10 times more than car accidents; 12 times more than AIDS
• And a lot more than all the military casualties in all wars in this century put together
• One person in the USA dies of a heart attack every minute (mostly smokers).
• One dies of other smoking-related illness every 3 minutes!
• Smoking has orphaned billions of children around the globe, greater than all the wars combined has caused
• Smokers die 13-14 years earlier than non-smokers
• Risk of dying from lung cancer among smokers compared to non-smokers: 22 times greater in men and 12 times greater among women
• Since 1950, lung cancer deaths among women have increased 600%
• Smokers have three times risk of dying from heart attack
• Tobacco use is the leading cause of preventable deaths
Death rates dropped by 12 percent for cancers of the lung, pancreas, bladder and oro-pharynx, when smoking dropped from 22.8 percent to 18.4 percent. (In 2000, it was down to 17.1 percent)
Consumption dropped from 127 packs per day to 69 packs, a 45 percent decline. National average dropped by 25 percent.
The wonders of quitting are truly remarkable and they provide smokers who want to kick the habit great hopes for their future, as illustrated hereunder:
• Twenty minutes after quitting:
• Blood pressure drops to normal
• Pulse rate drops to normal
• Heart rate drops to normal
• Circulation has already improved
• Body temperature of hands and feet increase to normal
In 24 to 48 hours:
• Chances of heart attack begin to decrease
• Nerve endings in nose and mouth begin to regrow
• Ability to smell and taste are enhanced
• Mucus begins to clear from the lungs
One year after quitting: Excess risk of coronary heart disease is half that of a smoker’s
Five years after: Lung cancer death rate decreases by half
After ten years:
• Lung cancer death rate is now equivalent to that of a non-smoker
• Pre-cancerous cells are replaced by healthy cells
• Risk of other cancers (mouth, throat, bladder, etc) decreases
At Fifteen years: Those who kicked the habit are now at NO more at risk of heart disease than if you had never smoked!
All medical evidences available today make one thing absolutely clear: Tobacco is a poison. It maims and kills. Smoking is slow suicide that could end in a miserable death for the smoker and devastation for his/her family. Isn’t it time to quit taking and polluting our environment with this poison?
This and other health articles are compiled in a book listed in the US Library of Congress which you could view at www.phillipschua.com
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Philip S. Chua, MD, FACS, FPCS, Cardiac Surgeon Emeritus in Northwest Indiana and chairman of cardiac surgery from 1997 to 2010 at Cebu Doctors University Hospital, where he holds the title of Physician Emeritus in Surgery, is based in Las Vegas, Nevada. He is a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons, the Philippine College of Surgeons, and the Denton A. Cooley Cardiovascular Surgical Society. He is the chairman of the Filipino United Network – USA, a 501(c)(3) humanitarian foundation in the United States. Email: [email protected]
