Health effects of smoking

Smoking harms nearly every organ in your body. It reduces general health and can cause fatal diseases.

Tobacco smoke is made up of thousands of chemicals and many of them are very harmful. More than 60 of them cause cancer.

Poisons in tobacco smoke include:

• Carbon monoxide
  Fatal in large doses, this poisonous gas is also found in car exhaust fumes. It takes the place of oxygen in your blood, starving your lungs, heart and other organs of the oxygen they need to function properly.
  
• Tar
  These sticky, brown particles coat your lungs like soot in a chimney, increasing the amount of mucus in your lungs and restricting your breathing. Tar contains chemicals that cause cancer.

Long-term smokers are at a higher risk of developing a range of potentially deadly diseases including:

• Heart disease, heart attack and stroke.
  
• Cancer of the lung, mouth, nose, throat, oesophagus, pancreas, kidney, liver, bladder, bowel, ovary, cervix, bone marrow and stomach.
  
• Lung diseases such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), which includes chronic bronchitis and emphysema.
  
• Poor blood circulation in feet and hands, which can lead to pain and, in severe cases, gangrene and amputation.
  

Half of all long-term smokers will die because of their smoking.

However, quitting smoking has immediate as well as long-term benefits, reducing risks for diseases caused by smoking and improving health in general.

You will feel the benefits of quitting straight away as your body repairs itself.

Typically:

• Within a month your immune system begins to show signs of recovery. |
  
• After two months your lungs will no longer be producing extra phlegm caused by smoking and blood flow to your hands and feet improve.
• After twelve months your blood pressure returns to normal.
  
• After ten years of stopping your risk of lung cancer is markedly lower than that of a continuing smoker and continues to decline (provided the disease is not already present).
  
• After fifteen years your risk of heart attack and stroke is close to that of a person who has never smoked.
  
• Stopping smoking reduces your risk of developing, or worsening of, lung disease including chronic bronchitis and emphysema.
• Over time, your sense of taste and smell will slowly improve.