A new American study has found that smoking adds at least five diseases and 60, 000 deaths per year to what was previously thought.
The data, published in The New England Journal of Medicine, comes from a survey of nearly 1 million people who were followed for 10 years. As well as the previously known hazards of smoking, including lung cancer and disease, artery disease and heart attacks among others, the new study also found links between smoking and kidney disease, intestinal disease and heart ailments.
Researchers behind the study say that what we know about the consequences of smoking is still being uncovered.
“The smoking epidemic is still ongoing, and there is a need to evaluate how smoking is hurting us as a society, to support clinicians and policy making in public health,” said Brian D. Carter, who authored an article about the study in The New England Journal of Medicine.
The study observed participants habits (like smoking) and looked for statistical correlations between their habit and their health. When looking at the deaths among the participants between 2000 and 2011 the smokers were twice as likely to die from health ailments compared to participants who had never smoked.
The study was paid for by the American Cancer Society and used the work of scientists from four universities in Australia as well as the National Cancer Institute.
According to Quit Now, smoking is the leading preventable cause of death and disease in Australia. However its website states that quitting at any age has health benefits, with the best heart benefits coming from quitting early.
