Cigarettes, killing more than 480,000 people each year, are the leading cause of preventable death in the United States. With every cigarette lit, more than 7,000 chemicals are released into the air. This poses a threat not only to the smoker, but to anyone who breathes the surrounding air. After becoming exceptionally popular in the 1980s, cigarette smoking has become a worldwide epidemic. The purpose of this essay is to educate the younger generation about the dangers of smoking. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Bryan Curtis, of St. Petersburg, Florida, was only 13 years old when he started smoking cigarettes. Little did he know that 20 years later he would be leaving behind his wife Bobbie and their two-year-old son. Bryan discovered he had lung cancer at 33 and died 47 days after his diagnosis, less than a month after his 34th birthday. After realizing that his addiction would soon be the cause of his death, Bryan began advocating for teenagers about the effects of smoking cigarettes. Once Bryan could no longer actively go out and support the cause, his mother, Louise Curtis, began speaking out on his behalf. Bryan and his family even chose to hold an open casket funeral to show everyone the sad reality of smoking cigarettes. A common misconception, especially among teenagers, is that taking just one hit won't hurt them. However, according to a report from the U.S. Surgeon General's office and researchers at Keck Medicine at the University of Southern California, it only takes one shot to cause a lot of damage. “Because tobacco contains thousands of addictive and cancer-causing chemicals, even a whiff of tobacco can have adverse effects on the body, the report found” (King keckmedicine.org). After you take a puff of a cigarette for the first time, your nose and throat will become red and irritated and you will start to cough. In addition to immediate intake of dangerous chemicals, you may experience tooth discoloration, bad breath, and age spots. Even worse, you are exposing the body to the possibility of addiction. “Because nicotine is a stimulant, your brain will release chemicals that make you feel good or make you want to eat. When you don't satisfy the urge you will feel anxious and irritable.” So not only are you causing immediate damage to your body, but you are almost guaranteeing that you will develop an addiction to nicotine. In addition to short-term effects, regular smokers have a higher risk of developing cardiovascular disease, respiratory disease and many other forms. of cancer. Additionally, smoking increases the risk of having a stroke. A stroke occurs when brain cells are damaged due to lack of blood flow to the brain. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), cigarette smokers are two to four times more likely to have a stroke than nonsmokers. “Smoke inhalation damages blood vessels and can cause them to thicken and narrow. This makes the heart beat faster and blood pressure rise. Clots can also form." Another big risk associated with cigarettes is the development of COPD, formally known as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. As reported by the CDC, smokers are nearly 13 times more likely than nonsmokers to develop COPD. COPD is a condition that involves obstruction of the lungs in various stages. Some symptoms include shortness of breath, overproduction of mucus, and coughing. If you have asthma and smoke, cigarettes can make your attacks worse. Smoking cigarettes can also theoretically cause cancer anywhere in the body. PlacesCommon areas where smokers can develop cancer include the lungs, bladder, liver and stomach. “Smoking also increases the risk of death from cancer and other diseases in cancer patients and survivors. If no one smoked, one in three cancer deaths in the United States would not occur." When you smoke a cigarette, thousands of chemicals affect not only the smoker, but also everyone around him. “Since the Surgeon General's Report in 1964, 2.5 million non-smoking adults have died from breathing second-hand smoke.” Secondhand smoke can also affect children with asthma and can make their asthma attacks worse. Secondhand smoke is extremely harmful to the cardiovascular system and can cause heart disease and stroke. “Nonsmokers exposed to secondhand smoke at home or work increase their risk of developing heart disease by 25-30%…Exposure to secondhand smoke causes more than 8,000 stroke deaths each year.” These numbers are extremely concerning, especially considering that non-smokers do not choose to breathe in these chemicals. Secondhand smoking also increases the risk of heart attack among nonsmokers. “Breathing second-hand smoke interferes with the normal functioning of the heart, blood and vascular systems in a way that increases the risk of heart attack. Even brief exposure to secondhand smoke can damage the lining of blood vessels and make platelets more sticky. These changes can cause a fatal heart attack.” Additionally, those who already suffer from heart disease are even more prone to these problems associated with secondhand smoke. Many non-smokers struggle to understand why people start smoking cigarettes to begin with and why they don't want to quit. People are more likely to become addicted to nicotine when they are teenagers. This is because the younger you are, the greater your risk of becoming addicted to nicotine. “According to the 2014 Surgeon General's Report (SGR), nearly 9 in 10 adult smokers started before age 18, and nearly all started by age 26.” The physical and emotional effects of nicotine on the body are what keeps the smoker hooked. As your body gets used to these effects, you will have to smoke more to get the initial “buzz” that the cigarette gives you. This is what makes it so difficult for people to quit smoking. Withdrawal symptoms can be as mild as headaches and dizziness, or as extreme as anxiety and depression. Quitting is especially difficult for those who use cigarettes to cope with mental health problems, such as anxiety and depression. “If a smoker uses tobacco to manage unpleasant feelings and emotions, it can become a problem for some when trying to quit. The smoker can connect smoking with social activities and also with many other activities. All these factors make smoking a difficult habit to break.” For many people, cigarettes are used to relieve stress. The Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) conducted research on healthcare facility workers because of how emotionally and physically demanding their jobs are. “Workers who experienced conflict in both directions – that is, both stress at home from work (“work-home” conflict) and stress at work due to personal issues (“work-home” conflict) – were 3.1 times more likely to smoke than those who did not experience these two types of conflict, the researchers found.” Although the research would have been more accurate if a larger group had been used, we can still gain a good understanding of the positive correlation between stress and the amount of cigarettes a person smokes. On the other hand, many people who smoke cigarettes believe that it reduces their stress, when in reality it does.. 2019.