| Nearlty 30% of the UK adult population smokes. If you smoke, giving up is
probably the greatest single step you can take to improve your health. Seven
out of ten smokers say that they want to stop, but most believe they can't. They're
wrong. In the last 15 years, 11 million people in the UK have successfully kicked
the habit. |
 |
If you smoke the 4000 chemicals
you inhale
will cause an early painful death, your skin will wrinkle
and your breath will stink. It's your choice....
Smokers are at greater risk from illness and early death than non-smokers.
Even breathing the smoke from other people's cigarettes, or passive smoking,
can affect your health. Serious and often fatal diseases are caused by smoking,
these include:
- lung cancer
- other cancers such as mouth, throat, larynx, oesophagus, bladder, kidney,
pancreas and stomach
- coronary heart disease
- chronic bronchitis and emphysema
Why quit?
Giving up smoking increases your chances of living a longer and healthier
life. When you are no longer exposed every day to nicotine, carbon monoxide,
tar and other poisons, your body begins to repair the damage. As body systems
start to return to normal, you experience loads of benefits, many within a few
weeks:
- improved breathing
- better able to cope with sudden exertion
- loss of smoker's cough
- sense of smell and taste improves
- hair, skin and breath no longer smell of tobacco smoke
- lack of worry over damage smoking is doing to your health
- less risk of smoking-related diseases
It's not easy but we can help
Smokers who quit before the age of 45 have a life expectancy close to that
of people who have never smoked. For people above this age, the gap widens, but
smokers who quit over the age of 45 still enjoy considerable health benefits
over people who continue to smoke. The ASH website is hard hitting and straight to the point, it does
however give some excellent advice on how to quit.
Back to the Healthy Living page [HERE] |
