If you smoke or chew tobacco, quit now. Cigarette smoking is linked to many different types of cancer.
Tobacco use is the leading preventable cause of cancer in the U.S. Along with helping to prevent cancer, staying tobacco-free can stave off heart attacks, emphysema, and other cardiac and respiratory diseases.
Steer clear.
Health-care providers say that it’s almost never too late to stop using tobacco and that a person’s health will benefit immediately after quitting. So if you smoke, know that it is possible to improve your well being.
Your health-care provider can give you information on many proven methods that can help and tobacco use.
Research shows that tobacco is linked to 90% of all lung cancers — as well as bladder, cervix, colon, esophagus, kidney, larynx, liver, mouth, pancreas, pharynx and stomach cancers.
Even more dangerous is the mix of tobacco and alcohol. Smoking and drinking alcohol may increase the risk of developing mouth — and throat — related cancers.
According to the Centers for Disease Control, secondhand smoke can increase the risk of cancer by 20 – 30 percent among people who have never used tobacco. Secondhand smoke also causes respiratory disease among non-tobacco users, especially babies and younger children.
Check In With Your Health
The choices we make each day can help reduce our risk of cancer.
AICR's new Cancer Health Check will help you learn more about your
choices and how you can stack the odds in your favor.
