Efekty palenia. (THE EFFECTS OF SMOKING)

Smoking is the largest single preventable cause of death in Europe today. In Britain it kills more people each year than road traffic accidents, heroin abuse or dangerous sports. It accounts for one in three of all deaths between 40 and 64. About 90% of lung cancers and 20% of coronary heart disease deaths are smoking - related. Non-smokers run a small but not insignificant risk of lung cancer from passive smoking.

There are many reasons for smoking. Teenagers start smoking because of peer pressure and persuasion by their friends or they are curious, so they want to find out how it is. Some teenagers have the example of their parents. They start smoking and then it is hard to give up cigarettes.

For many people cigarettes are their true love and they don’t care about the consequences of smoking. Other treat it as their bad habit.

Of course smokers know that their habit is probably going to kill them but they prefer not to think about it. The best example for it is an experiment which is carred out in England. There is an Englishman who has been smoking since he was eleven. He loves smoking and he smokes between two and three packets a day. He says that cigarettes are your statement about yourself. For example: if you take out a packet of Marlboro you are saying: I’m an outdoor type or if you take out a packet of Benson, you are saying: I’m classy...
So he has started producing cigarettes called ”Death”. And none buys those cigarettes. The reason? Because smokers can’t say: ”Yes, I’m killing myself, but at least I know it”. They prefer to hide the fact. People try to hide the truth. The advertisements never show pictures of real smokers coughing up their lungs early in the morning. Television, papers, posters always show us clean - shaven young men. They suggest that it is manly to smoke. Smoking is associated with the great open - air life, with beautiful girls and true love... What utter nonsense!

The real life is different. Smokers have serious problems with health. They have bronchial troubles, heart disease, weak chest, their lungs callapse. In the end they have a lung cancer. Besides smokers are managed by fertility problems and impotence.

There are many smaller effects of smoking, too. Smokers have stained fingers, which don’t smell very good. Their eyes are almost yellow. They have damaged teeth and bad breath.