Cigarettes consist of dried tobacco leaves, as well as ingredients added for flavor and other properties. More than 4,000 individual chemicals have been identified in tobacco and tobacco smoke. Among these are about 60 compounds that are carcinogens (substances that cause cancer).

Consider the shocking facts:

• Cigarettes kill more than 400,000 Americans every year. This figure represents more deaths than from AIDS, alcohol, car accidents, murders, suicides, drugs and fires combined. 

• Cigarette smoking and tobacco use is an acquired behavior, one that the individual chooses to do, smoking is the most preventable cause of premature death in our society.

• Smoking is a major cause of cancer, heart disease, bronchitis, emphysema and stroke.

• Smoking is directly responsible for 87 percent of lung cancer cases and causes most cases of emphysema and chronic bronchitis.

• Nicotine is an addictive drug, which when inhaled in cigarette smoke reaches the brain faster than drugs that enter the body intravenously. Smokers become not only physically addicted to nicotine; they also link smoking with many social activities, making smoking a difficult habit to break.

Short-term effects:

• Nicotine addiction

• Shortness of breath

• Sense of taste and smell are dulled

• Teeth, fingers, and lips become stained yellow

• Bad breath

• Coughing

Long-term effects:

• Lung Cancer, As well as Mouth, Throat, Bladder, and Stomach Cancers, etc

• Emphysema

• Heart Disease

• Stroke

• Upper Respiratory Disease

• Pancreatic Cancer

Sources:
American Cancer Society, 2000.
American Lung Association, 2000.

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