Smoking facts

What smoking does to people

it kills 434,000 people a year in the USA [1]
it kills 750,000 people in China each year. One third of 300 million Chinese men now under 30 will be killed by cigarettes unless they quit [11]
it killed almost 5 million people worldwide in 2000 [16]
up to 60,000 Americans die each year from secondary smoke (also called 'passive smoking' or 'sidetream smoke') where people who don't smoke breathe in the pollution from smokers' cigarettes [12]
non-smoking adults who regularly breathe cigarette smoke - passive smoking - face a 20% increased risk of cancer [13]
if your parents smoke, it will damage your lungs too [2]
more than half of all deaths from smoking are among people between 30 to 69 years of age [16}.
tobacco kills one out of every two people who smoke it. It increases the risk of 24 deadly diseases including cancers, heart disease, strokes and bronchitis[3]
the World Bank estimates that within 30 years, tobacco will be the leading cause of death in the world, killing 10 million people per year [14]
smoking can cause impotence in men [4], turn their hair grey or make them bald [10]. It also messes up peoples' enjoyment of sex [15]
half of all teenagers who take up the habit will be killed by it [5]
one quarter of all Americans smoke. Each one smokes around 2538 cigarettes every year [6]
women who smoke more than 20 cigarettes per day run four times the risk of getting breast cancer [7]
smokers have a greater risk of going blind in later life [8]
tobacco advertising of this killer weed is aimed at encouraging young people to smoke by giving them the impression that smoking is cool. [9]

I think smoking is stupid! And I expect you do too after reading all this sad stuff.

1. Science News, 14/05/94, 314-315 et seq. (US Surgeon General's estimate, 1994); 2. Science News, 02/07/94, 5; 3. New Scientist, 15/10/94, 4; 4. New Scientist, 17/12/94, 12; 5. New Scientist, 22/7/95, 12; 6. New Scientist, 20/7/96, 13; 7. New Scientist, 9/11/96, 4; 8. Science News, 12/10/96, 231; 9. New Scientist, 14/12/96, 4-5; 10. New Scientist, 11/1/97, 26; 11. New Scientist, 6/9/97, 21; 12. Science News, 17/1/98, 36; 13. Science News, 17/11/98, 251; 14. New Scientist, 29/5/99, 15; 15. New Scientist, 9/10/99, 29; 16. MedicineNet, Nov 2004.