Diseases caused by smoking can be pretty scary. Smoking causes a multitude of diseases because of the ingredients in cigarettes and tobacco products. Some of these disease-causing substances are acrolein, nicotine, tar, polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons, nitrosamines, and other carcinogenic substances. Below are a few of those diseases.• Tar lungs and smoker’s cough. A smoker’s lungs become damaged as tar accumulates. And when the lungs can no longer function efficiently, it will resort to finding another way of removing tar. And that is what causes smoker’s cough.
• Heart disease, stroke, atherosclerosis, and peripheral vascular disease. Ingredients in tobacco products lead to the narrowing of blood vessels which increases the likelihood of a blockage. Smokers below 40 years old are 5 times more likely to have a heart attack. Passive smokers are at an increased risk of developing heart disease by 25 to 30%.
• Lung cancer. People who have smoked at some point in their lives have a 1 in 10 chance of developing lung cancer. If you continue smoking, your risk increases to 1 in 6. In the United States, 87% of lung cancer cases are related to smoking. Passive smokers are at an increased risk of developing lung cancer by 20 to 30%.
• Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and emphysema. Both diseases are the result of long term exposure to substances commonly found in smoke, like carbon monoxide and cyanide.
• Tuberculosis. Smokers who consume 20 cigarettes a day increase their risk of acquiring tuberculosis by 2 to 4 times.
• Infection. Smokers have increased risk of acquiring infections like common colds, bronchitis, and other pulmonary and respiratory infections.
• Infant diseases. Infants born to smoking mothers have low birth weight and are small for their gestational age. These conditions predispose the infants to other diseases like jaundice and breathing problems. Sudden infant death syndrome has also been linked to secondhand smoke. In the United States, 430 infants die annually because of sudden infant death syndrome.

In all these conditions, death is inevitable. Life expectancy of smokers is reduced by 2.5 to 10 years. And secondhand smoke is just as hazardous. All these diseases will go away if only smokers will quit. Do you smoke? Quit now and save us all from the hazards that a single puff of cigarette can do.

 Click here for more information on diseases caused by smoking.