Smoking is the number one cause of preventable death in the world today. The adverse health effects of cigarette smoking account for an estimated 443,000 deaths, or nearly one of every five deaths, each year in the United States alone.
Today, almost everyone knows the role that long-term, heavy smoking plays in developing lung cancer and heart disease. What is sometimes overlooked is that it also plays a significant role in damaging dozens of other body systems as well as your overall health.
Apart from the specific damage smoking causes to the lungs, larynx and arteries, smoking also reduces the desire to exercise in most people. This is because many smokers relate smoking to lowering stress. By using a chemical to “lower” stress, your motivation to exercise is reduced. When you lower your oxygen concentration your arteries constrict causing a “smoker’s hack”. This reduces the incentives for healthy exercise even more.
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The reason I wrote this article is because, if you’re a smoker, after reading this I hope it cause you to want to quit smoking. You see, everyone takes breathing for granted. That is everyone except those for whom it’s a daily struggle. That effort can be a result of a range of lung diseases, many of which are self inflicted. The problem with these diseases is a cure is often difficult to come by.
Probably the best known lung disease is lung cancer. Thankfully people are better able to survive this disease today as a result of improved treatments. These relatively new treatments make it one of the few conditions that can actually be cured. Using a combination of surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation, a person can emerge from lung cancer with excellent prospects of a somewhat normal lifespan and lifestyle.
One of the best reasons to want to stop smoking is COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease), a lung disease that affects millions of people. From chronic bronchitis to emphysema there are many various forms of COPD. The problem with these, or any of the lesser known obstructive lung diseases, is there is no known cure for them yet.
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