Smoking | Teen Ink

Smoking

March 21, 2018
By Anonymous

Every time someone takes a puff of that smoke they are signing a contract.  A contract to a foul stench of breath.  A contract of carcinogens of many cancers.  A contract of affecting everyone around them that is inhaling the smoke.  A contract of many health problems.  Therefore a contract of dying.  Smoking cigarettes is a harmful substance to do to the human body and the world.  Smoking cigarettes can cause harmful effects on an individual's body as well as cause that individual to become addicted and to go into debt. 


Tobacco is a green leafy plant that is grown in southern states where it is most common.  There are so many ingredients in cigarettes for smoking.  There are over four thousand chemicals in cigarettes with fifty one of those chemicals being carcinogenic (Dunington 30).  Nicotine and tar are the most poisonous chemicals in cigarettes.  Nicotine is a drug, a main drug used in insecticides (Dunington 30).  One drop of those insecticides on someone's tongue can and will kill them(Dunington 30).  Just imagine what the nicotine does to people's’ body when they smoke in cigarettes.  With nearly seven billion people in the world, fifteen percent of the adult population smokes cigarettes (Centers 2).


In the US one hundreds people were surveyed asking if they smoked and fifteen of every hundred adults in 2015 (Centers 2).  In the US, adults smoke more than teenagers because of stress and money issues.  Most adults are parents and have kids that put a lot of stress on their parents with behavior and money.  When you become an adult you have responsibilities and bills to pay, some adults can’t pay their bills because they don’t have enough money which adds on stress (Why 3).  When adults have a lot of pressure and stress on their hands they think that smoking will relieve them of everything on their minds so they smoke.  Adults smoke to relieve all the stress without caring what cigarettes do to their bodies.  Some smokers like teenagers don’t have a clue what cigarettes to do their body or they think that it won’t happen to them.  On the other hand, the adults that smoke know what cigarettes do to their body but some of them just don’t care or they are too addicted to quit because of the nicotine. 


In the human body there are many different organs, cells, and bones.  With every different organism and cell there are always ways to get sick, broken bones, or failing organs.  With cigarettes, smoking affects nearly every organ, cell, and bone in the body (Centers 3).  “Smoking can cause narrowed arteries causing more blockages which means less blood and oxygen flow to the heart causing heart diseases” (Worst 3).  Smoking cigarettes can make people's blood pressure become dangerously high as well as cause strokes.  “Smokers have problems with their blood pressure because when the smoke is inhaled in their lungs, the oxygen needed can’t get to the lungs and heart which makes the heart work harder and beat faster which causes high blood pressure” (Why 25).  As a result of not getting enough oxygen to the heart this causes the brain to not get enough oxygen as well, which causes serious strokes.  Also, when the cells in the brain are deprived of oxygen, the cells will die which also causes strokes and many cancers cancer (Worst 3). 


Cigarettes have a copious amount of carcinogens due to the chemicals used to make them. “There are fifty one chemicals in cigarettes that are carcinogenic” (Dunington Thirty).  A carcinogen is a gene that causes cancer all throughout the parts of the body.  Once there are cancer cells in the body. Each cell goes around spreading their “sickness” to other healthy cells destroying the body making the body have cancer.  Smoking can cause twelve different cancers through the body affecting organs, cells, and the brain (Death 1).  The most common cancers smoking causes are Bladder, Blood, Cervix, Colon and rectum, Esophagus, kidney and ureter, Liver, Oropharynx (which includes the parts of the throat, tongue, soft palate, and the tonsils), pancreas, stomach, and trachea and lung cancers.  These cancers are very deadly especially lung cancer.  Lung cancer is the most popular cancer from smoking cigarettes because the tar in cigarettes stick to the lungs which blackens them and damages healthy cells (Worst 2).  “Ninety percent of lung cancer deaths in men and women are caused by smoking” (Health two).  Smoking doesn’t just cause cancer, it can also form many lung diseases by damaging airways and and the small air sacks called alveoli in your lungs (Health 2).  When these air sacs and airways are damaged this can cause COPD which includes emphysema and chronic bronchitis which makes it hard to breathe (Health 2).  COPD doesn’t just make it hard to breath, it also causes early death in men and women (Worst 2).  Smoking can also cause asthma or affect the people around them that have asthma.  Asthma is a lung disease that makes it really hard to breath because the airways in the body are closed and not freely opened like normal airways.  When smokers smoke around people that have asthma and they breathe the smoke in then their airways are compromised with the smoke which doesn’t let the lungs get oxygen.  When people have asthma and they inhale the smoke this causes severe asthma attacks (Worst 4). 


With all of the health problems that affect the smoker directly there are other health issues that occur to others around the smoker and inside the smoker.  Women that are pregnant and that smoke have high risks for her body but also the baby inside of her.  Smoking can cause serious health problems to the baby before and after the baby is born.  Smoking while pregnant can cause the baby to have a premature birth weight and can make the baby go into distress (Worst 5).  With every pregnant women there is a different length of time the baby is inside the mother.  When every woman that gets pregnant the doctor tells the women their due date forty weeks after she was conceived.   Forty weeks is the estimated time the baby should be inside the mother but when the mother makes bad decisions sometimes the baby can be born early or late.  Smoking causes the baby to have a premature birth which makes the baby be born at a low weight which can be life threatening to the baby (Worst 5).  Smoking while pregnant can cause preterm delivery, stillbirth (death of the baby before birth), low birth weight, sudden infant death syndrome, ectopic pregnancy, orofacial clefts in infants (Health 4).  These complications are very common in pregnancies when the mother is a heavy smoker or if the mother breathes smoke daily from secondhand smoke. 


Second hand smoke is smoke that is in the air from a lighted cigarette that someone is smoking. This smoke can come directly from the cigarette or it can come from the mouth of the smoker when they breathe out.  “Secondhand smoke consist of the same chemicals that the smoker of the cigarette inhales” (Health risks 1).  Secondhand smoke known as SHS causes lung cancer just like the smoker of the cigarette (Health risks 2).  There is evidence suggesting that smoking is linked to cancers involving  Larynx, Pharynx, Nasal sinuses, Brain, Bladder, Rectum, Stomach, and Breast in adults (Health risks 2).  There is also evidence suggesting that children get cancers such as Lymphoma, Leukemia, Liver cancer, and Brain tumors from SHS (Health risks 2).  With all of the harmful ways that cigarettes have with SHS, this can cause mental and emotional changes (Health Risks 3).  Some studies have shown that secondhand smoke is linked to symptoms in depression(Health Risks 2).  Young children are most affected in secondhand smoke and they are the least able to avoid it (Health Risks 2).  Most exposure to secondhand smoke is linked with adults such as family members and friends.  Studies have shown that children whose parents smoke get sick more often, have more lung infections like bronchitis and pneumonia, more likely to cough and wheeze, and get more ear infections.  Secondhand smoke can cause asthma attacks, make asthma of others worse, and cause new causes of asthma in children who didn’t have it before (Health Risks 3).  Some of these problems seem small but it adds up quickly.  Think of all of the expenses, the doctor visits, medicines, lost school time, and often lost work time for the parents who stay home with their sick child (Health Risks 2). 


Everyone should be concerned about secondhand smoke everywhere, especially places such as work, public places, at home, and in the car(Health Risks 3).  A work space is a major source of secondhand smoke for many adults.  “Surgeon generals have said that a smoke free workplace is the only way to prevent secondhand smoke at work” (Health Risks 3).  Just like workplaces, in public everyone can be exposed to secondhand smoke where smoking is allowed, such as restaurants, shopping centers, transportation stations, parks, and schools (Health risks 3).  Surgeons suggest that people choose non smoking restaurants and businesses, and let the smoking businesses know that secondhand smoke is a harmful things (Health Risks 3).  Smoking at home is more dangerous than in public.  Home is where the heart is and when smoking is at home it affects family.  Making your home a smoke free home is the best things to do for family and friends so we can stop the secondhand smoke health problems (Health Risks 3). 


There is no safe level of exposure to secondhand smoke (Health Risks 3).  The best way to get rid of secondhand smoke is to get rid of smoking in the world.  Smoking is very hard to quit, but there are many ways to quit like the “cold turkey method” (Ways 1).  The cold turkey method is trying to quit smoking without any help from any family or therapist or anything.  This method is the hardest method and that why only six percent of people that try using this method actually quit (Ways 1).  Adding onto the methods of smoking there is also the “build a quit plan” (Ways 1).  This plan gives smokers a certain date to quit smoking by and motivates them to quit by this date.  This plan is meant for smokers to tell their family members and friends that they are planning to get rid of all the cigarettes and ashtrays from their home, work, and car (Ways 1).  The next method to quit is the “behavioral method” (Ways 1).  This method is a way to talk to a counselor and find ways to not smoke and together find the things that triggers smokers to smoke and make a plan to get through the cravings (Ways 1).  The fourth method to quit smoking is the “nicotine replacement therapy” (Ways 1).  This method includes using nicotine gum, patches, inhalers and sprays (Ways 1).  These patches and pieces of gum works by giving smokers nicotine without using tobacco which can make them quit easier (Ways 1).  The last and final method is the “combo treatments” (Ways 2).  This method uses multiple methods above to make quitting the easiest (Ways 2).  This method is the most useful because smokers are getting double the help.  If a smoker uses the quit plan and the nicotine replacements they have a motivation quit plan and the patch that makes them think they are smoking because they get their nicotine.   The faster they quit, the faster air will be cigarette smoke free.
Smoking cigarettes can cause harmful effects on an individual's body as well as cause that individual to become addicted and to go into debt.  With all of the effects and harmful illnesses smoking causes it is important that teens and adults never smoke or quit smoking immediately.  Just one puff of a cigarette can cause choking or coughing for your first time.  That one pack of cigarettes in persons lifetime can cause asthma or chronic bronchitis when they can avoid it.  A pack of cigarettes a month can cause rotted teeth and a pregnant mother’s child to have a birth defect or never make it out of the whom alive.  I pack of cigarettes will cost the smoker's life and someone else's from secondhand smoke.  Cigarettes are killers to the person who sticks it in their mouth and lights it and to the air around them that everyone breathes.  Every Time that statistic goes up in the population of people that smoke, everyone hopes they remember they aren’t just killing themselves, they are killing the world.



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