In a previous post I mentioned that anyone who is serious about quitting smoking will only be successful if he or she has a personal reason—a STRONG personal reason—for wanting to quit.  Half-hearted attempts almost inevitably fail.

The purpose of these few blog posts on the dangers of cigarette smoking is to make smokers aware of just how truly dangerous tobacco smoke is, so that they will be armed with a strong, personal reason to quit smoking.

• Cancer

Obviously, the smoker is in much greater danger of getting lung cancer that a non-smoker.  However, did you ever stop to think that other parts of your smoke-polluted body are also just as vulnerable to becoming cancerous as your lungs are?  Consider your:

—Sinuses

—Nose

—Tongue

—Gums

—Lips

—Throat

—Larynx (voice box)

—Bladder

—Stomach

—Kidneys

—Pancreas

—Bone marrow

I challenge you, if you the guts to do it, to go to a hospital and visit with cancer patients.  It’ll scare you strait.

• Poisons

You may be shocked to know that cigarette smoke has over 4,000 chemicals in it, and at least 69 of those chemicals are known carcinogens.  The amount of tar from that smoke is bad enough, but tar is not the only enemy.

Among those 4,000 chemicals are:

—Carbon monoxide

—Arsenic

—Benzene

—Formaldehyde

—Hydrogen Cyanide (the same gas that the Nazis used in their concentration camp gas    chambers)

• Tobacco Additives

Consider this fact:  pure tobacco smoke is bad enough for you.  But in addition to the tobacco, today’s cigarettes have chemicals added to them.  There are 599 chemical additives that the US government allows cigarette companies to add to the cigarettes you smoke.

• Radioactive Fertilizers

Since the 1930s, tobacco farmers have been using fertilizer that is Phosphate rich.  The source of the Phosphate used by commercial tobacco farmers is taken from a mineral that contains Radium, and radioactive Lead 210 and Polonium 210.  These commercial farmers reapply this fertilizer year after year, causing an accumulation of radioactive chemicals in the tobacco’s soil.

From 1930 to 1956, the lung cancer death rate for white, US males increased by almost 10 times.  From the late 1930s to the early 1960s, the amount of radioactive Polonium tripled.  Is it a coincidence that during this same time, US tobacco farmers began using Phosphate rich fertilizer?  I don’t think so either.

So what about the radiation in cigarette smoke?  Using the radiation given off and absorbed from a chest X-Ray as an example, estimates made for the one pack a day smoker vary anywhere from 200 chest X-Rays a year to nearly ten times that amount.  Remember that radiation and cancer go hand in hand.

What are your thoughts or experience with smoking and trying to quit?  If you would, please click on “Leave A Reply” and post a comment.  I’d like to hear your opinion.

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