Smoking diseases too often underestimated

Illnesses underestimated by smoking

15/04/2015

For a long time it has been known that many diseases can be caused by tobacco consumption. However, a new study shows that smoking harms health even more comprehensively than previously thought.

One billion deaths from tobacco consumption
In this century, it is estimated that about one billion people will die as a result of their tobacco use. It has long been known that smoking endangers health, but apparently the risks are even greater than previously thought. A study in the journal „New England Journal of Medicine“ published, it comes to the conclusion that after all, 17 percent of the death rate among smokers are due to diseases that have not previously been associated with the blue haze.

Smoking triggers many diseases
It has been thought that smokers' two- to threefold higher mortality rates are due to the 21 common diseases that are included in US official statistics as smoker's diseases. These diseases were listed by the Surgeon General, the United States's highest authority on public health affairs, in 2014 on the occasion of the 50th anniversary. These include 12 types of cancer such as lung cancer, pancreatic cancer and colon cancer, cardiovascular diseases such as heart attack, stroke, diabetes, arterial diseases such as atherosclerosis (arteriosclerosis) and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease COPD (smoker's lung).

Not just lung cancer
„The health effects of smoking are diverse and go far beyond the classic deterrent picture of lung cancer“, said Michael Hallek from the Department of Internal Medicine at the University Hospital Cologne, reports the Austrian „default“. The list of complications of smoking now needs to be supplemented with a number of items based on the findings of the study. The authors of the study around Dr. Brian Carter of the US Cancer Society reviewed the relationships based on the long-term data of close to one million participants in five cohort studies.

Higher risk of kidney failure and infections
For example, the researchers found that the relative risk of dying from kidney failure is 1.7 to 2.3 times greater in smokers. And the risk of dying from an infection is 2 to 2.7 times higher. „Although the relative risk in classical tobacco-associated diseases is up to 25 times higher“, said Thomas Zander of the German Society of Internal Medicine (DGIM), „but given the new numbers, it becomes apparent that tobacco use is significantly involved in many other diseases.“

It is always worthwhile to quit smoking
The study also makes hope, according to the internist: „Interestingly, after a complete cessation of smoking bersonders in these - now newly assigned to smoking - the risk decreases again“, like Zander. According to the data, the increased risk of these diseases among former smokers decreased in proportion to the number of smoke-free years. „These findings confirm once again that it is always worthwhile to quit smoking“, commented Michael Hallek, who was not involved in the study. (Ad)