With Florence Amagiya

The Federal government advised that ‘smokers are liable to die young’. This is the slogan that rings bell in your ears at the end of every cigarette advertisement on your radio or television set. But in spite of this warning, the number of smokers are on the increase in Nigeria. Smoking is a major cause of mortality in the world today.

It has been linked to a variety of illnesses including heart disease, cancer and respiratory diseases. Cigarettes are filled with poison that goes into the lungs when you inhale. Coughing, dizziness, burning of the eyes, nose, and throat are early signs that smoking is dealing with you. If you have diabetes, high blood pressure or high cholesterol, then smoking increases your health risks.Smoking increases your chances of getting cancer.

Cigarette smoking may play a role in developing many kinds of cancer. Lung cancer is the most common kind of cancer caused by smoking. A smoker is at greater risk of getting cancer of the lips, mouth, throat, or voice box. Smokers also have a higher risk of getting esophagus, stomach, kidney, pancreas, cervix, bladder, and skin cancer.

If you already have heart or blood vessel problems and you smoke, you are at a greater risk of having continued or worse health problems. The nicotine in the tobacco causes an increase in your heart rate and blood pressure. The arteries (blood vessels) in your arms and legs tighten and narrow because of the nicotine in cigarette smoke. Cigarette smoke increases blood clotting, and may damage the lining of your heart’s arteries and other blood vessels.

Carbon monoxide is a harmful gas that gets into the blood and decreases oxygen going to the heart and the body and cigarette smoke contains this gas. Hardening of the arteries happens more often in smokers than in non-smokers. This may make it more likely for you to have a stroke (blood clot in your brain). The more cigarettes you smoke, the greater your risk of a heart attack.

If you are so young when you start smoking, then you have a greater risk of getting lung diseases. Many smokers have a cough which is caused by the chemicals in smoke. These chemicals harm the cilia (tiny hairs) that line the lungs and help remove dirt and waste products. Depending upon how much you smoke, your lungs become gray and “dirty” (they look like charcoal). Healthy lungs are pink.

My questions are: Why do we continue to smoke when we know smokers are liable to die young? Can the benefits of cigarettes be compared to your health and life? Why are some of the medical doctors also involved in this habit when they ought to know better? The little I know about a habit cultivated is that it is not easy discarded. But we are not talking about the easy nature of discarding this unhealthy habit; we are talking about our lives, our future and the lives of our family members. We should stop committing suicide by installment! Each time we light a cigarette and smoke, we do not only endanger our lives, but that of the people around us.