Why Tobacco Is The Leading Cause Of Preventable Death

It is the single most preventable cause of death and disease. It causes more deaths than drugs, car accidents, fire, auto accidents, AIDS, suicide and homicide combined. Can you guess what it is? It is smoking and it is killing many people. Why would you want to smoke if it causes so many deaths? People have all kinds of excuses for that question. Some of which include: “I’m stressed out”, and “I just want to fit in”. Would you want to die because you wanted to be cool or you felt stressed? There are many reasons why you should not smoke. It is causing pain and suffering not only to the smokers, but also to people who do not smoke. Addiction to smoking is one of the most serious and expensive health problems in the U.S. today I am going to inform you about smoking and why you should not smoke. You need to know this information because it is bad for you and you need to inform other people why not to smoke as well. My three main points on why smoking is bad are, because it’s bad for health, costs a lot, and affects others who do not even smoke.

Over the last few decades, tobacco and nicotine prevention efforts have risen to an all time high. Prevention efforts focus on education to the public of the negative effects on one’s health when using tobacco and nicotine products, as well as with pleas to healthcare policymakers to increase restrictions on product manufacturing and sales. One policy effort growing in popularity in the United States is called Tobacco 21, which proposes to raise the legal age of purchase for consumers of tobacco and nicotine products to 21 years of age (Farber, Pakhale, & Neptune, 2016). Farber, Pakhale, and Neptune (2016) state that 90% of tobacco and nicotine users begin smoking before the age of 18, with 99% of users starting before the age of 26. Lower smoking cessation rates are associated with earlier ages of initiation and the tobacco industry is known to target youth in advertisement of these products lending to the early age of initiation. The tobacco industry themselves admit that increasing the age allowed for purchase to exclude youth would substantially effect their sales. Tobacco 21 laws also deter adolescents from gaining tobacco or nicotine products from friends 18 to 21 years of age, which is the most likely age group to supply younger teens. With this knowledge, placing tighter restrictions on consumers younger than 21 years of age, using the Tobacco 21 policy, may deter tobacco and nicotine initiation in hopes to prevent individual use at all in the future (Farber

In 2005, Needham, Massachusetts, has passed a regulation that banned the tobacco sale to anyone under 21. This regulation has achieved great success. The number of smoking students in high school has decreased by 47%. Smoking rate has decreased rapidly after 30 days and the 60% of frequent smoking

If 90% of United States smokers could have another chance to redo it, they reported that they would not even have their first puff that initiated their tobacco addiction (Winickoff, Gottlieb, and Mello 2014). The Tobacco 21 bill is a fairly new legislation and already it has shown a decline in underage smokers as a result of its implementation. The results of the survey presented that the public opinion was largely accepting and supportive of the bill. The main argument against the bill is the harm that will come to retailers of tobacco products. Correspondingly, the argument is proven inaccurate and in favor of the bill. The past has shown the improved outcome of the country from the raise in the minimum alcohol age, and researchers regard

middle (grades 6-8) and high school (grades 9-12) students, CDC and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) analyzed data from the 2011-2014 National Youth Tobacco Surveys (NYTS). In 2014, e-cigarettes were the most commonly used tobacco product among middle (3.9%) and high (13.4%) school students. Between 2011 and 2014, statistically significant increases were observed among these students for current use of both e-cigarettes and hookahs (p<0.05), while decreases were observed for current use of more traditional products, such as cigarettes and cigars, resulting in no change in overall tobacco use. Consequently, 4.6 million middle and high school students continue to be exposed to harmful tobacco product constituents, including nicotine.” (Arrazola

Smoking is the single highest cause of preventable death in America and puts users at significantly greater risk for disease compared to the rest of the population. Tobacco use costs the U.S. more than 289 billion dollars annually in medical expenses and lost productivity (Surgeon General, 2014). The problems associated with smoking are due in part to its addictiveness. Nicotine is the addictive substance found in tobacco and its chemical dependence is as strong as heroin, cocaine, or alcohol (CDC, 2014). Getting all smokers to quit entirely is not realistic due to nicotine’s addictive characteristics.

Many drugs are used, misused, and abused in American society today. Some of these carry stigma in the general population, forcing users into an underground drug subculture. Others are accepted and almost promoted under certain circumstances. Tobacco is one of those drugs. Tobacco will be discussed in the context of cigarette smoking. This is not to undermine the existence or danger of other forms of tobacco, but instead to have an exhaustive discussion of cigarette smoking and its societal impact. Cigarettes are a means of inhaling tobacco, where it enters the lungs and is absorbed through the blood vessels, traveling to the heart, from which it is finally pumped to the brain (Hogan, Gabrielsen, Luna, and Grothaus 2003:76). Cigarettes are detrimental to society because they not only affect the user who chooses to smoke; they impact people around them through second-hand and residual smoke. The damage done by cigarettes is not impossible to address. Successful prevention measures are already in place, but this paper intends to suggest other more direct measures, especially related to statutory regulations.

Smoking is one of the leading preventable causes of death in the United States. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Cigarette smoking causes more than 480,000 deaths each year in the United States, which are nearly one in five deaths. The problem about smoking is that not only the smokers are affected by the smoke, but non-smokers and children who are exposed to the secondhand smoke; secondhand smoke, also known as environmental tobacco smoke, is smoke from burning tobacco products that can be inhaled from the exhaled smoke by the smoker, mainstream smoke, or sidestream smoke, which is the smoke that comes from a lighted cigar, cigarette, or pipe and is more toxic and dangerous than the smoke that comes from the

One of America’s leading cause of death is smoking. Smoking has been around for years and doesn’t look like it’s going away anytime soon. The effects of smoking harms about every organ in the body, for example: the heart, blood vessels, lungs, eyes, mouth, reproductive organs, bones, bladder, and digestive organs. Smokers use that “it’s my body, I do what I want,” The problem with that is smoking doesn’t just affect the person doing it. It harms other people in the ways; it’s called 2nd hand smoking. People who receive second hand smoking are possible to get a disease as a person who smokes regularly. It might not be as serve but will still be not good. Most people are trying to quit but aren’t trying hard enough without motivation. Smoking is one of the most common causes of death however quitting now will decrease your chances of disease and death.

In fact, the tobacco industry has suffered ever since antismoking advertising has begun (Johnston, p. 107). According to statistics, 4 in every 10 Americans who are in 12th grade have tried cigarettes, and 1 in 10 consider themselves current smokers. As well as, 1 in 5, 8th graders have tried cigarettes, and 1 in 16 consider themselves current smokers (Johnston, p. 107). Now that society is aware of the harms of tobacco, it is important to decrease such rates of smoking amongst youth. Not only are there commercials about the risks of cigarette smoking, but also there are commercials that promote living above the influence of all drugs, including alcohol and marijuana. Lastly, as research continues to improve, and new drugs arise it is important to keep youth educated on the risks of using such drugs. It is important to keep our youth safe from the dangers of

Cigarette smoking has been identified as the number one cause of preventable disease as well as, death worldwide. Today, smoking-related diseases are claiming over 4 00,000 American lives each year. Among people who smoke, 70 percent of them are teenager. Smoking harms almost every organ in the body, causing lung cancer, coronary heart disease, and chronic pulmonary diseases. As a result, researchers have found out that teenagers in Washington State start to purchase tobacco at an early age. The Washington State’s top lawyer was set to unveil legislation seeking to raise legal the smoking age from 18 to 21 (Morris). If the bill would be passed

An estimated 36.5 million or 15.1 % of adults aged 18 years old and older currently smoke cigarettes and more than 16,000,000 have smoking or live with diseases that are related to smoking. According to US department of health and human services, over the past five decades, there is a significant decline in cigarette smoking in the U.S. The progress has slowed in recent years and the prevalence of use of other tobacco products such as vapes, e-cigars and smokeless tobacco

Unfortunately, Scullion, Crumbie, Cumming, and Jebb (2013) warn there are always issues with age barriers--forbidden fruit can seem all the more attractive, especially to young people who can become inventive in their ability to access what they should not. Scullion et. al indicated research appears to show that increasing the minimum age for buying tobacco reduces the prevalence of smoking among young people. Sussman and Ping (2009) noted daily cigarette smoking prevalence in the United States increases from approximately four percent among 12-year-olds, 8 percent among 16-year-olds, 12 percent among 18-year-olds, 15 percent among 20-year-olds, and levels of among 26-year-olds at 22 percent. Otten, Van de Ven, Engels, and Van den Eijnden

Attention getter: According to Tobacco-Free Kids, “about 400,000 people die from their own smoking each year, and about 50,000 die from second-hand smoke annually. Smoking kills more people than AIDS, alcohol, car accidents, illegal drugs, murders and

Tobacco; one of the most profitable products in history, an addictive substance, and a deadly killer. Smoking tobacco used to be a thing that was endorsed in American society. Now, with the new medical advances and knowledge, society has seen the side effects of smoking and how fatal it actually is. Teenagers have been one of the largest age groups that have been affected by smoking. After analyzing all possible reasons as to why teenagers would smoke while knowing it can affect their health, three possible reasons stuck out the most. Teenagers smoke despite knowing the health problems that originate from smoking because of peer pressure, an “invincibility” mentality, and seeing a role model or family member smoke.