KARACHI: Globally, 942 million men and 175 million women 15 years or older are currently active smokers. According to WHO data, it is estimated that tobacco use kills nearly six million people every year. Approximately five million deaths are the result of direct tobacco use while more than 6,00,000 are the result of non-smokers being exposed to second-hand (passive) smoke.
Hence, one person dies every six seconds due to the adverse effect of tobacco. Around 35% of adults (47.9% males and 20.3% females) in India use tobacco in some form or the other.
Tobacco is consumed in the form of cigarette, bidi, cigar, hookah, tobacco chewing, chillam, snuff; among these cigarettes and bidis are the most common and most harmful. Use of smokeless tobacco is more prevalent in India (21%). People start using tobacco after seeing their role models, or cultural practices, or at times parental influence plays an important role.
Tobacco smoke contains more than 7,000 chemical compounds and smokeless tobacco products contain more than 3,000 chemicals of which at least 70 are known carcinogens that can damage nearly every organ system in the human body. Risk of developing various cancers due to use of tobacco increases multi-fold with early initiation, prolonged duration of use, number of tobacco products use per day, and also depends on the mode of use, degree of inhalation.
Apart from direct health loss, tobacco indirectly attributes to economic and environmental loss. Forests are being destroyed for the cultivation of tobacco crop. Burning of tobacco produces a number of toxicants in the environment. Manufacturing, packaging and transportation also cause environmental pollution. The cigarette, thus, is the deadliest artefact in the history of mankind.