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To comprehend how the dangers of smoking tobacco/snuff are harmful to our health, we also must know how Joe Camel violated public law. What dangers do second-hand smoking risks have? How did snuff become bad for human health? When did they start to label cigarette packages? How did the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act happen?
“Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being, and merely the absence of disease or infirmity,” states World Health Organization.
Dangers Of Tobacco
Smoking tobacco shortens your life span by 10 years and can cause cancer. It is also one of the main reasons that can damage your body inside out, and it can lead to death. Nearly every organ such as your lungs, heart, skin, blood vessels, and so on.
Tobacco kills nearly 9 million people every year from anyone who inhales its smoke regularly. Not to mention, the 41,000 people who died from exposure to second-hand smoke. It is a fact that all forms of tobacco are extremely dangerous.
There is no safe level of exposure to tobacco. The forms of snuff are bidis, cigars, kreteks, cigarillos, pipes, and roll-your-own cigarettes/snuff.
Any dangers of being addicted in the long term will increase the risk of blood clots forming. A blocked artery causes angina, heart attacks, complete heart failure, and strokes.
Second-hand Smoking
Having second-hand smoke seems harmless due to you not smoking yourself. However, this technique is even more dangerous to one health. Primarily if you have asthma also known as reactive airway disease.
Being exposed to second-hand smoke you’d have to breathe in those harmful chemicals, even in a confined space. Those toxic chemicals have short and long effects. The short effects are sore throat, headaches, coughing, and nasal and eye irritation.
The long effects are lung cancer, strokes, coronary heart disease, and even the risk of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). For children, smoking can cause them to have weaker lungs when exposed to secondhand smoke. As said before secondhand smoke can trigger children to have asthma attacks.
Also can cause kids to get more ear infections when smoking around them. Not to mention the health of an infant inhaling the smoke. SIDS is unexpected in the first year of an infant’s life when exposed to the product. SIDS is short for Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.
Joe Camel
Congress passed the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act in 1969. This law banned cigarette advertising on TV and radio and requires tobacco companies to put warning labels on their packages. The warning label states: “The surgeon general has determined that cigarette smoking is dangerous to your health.”
The 1997 “Joe Camel” advertisement campaign by the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company violated federal law. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) did this to protect minors and prevent them from smoking. They determined that the Joe Camel campaign was geared towards selling tobacco products to underage smokers.
According to the FTC, “after the campaign began the percentage of kids who smoked Camels became larger than the percentage of adults who smoked Camels.” Due to this, the safety and health of many children were significantly damaged.
Conclusion
The human body isn’t designed for smoking or inhaling smoke. As mentioned earlier toxic chemicals damage the body inside and out. Meaning some groups of people have a higher percentage of issues with their health. However, there are some treatments to help certain groups quit continuing from harming themselves.
About 17 million citizens have at least one family with a disease caused by smoking. Now imagine preventing those people by stopping tobacco advertising and stop making dangerous products to sell. Anyone who’s exposed to secondhand smoke whether they’re at home or at work has a higher risk of lung cancer.
There are also different types of cancer such as larynx, acute myeloid leukemia, colon, etc. Acute myeloid leukemia is a blood cancer, this interferes with cancer treatments that increase the risk of recurrence. Also causes more serious complications and often leads to death.
Written by Tiffany Fleming
Sources:
Cancer: Health Risks of Smoking Tobacco
CDC: Tobacco Use
FTC: Joe Camel Advertising Campaign Violates Federal Law
NHS: Second-hand smoke
UTEP: Tobacco-Free Campus
Featured and Top Image Courtesy of Emma Doughty‘s Flickr page – Creative Commons License
Inset image Courtesy of Saj Shafique‘s Unsplash Page – Creative Commons License
