If you watch TV or use a cell phone, you’re getting radiation. If you smoke cigarettes, you’re definitely getting it too.
smoking
AHA: Don’t Be Fooled, Smokeless Tobacco Isn’t Exactly Safe
If you think chewing on tobacco is any better for your health than smoking it, the American Heart Association (AHA) respectfully disagrees. The national nonprofit group released a statement Monday discouraging smokers from …
Declines in U.S. Smoking Rates Remain Stalled at 20%
For the fifth year in a row, the decline in smoking rates among adult Americans remains stalled. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 20% of adults still smoke, a figure that hasn’t changed since 2005.
Can Eating Vegetables Prevent Lung Cancer?
If you smoke, you know you’re putting yourself at increased risk of lung cancer. But if you boost the variety of fruits and vegetables that you eat, you may be able to lower those odds a bit.
Scientists in Europe report in the American Association for Cancer Research’s journal that smokers who consumed the greatest variety of fruits …
How Parental Smoking Affects Kids
There’s plenty of data showing how harmful smoking can be, and that goes for both smokers and the people around them. Two studies published in Pediatrics point out how indirect the effects can be. A study of paternal smoking in Hong Kong finds that children whose fathers smoke are heavier at seven and 11 years old than their …
When kids benefit from public smoking bans
A study conducted by researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health finds that children and adolescents who don’t live with smokers experience substantial health benefits from no smoking laws. Yet, perhaps unsurprisingly, researchers also found that kids who live in counties with public smoking bans but are exposed to secondhand
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Four risk factors reducing U.S. life expectancy
A new study from researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington suggests that four preventable risk factors—high blood pressure, smoking, high blood sugar and overweight/obesity—are significantly reducing life expectancy across the U.S. In the new
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Do Electronic Cigarettes Actually Work?
There are all sorts of products out on the market made to wean smokers off a dangerous habit—the patch, the lozenge, and the gum, for example. Yet, what about the e-cigarette?
Lung-cancer patients who quit smoking survive longer
There’s no question that quitting smoking benefits your health, not least by reducing your risk of developing lung cancer. But what if you’re a smoker who has already been diagnosed with lung cancer — will quitting give you any advantage in fighting the disease?
More teens are smoking pot
While use of drugs such as cocaine or methamphetamine has declined among U.S. teens, more adolescents are smoking marijuana, according to the results of an annual survey funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse. Researchers at the University of Michigan surveyed some 47,000 eighth-graders, high school sophomores and high school
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Get up, light up? A routine that may increase cancer risk
For many smokers, that first cigarette of the day is all part of the morning routine. But, new research suggests that smokers who light up first thing in the morning may have a disproportionate risk for developing lung cancer. According to a small study published in the December issue of the journal Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers &
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U.S. Life Expectancy: Impact of Smoking and Obesity
If current obesity trends continue, life expectancy gains due to decreases in smoking could potentially be canceled out in the future, according to research published this week in the New England Journal of Medicine. By analyzing data from several national health surveys including tens of thousands of respondents, researchers Susan
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The Science Behind Moving Smoking Bans Outside
When, more than a decade ago now, smoking bans began to take effect around the world, researchers and public health officials feverishly collected data demonstrating the health benefits: lower levels of respiratory illness were reported among bar workers from Dublin to San Francisco after indoor smoking bans took effect, saliva tests …