Women smokers face greater health risks than in past

According to a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) women smokers are at a greater risk than at any time in recent decades from lung cancer and other ailments linked to their tobacco use. The research found a marked increase in deaths among female smokers from lung cancer, chronic obstructive lung disease and other health ailments. The study of more than 2.2 million adults 55 years and older found that women who smoked in the 1960s had a 2.7 times higher risk of lung cancer than those who never smoked. But among present- day female smokers, that risk is 25.7 times higher when compared to non-smokers,” the study published here Wednesday said. The study , led by Michael Thun, a physician who recently retired as vice president emeritus of the American Cancer Society, found that smokers lose an average of about 10 years over over their lifetimes compared to people who have never smoked. “The findings from these studies have profound implications for many developing countries where cigarette smoking has become entrenched more recently than in the United States,” Thun said. “Together they show that the epidemic of disease and death caused by cigarette smoking increases progressively over many decades, peaking fifty or more years after the widespread uptake of smoking in adolescence.” On a more positive note, Thun’s research confirmed that quitting smoking at any age dramatically lowers mortality from all major smoking-related diseases.