If adult smoking is on the decline in Karnataka, over 70 per cent of children between 12 and 15 years of age across the country are prone to smoking , says the Lancet journal. The risks are high as teenage smoking leads to various health hazards like poor fitness, gastritis, halitosis (bad breath), sexual dysfunction, infertility, impotency and early aging, warns Dr Sandeepa, Consultant Transplant Pulmonologist, BGS Gleneagles Global Hospitals
The smoking also predisposes teens to cardiac and neurological events like heart attacks and stroke, she reveals. Despite the risks, the last National Family Health Survey in India says that 45 per cent of all men and seven per cent of women in the age group 15 to 49 in the country are tobacco users.
Dr Nirmala C, Consultant Gynaecologist, Gleneagles Global Hospitals says use of tobacco among women is on the rise in urban areas and warns that this places them at risk for various cancers of the lungs, mouth, larynx, pharynx, oesophagus, kidney, pancreas and bladder. “Smoking during pregnancy is associated with preterm delivery, premature rupture of membranes, placenta praevia, miscarriages, neonatal death and so on,” she adds.
Second -hand smoking is also injurious to health. Explaining that second -hand smoke is the combination of smoke from the burning end of a cigarette and the smoke breathed out by smokers, Dr Sandeepa, says non-smokers, who are exposed to it at home or at work increase their risk of developing heart disease and stroke by 25 to 30 per cent and that of lung cancer by 20 to 30 per cent.
Worryingly, going by the World Health Organisation (WHO), smoking claims the lives of over seven million people each year and of those who die, about 900,000 are non-smokers, regularly exposed to second hand smoke. In the words of the organisation tobacco use is an epidemic associated with rising stress levels, unhealthy eating habits, work hours and sleep routines.
Nicotine Replacement Therapy (NRT) does hold out hope, however, as it is recognised globally as an effective form of treatment to help smokers quit the habit, helping to reduce nicotine withdrawal symptoms and craving, notes Dr. Murali Mohan B V, chest physician with the Narayana Mazumdar Shaw Medical Centre.
