Most people are fully aware that smoking can lead to lung cancer, but how smoking affects the body is actually much more than that.

1. How Smoking Affects the Body
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Most people are fully aware that smoking can lead to lung cancer,
but how smoking affects the body is actually much more than
that.
Cancer of the lungs is only one of the risks run by smokers.
Smoking is a high risk factor for several kinds of cancer including
mouth, larynx, pharynx, esophagus, kidney, pancreas, bladder,
cervix and stomach as well as some types of leukemia.
As well as cancer, smoking can cause other lung diseases as in
pneumonia, emphysema and chronic bronchitis. These diseases
which come under the term of chronic obstructive pulmonary
disease or COPD can cause chronic illness and disabilities and can
also be fatal. Long-term smokers carry the highest risk of COPDs
Vascular disease: narrowing or clogging of blood vessels can lead
to all kinds of problems. Peripheral vascular disease affects blood
vessels feeding the leg and arm muscles.
Problems in the blood vessels feeding the heart can lead to heart
disease and heart attacks, and blocked vessels to the brain can
cause a stroke. Men who smoke can find blood vessel disease will
cause erectile dysfunction.
Eyesight can be affected by smoking: health risks in smoking
include increased risk of macular degeneration, sometimes
leading to blindness. Also premature aging and wrinkling of the
skin, halitosis or bad breath, tooth and gum disease, yellowing
and brittle fingernails, not to mention revolting smelling hair and
clothes.
How Smoking Affects The Body discoverthefacts.com/smoking

2. Expectant or nursing mothers have some unique ways of how
smoking affects the body, to themselves as well as the new life
they are carrying. Women (particularly over 35) who smoke and
also take oral contraceptives have a very high risk of heart
attack, stroke and thrombosis. Smoking carries a high risk of
miscarriage or babies born underweight; which are more likely to
have physical problems, learning difficulties or even risk of death.
Nicotine can be passed into breast milk as well as cervical fluids,
amniotic fluids and umbilical cord.
One of the main health risks in smoking is a shortening of life
expectancy: the CDC estimates an adult male will lose an
average of 13.2 years of life and females 14.5 years, due to
smoking. Add to that the risk of diseases during their lifetime
which can impair the quality of life long before that. Even without
contracting a disease, smoker’s activities are limited by
difficulties in breathing and moving around, both at work and
play.
The health benefits in quitting are more than just decreasing the
health risks in smoking:
Just 20 minutes after quitting your blood pressure will drop and
your heart rate decrease
2 hours afterwards the carbon monoxide level in the blood
returns to normal
Between two weeks and three months after quitting, blood
circulation will improve and lung function increase.
Anywhere between one and nine months after quitting you will
notice a marked decrease in coughing and shortness of breath.
Lungs will start to regain their normal cilia function (these are
hair-fine elements in the lungs that dispel mucus) and increase
their ability to handle mucus and reduce risk of infection. The
lungs will begin to be cleansed from the inside.
How Smoking Affects The Body discoverthefacts.com/smoking

3. After the first year of not smoking, you have reduced the risk of
ordinary heart disease by half, compared to a smoker.
Five years on, your risk of stroke is reduced dramatically, and
between 5-15 years the risk will be the same as that of a non-
smoker.
After 10 years the death rate from lung cancer is reduced by half,
compared to a continuing smoker.
Apart from the health risks in smoking, what about the money
you spend? Look at the price you spend a day on cigarettes and
multiply that by 365. Wow! How much do you spend in a year!
Multiply it by 10, and think what you could have done with all
that money instead of burning it over 10 years!
All this cost, along with how smoking affects the body must
surely give you reason to quit. Find yourself a quit smoking plan
and start it right away!
How Smoking Affects The Body discoverthefacts.com/smoking