Smoking and Cancer
When one puffs on a cigarette, he оr she inhales the cigarette smoke through the mouth, then the smoke goes to the larynx and down to the lungs. From there, nicotine enters the bloodstream and reaches all organs of the smoker’s body. It logically follows that smokers run a higher risk of developing cancer at the vocal tract and the lungs. Because deposits of carcinogens could be traced to all of the smoker’s organs, they are also threatened by malicious tumors. Scientists have discovered that smoking also results in the development of cancer of the kidney, bladder, pancreas, stomach, and cervix, as well as acute myeloid leukemia.
Still, when we think of smoking and cancer, the issue that pops up in our mind is lung cancer. UK health authorities have estimated that cigarette smoking accounts for ninety percent of the lung cancer death cases among men and eighty percent among women. Furthermore, lung cancer is the leading cause for cancer-related death and most of the lung cancer cases are caused by cigarette smoking.
U. S. scientists have found out that cigarette smoking is one of the major causes for esophageal cancer. Consequently, reductions in the use of tobacco products could prevent most of the approximately 12,100 deaths from esophageal cancer which occur in the country each year.
Smokers usually have a somehow hoarset voice, due to the deposits of tar and other harmful substances which are transferred with cigarette smoke on their vocal cords. When these deposits reach a critical level, the smoker becomes very prone to developing laryngeal cancer. Statistical data demonstrated that in 2003, this form of cancer had killed 12,500 people in the United States.
However, researchers from the American Institute of Oncology have discovered that the risks of cancer death among smokers are directly linked to the concentration of vitamin E in their blood. Individuals with higher concentration of vitamin E in the body run lower risk of developing cancer and cardiac diseases, in comparison to those with lower levels of vitamin E in their blood. The optimum concentration of vitamin E in the bloodstream is thirteen or fourteen milligrams per liter. Vitamin E is contained in most nuts and seeds, full-grain bread, and dark-leafed vegetables. It should be noted, however, that the only way to reduce the risks to their minimum is to quit smoking.