Effects Of Smoking Essay Example For Students

Effects Of Smoking Essay According to the American Lung Association, there arean estimated 50 million people who smoke. For some reasonpeople just do not fully understand the risks they take bysmoking. Cigarette smoking is a frequent cause for manyhealth problems with smokers. To begin with, there are many hazardous ingredients incigarette tobacco. Some of the ingredients are poisonous oraddictive. Cigarette smoke produces thousands of chemicalsthat are hazardous to a smokers health. There are over4000 chemicals produced by a burning cigarette. At least200 chemicals are known to be poisonous to a persons health. Though filters help block some of the chemicals, they willnot stop them completely. Nicotine is an addictive drug and also one of the mostdangerous ingredients in cigarette tobacco. Cigarettesmokers are addicted to the nicotine in cigarettes just likea junkie is addicted to heroin or cocaine. When a personsmokes a cigarette the body reacts immediately to thechemical nicotine. Nicotine begins to effect a smokersblood pressure, the flow of blood from their heart, theheart beat and breathing rate. Cigarette smoke also contains carbon monoxide, the samepoisonous gases released from a car exhaust pipe. Carbonmonoxide is a colorless and odorless, highly toxic gas thatreduces the amount of oxygen that the blood can carry. Combined with the effects produced by the nicotine, itcreates an imbalance in the demand for oxygen by the cellsand the amount of oxygen the blood is able to supply. Tar is another chemical produced from cigarette smoke. Tar contains at least 30 cancer causing irritants. Tar is amixture of several substances that condense into a stickysubstance on the lung. Tobacco manufactures have produced acigarette that is low tar and low nicotine to reduce thechance of cancer, but these cigarettes are still hazardous. There are many deadly diseases related to smokingcigarettes. The respiratory diseases that have been linkedto cigarette smoking are lung cancer, cancer of the larynx,chronic bronchitis, emphysema and coronary heart disease. The hazards of these diseases increase with the quantity ofcigarettes smoked and the length of time the habit iscontinued. Smoking related diseases cause the death of more than400,000 Americans in 1994. Almost everyone knows thatsmoking is hazardous to their health and can cause lungcancer, along with many other diseases. Smoking isresponsible for 30 percent of all cancer deaths annually inthe United States, which totals out at more than 155,000each year. In closing, it has been medically proven thatcigarettes have many dangerous effects on a smokers life. Even though I knew the effects of smoking, I was unable toquit smoking until I was about seven years into the habit. It is a very dangerous substance which may lead to manyhazardo