How does smoking affect my health?

Smoking can cause many diseases including lung cancer, mouth cancers, heart disease and chronic lung disease. It can also cause a cough that won’t go away, and it may make it hard for you to breathe. Smoking can shorten your life by as much as 14 years on average. 

How does smoking hurt me right now?

• Smoking gives you bad breath. 
• Smoking will cost you lost of money.
• Smoking makes your clothes and hair smell bad.
• Smoking turns your teeth and fingers yellow and it makes your skin wrinkle more easily.
• Smoking makes it hard to run fast and makes you get tired more quickly when you exercise.
• Smoking makes you sick more often. You may get more colds, bronchitis, the flu, or even pneumonia more often if you smoke.
• Smoking can cause lip, throat, lung and other cancers.
• Smoking can affect your sexual performance by making it difficult for blood to reach all of the body’s organs.
• Smoking weakens your tendons and ligaments, making it easier to get injured. It’s easier for you to develop spinal disc disease. It also makes it harder for injuries to heal.
• Smoking is terribly addicting, sometimes from the first cigarette.

What if I smoke just a few cigarettes a day?

Even a few cigarettes a day are bad for your health. Once you start smoking, it can be very hard to stop. A recent study showed that if a fourth grader smokes even one cigarette, the chance for that person becoming addicted to nicotine when taking up smoking several years later is much greater.

The nicotine in cigarettes is poisonous and very addictive. There are also dozens of other chemicals in tobacco that have negative affects on your body. Once you start using cigarettes or any tobacco products, your body will feel like it cannot function without it. It doesn’t matter whether you smoke it or place it in the sides of your mouth (snuff). Most adult smokers started when they were teenagers or even earlier and later found that they could not stop smoking.

But isn't smoking relaxing?

 No, smoking actually makes your heart beat faster and can make it hard to think clearly.

Where can I get help if I want to quit smoking?

 You will need some help to stop smoking once you are addicted. Nine out of ten smokers who try to go “cold turkey” fail because nicotine is so addictive. It is easy to find help to quit.