The addictive properties of nicotine are well-documented. The inhaled nicotine while vaping has the potential to disrupt the normal functioning of multiple brain regions. Because of this, nicotine may become more appealing as the brain craves this substance in increasing quantities.

Nicotine impacts the following brain functions:

1. Reward processes are an integral part of the brain’s mechanisms for motivation. These systems direct actions to maximize good results and minimize bad ones. But is that always the way things go?
2. Executive function is essential for controlling one’s ideas, deeds, and emotions, and vaping may be involved here, too.

When nicotine enters the brain, it mimics the effects of other forms of reward, such as food, sex, and social connection. The brain’s reward and executive function systems can be “hijacked” by nicotine, making them more sensitive to cues involving nicotine.

The brain associates vape design logos and the shapes of a vape device with nicotine through repeated exposures. In this, we are no better off than Pavlov’s famous dogs and their salvation when they saw food and then, simply, the empty bowl that represented food.

Simply put, it is a learning process, and the brain responds accordingly by prompting a desire for the object (nicotine) and the means to it (vaping).

Then, too, addictive substances lead to increased tolerance and cravings. Many students quickly use up their electronic cigarettes despite the promised three-month duration for a vaping device. This alone points to the excessive use of the devices and addiction.

To conduct this study, researchers in Ecuador administered cognitive tests to over 400 college students aged 18 to 30. Of these, 111 smoked cigarettes and vaped, 64 smoked exclusively, and 31 smoked alone.

Cognitive tests indicated that smokers and vapers consistently performed worse than non-smokers and non-vapers.

Is it necessary to wait for this research to be published in a peer-reviewed journal before we realize the dangers posed by vaping? The harm is happening right now, and waiting is questionable.

What Does Smoking Do to the Brain?

Most smokers think this activity may affect only the lungs, but scientific studies have shown that it also affects the brain and the digestive system.

Recent research found that smoking reduces brain size. Consequently, smoking effectively speeds up the aging process of the brain’s normal loss of brain volume with age. Although scientists have recognized the correlation between smoking and reduced brain capacity for some time, they have remained puzzled about the exact cause. And there is a person’s genetic makeup to think about, too.

This loss of brain tissue, which can be natural or artificial, is raising the issue regarding smoking or vaping, which may be a precursor to Alzheimer’s disease.

I’ve previously written about the research on vaping and what it discloses regarding the various dangerous elements that can be in a vaping cartridge. The outlook wasn’t pleasant then, and this additional research input appears to prove even more concerning now.

We know it’s not just smoking cigarettes that can cause the brain to reduce in size because vaping may do it, too. Pulling in the smoke and pushing it out of your mouth is not without consequences. Anyone who does this needs to be informed of the dangers.

Smoking or vaping can provide short-term respite for certain people with mental health issues, who may use it as a “self-medication” method. Nicotine withdrawal, on the other hand, could make depressive and anxious feelings much worse.

Cancer is one illness that frightens many people, and for good reason. No one wants to do something to encourage cancerous growth, but here is one that does. Tobacco use is associated with an increased likelihood of colon cancer. The second most common cancer killer is colon cancer. How attractive is a colostomy bag for a college student? Would they trade it if they could and not have to have one because they didn’t smoke?

When we consider what might be highly important to college students, e.g., getting into graduate school or passing tests for job opportunities, vaping rises in significance to them. Diminished ability on any cognitive testing can be an important reason to quit vaping if it stymies your ability to get into a highly desirable program or a job with a fantastic future.

Legal Restrictions of E-cigarettes

“As of March 31, 2024, 50 states (Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Texas, Utah, Vermont, and Washington), the District of Columbia, the Northern Mariana Islands, Palau and the U.S. Virgin Islands have passed legislation that requires a retail license to sell e-cigarettes over-the-counter.” There are also restrictions as well as regulations on the age of any person to purchase these products in these states or territories.

American Samoa and the Marshall Islands do not have any legislation requiring a minimum age.

The situation concerning vaping and the distribution of associated products has now reached the level of federal involvement. To fight the illicit sale and distribution of electronic cigarettes, the Justice Department and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) established a federal multi-agency task force today.

In addition to the FDA and the Justice Department, the task force will assemble various law enforcement agencies, such as the ATF, USMS, USPIS, and FTC, to work together in a coordinated and streamlined manner to combat the illicit distribution and sale of electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS) like e-cigarettes and vapes, which are causing a surge in nicotine addiction among young Americans.

We can no longer dismiss these products as harmless, and we must see them as possessing a criminal incentive regarding their distribution and use, harming those who purchase them. Those profiting from vaping products will fight against any restrictions using legal means.

Critics may claim discrimination against individual rights, despite the proven dangers of products like alcohol cigarettes. Research tells us that the juvenile mind is not fully mature until about the age of 25 and these products are aimed at a market that is well below that cutoff point. Even at 25, some individuals will not have reached majority in their brain development. Who should protect them from this type of advertising, and do we have an obligation to do it?

Restrictions on over-the-counter products are not new, and when we consider cocaine, this is a good example of where protecting the consumer was legally necessary. In the 20s and 30s, cigarettes containing cocaine were sold in stores, and cocaine-infused beverages and elixirs were freely available for purchase.

The original name for a popular soft drink, Coke-Cola, was derived from the fact that it contained this energizing ingredient. One of Sigmund Freud’s associates, a young physician, became addicted to cocaine, and even Freud himself, at one time, extolled the value of cocaine. He used it on a regular basis and wrote extensively about cocaine in one of his books.

Freud was, in fact, highly addicted to nicotine and may be considered to have had an addictive personality. A chronic smoker, he would light up twenty cigars a day. Was he orally fixated?

He endured a long and arduous 16-year battle after being diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma of the palate in 1923. At that time, he flat-out refused to give up smoking despite the fact that the fourteen surgeries he had were considered disfiguring and Freud was a vain man.

Ironically, the reason Freud first used cocaine for patients was to free them from morphine addiction. Things did not go well in that regard, and you see where he ended up being addicted to cocaine and small, black cigars.

For the soft drink, the ingredient was removed from the beverage because research indicated cocaine should not be freely available to consumers without medical supervision.

We have the research results, and they are troubling, but we must increase educational efforts regarding vaping to protect the health of the young and, perhaps, the not-so-young.

The post Vaping Kills Brain Cells? Do We Demand Action? appeared first on Medika Life.

It’s much easier to light up a cigarette, which is not a controlled substance than to pop a pill for which you need a prescription. In fact, our body has specific nicotinic receptors in the spinal cord and brain.

Once, when I stopped smoking, I was visiting a friend and her sister, and she kept indicating that I should light up with them. I didn’t want to, but she said, “But what will you do with your hands?” Such a serious matter—what to do with one’s hands.

I guess I would’ve done with my hands what anyone else did: put them in a pocket or on the table or chair where I was sitting. What would anyone need to do with their hands if they didn’t have a cigarette? Well, now there’s a new push to become one of the crowd, and it’s vaping.

The question, of course, is now not one of what I would do with my hands but whether vaping is safer than smoking cigarettes. Remember the major lawsuits that were tried over years and years where people died of lung cancer (John Wayne smoked several packs a day, as did Edward R. Murrow, and both died of lung cancer). How many people have died because they smoked? I have a few in my family, and even though one stopped smoking for at least 30 years, cigarette smoking proved to be her death knell.

How Is Vaping Safer Than Cigarettes?

No one else has ever thought about giving up smoking like you have, correct? Well, many people say they want to quit, and it’s good for your health to stop smoking because it can cause damage to almost every part of your body, including your heart.

Smoking or being around smokers is a factor in almost one-third of heart disease deaths. And, there’s danger even in second-hand smoke, or, some would say, third-hand smoke. What is third-hand smoke?

There are pollutants in the air that get spread when people smoke tobacco. This is called third-hand smoke. Chemicals that are found in third-hand smoke include nicotine and chemicals that cause cancer, like formaldehyde, naphthalene, and others.

Over time, third-hand smoke gets on most surfaces. It can get stuck on soft surfaces, like clothes, furniture, drapes, beds, and carpets. It also settles on hard objects like floors, walls, and cars as dust-like particles. There may still be third-hand smoke around for months after the person who is smoking has stopped.

You might want to try e-cigarettes, vape pens, and other reusable and throwaway vaping devices to make the switch from regular cigarettes to not smoking easier. If you smoke e-cigarettes (also called vaping), is that better for you than chewing tobacco?

Might e-cigarettes assist you in quitting smoking for good? And are e-cigarettes better than prescription products to help you stop smoking? Researchers are looking at these questions; some are weighing in on vaping, but I have doubts.

Vaping is not without consequences, and the CDC released a report a few years ago that indicated people who were vaping had deaths associated with it. They hypothesized some fatalities resulted from using illegal vaping products, which might have contained harmful ingredients. There have been 2,807 cases of e-cigarette or vaping use-associated lung injury (EVALI) and 68 deaths linked to this disease, according to the CDC.

What’s in vaping? An analysis by a major university startled even the researchers, who found products they had difficulty identifying. Researchers found and measured six possibly dangerous additives and contaminants in e-cigarette liquids and aerosols.

Metals, carbonyls, free radicals, and phthalates are just some of the known toxicants that have been found and measured in e-cigarette liquids and fumes so far. If we’re concerned about having smoke with a carcinogenic product in it, how do we feel about having smoke that has metal in it? No one needs or wants metal fragments in their lungs.

Research is clear at this point that vaping carries with it specific dangers that may be as bad or even worse than cigarettes. However, if someone were smoking and wanted to stop, would it be better to vap or take the prescription product? That research has now been published, and it leans in the direction of vaping rather than the prescription product. But there’s another issue related to vaping.

The smoke in an e-cigarette product does contain nicotine and researchers have concluded that those who vap do so constantly during the day. As a result, they are exposed to higher levels of nicotine and all the other damaging products. Higher exposure, therefore, would lead to an addiction that may be as serious or even more serious than cigarette smoking. Heavy smokers may smoke more than a pack a day, but how many vap products does a vaper use during the day?

The big difference is that while there is a prescription product to help people stop smoking, there is no product that would help people stop vaping. Therefore, we have a new addiction with no apparent remedy at this point. Not only is the addiction potentially life-threatening, but many people believe it is a benign activity. The lack of information regarding vaping needs to be addressed, just as cigarette smoking was addressed when its cancer potential was revealed.

The post The Dangers of Fighting Cigarette Addiction With Vaping Are Not Vague appeared first on Medika Life.

Think tobacco, obviously, and how it can help calm smokers who, by virtue of the product formulation, become addicted to smoking. Besides the added ingredients, such as flavors, bronchodilators, or chemicals to keep the tobacco lit, there is nicotine, a part of our nervous system. Didn’t know that?

When we’re anxious, one thing we seek is relief, and nicotine can provide it by way of our body’s nicotinic receptors, which form a fundamental part of our body’s neurotransmission. If we ingest a nicotine-containing product (yes, smoking pushes nicotine into the sensitive lung lining and our bloodstream), it stimulates the release of dopamine, norepinephrine, and acetylcholine. All of these neurotransmitters provide calm and pleasure. Therefore, nicotine uplifts our mood, increases our alertness, and can even affect our cognitive abilities positively. But there is no free lunch here.

We know that some forms of nicotine-seeking, such as dipping, where a smokeless product is placed between the cheek and jaw are not safe. In a CDC survey of these products, it was revealed that there were 5.2 million adults aged 18 and up who said they currently used smokeless tobacco products.

About 4 out of every 100 men (4.2%) currently use smokeless tobacco, while less than 1 out of every 100 women (0.2%) currently use smokeless tobacco. Non-Hispanic white adults were the most likely to use smokeless tobacco, with nearly 3 out of every 100 (2.9%) currently using it.

We now know that the gums are one of the most vulnerable places in our bodies where toxins or bacteria can get into our blood. Putting anything in our mouth and leaving it there is like walking in traffic while wearing a blindfold.

If someone has used chewing tobacco, snuff, dip, snus, or dissolvable tobacco at least once in their life, and at the time of the survey, at least one of these products “every day” or “some days,” then they were considered to have “current smokeless tobacco product use.” The survey was given to people aged 18 and up.

The dangers of dipping are apparent when we review research on the physical price users may pay. I worked with a woman whose husband was a cancer surgeon who often performed operations on cancers of the jaw related to dipping. They called it “kamikaze surgery” because of the troubling aftermath. Smokeless tobacco products may also contain arsenic, which can poison you slowly.

Although the health implications of smokeless tobacco products have been well documented, newer nicotine-containing pouch products are an area where research needs to catch up. It has already been established that nicotine products are addictive, but what about the potential for cancer or other health consequences? Their popularity is impressive according to sales. From August to December 2019, sales rose to 126.06 million units. From January to March 2022, sales rose to 808.14 million units.

Sold as tobacco-free products, the assumption would appear to be that pouches are safer than items containing tobacco. But do we know its safety profile? We’ve already dealt with e-cigarettes and vaping and the hidden health dangers in that “tobacco-free” smoke. Nothing like taking heavy metals directly into your lungs for future multiple health disorders.

Do we need nicotine to help us deal with anxiety and stress? No, of course, we don’t, but again, here’s a “quick fix” that is as appealing to many as cigarettes once were. Does anyone know that the original Marlboro man died of lung cancer?

The post Smoke, Dip, or Pouch It and Suffer the Horrific Consequences? appeared first on Medika Life.

Think tobacco, obviously, and how it can help calm smokers who, by virtue of the product formulation, become addicted to smoking. Besides the added ingredients, such as flavors, bronchodilators, or chemicals to keep the tobacco lit, there is nicotine, a part of our nervous system. Didn’t know that?

When we’re anxious, one thing we seek is relief, and nicotine can provide it by way of our body’s nicotinic receptors, which form a fundamental part of our body’s neurotransmission. If we ingest a nicotine-containing product (yes, smoking pushes nicotine into the sensitive lung lining and our bloodstream), it stimulates the release of dopamine, norepinephrine, and acetylcholine. All of these neurotransmitters provide calm and pleasure. Therefore, nicotine uplifts our mood, increases our alertness, and can even affect our cognitive abilities positively. But there is no free lunch here.

We know that some forms of nicotine-seeking, such as dipping, where a smokeless product is placed between the cheek and jaw are not safe. In a CDC survey of these products, it was revealed that there were 5.2 million adults aged 18 and up who said they currently used smokeless tobacco products.

About 4 out of every 100 men (4.2%) currently use smokeless tobacco, while less than 1 out of every 100 women (0.2%) currently use smokeless tobacco. Non-Hispanic white adults were the most likely to use smokeless tobacco, with nearly 3 out of every 100 (2.9%) currently using it.

We now know that the gums are one of the most vulnerable places in our bodies where toxins or bacteria can get into our blood. Putting anything in our mouth and leaving it there is like walking in traffic while wearing a blindfold.

If someone has used chewing tobacco, snuff, dip, snus, or dissolvable tobacco at least once in their life, and at the time of the survey, at least one of these products “every day” or “some days,” then they were considered to have “current smokeless tobacco product use.” The survey was given to people aged 18 and up.

The dangers of dipping are apparent when we review research on the physical price users may pay. I worked with a woman whose husband was a cancer surgeon who often performed operations on cancers of the jaw related to dipping. They called it “kamikaze surgery” because of the troubling aftermath. Smokeless tobacco products may also contain arsenic, which can poison you slowly.

Although the health implications of smokeless tobacco products have been well documented, newer nicotine-containing pouch products are an area where research needs to catch up. It has already been established that nicotine products are addictive, but what about the potential for cancer or other health consequences? Their popularity is impressive according to sales. From August to December 2019, sales rose to 126.06 million units. From January to March 2022, sales rose to 808.14 million units.

Sold as tobacco-free products, the assumption would appear to be that pouches are safer than items containing tobacco. But do we know its safety profile? We’ve already dealt with e-cigarettes and vaping and the hidden health dangers in that “tobacco-free” smoke. Nothing like taking heavy metals directly into your lungs for future multiple health disorders.

Do we need nicotine to help us deal with anxiety and stress? No, of course, we don’t, but again, here’s a “quick fix” that is as appealing to many as cigarettes once were. Does anyone know that the original Marlboro man died of lung cancer?

The post Smoke, Dip, or Pouch It and Suffer the Horrific Consequences? appeared first on Medika Life.

The breast cancer death rate dropped by nearly half (43 percent) from 1989 to 2020, according to findings published in CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians. Unfortunately, racial disparities persist.

This decline in breast cancer death rates is significant and may be attributed to earlier detection through awareness and screening plus management advances. While I welcome the improvements in breast cancer mortality, I want to focus on some key ways you may reduce your risk of being diagnosed with breast cancer.

Let’s get to the top ways to significantly reduce your chances of getting (or dying from) breast cancer.

1. Don’t smoke.

If you currently smoke cigarettes (and have for more than ten years), you have a higher risk of developing breast cancer. This finding is not particularly surprising, nor is the fact that the duration of smoking matters: Those smoking for 40 years have a 1.6-times greater risk of breast cancer than non-smokers.

Moreover, the number of years smoked before a first full-term pregnancy appeared to be associated with a higher risk of breast cancer than comparative years smoked after pregnancy. Cigarettes are linked to breast cancer development, and the timing of the smoking exposure matters.

Whether women who previously smoked have a higher risk of breast cancer remains under investigation.

2. Breastfeed

Breastfeeding is associated with slightly lower breast cancer risk, especially for those who opt to nurse for a year or more.

Breastfeeding is associated with only a modest risk reduction; a large pooled analysis that included individual data from 47 studies (including about 50,000 women with invasive breast cancer and 97,000 controls) estimated that for every year of breastfeeding, there appeared to be a 4.3 percent reduction in the relative risk of breast cancer. If your risk had been 15 percent, breastfeeding might drop by slightly less than one percent.

3. Postmenopausal weight loss

Some, but not all, studies show that weight loss in postmenopausal women may reduce breast cancer risk. For example, a meta-analysis that included 237,000 women with breast cancer (and four million controls) discovered weight loss associated with nearly one-fifth (18 percent) lower breast cancer risk.

The Nurse’s Health Study prospectively assessed weight change since menopause among approximately 50,000 women followed up to 24 years. Here are the results:

Women with no prior hormone therapy use who maintained a weight loss of at least 10 kilograms (22 pounds) had more than a halving of breast cancer risk than women who did not.

4. Child-bearing

A full-term pregnancy affects breast cancer, but this influence hinges upon the age of the first full-term birth. Women bearing children later in life have an increase in breast cancer risk.

The Nurses’ Health Study looked at women who never delivered a baby compared with child-bearing women. The cumulative incidence of breast cancer by age 70, compared with a woman bearing no children, was as follows:

• For women delivering a first child at age 20, the risk dropped by one-fifth (for a woman with a one in eight baseline risk in the USA or many parts of northern Europe, a decrease by about two to three percent).
• For women delivering a first child at age 25, the breast cancer risk dropped by one-tenth or just over one percent for a woman at average risk in the United States.
• For women delivering a first child at 35, the breast cancer risk rose by one-twentieth. This risk is comparable to a woman who never had a full-term pregnancy.

Breast cells fully differentiate during and after pregnancy, which may protect the breast from cancer. On the other hand, having a first birth at a later age may increase the risk by giving additional stimulation to breast cells that are more likely to develop (and more likely to be damaged).

5. Move

The available research suggests that physical activity is associated with a lower risk of breast cancer. A meta-analysis of 139 studies discovered:

Higher physical activity levels appeared to lower breast cancer risk by nearly one-quarter (a drop by 22 percent in relative risk). This risk reduction appeared similar in pre- and postmenopausal women and for high- versus light-intensity movement.

Because higher weight in premenopausal women is associated with a lower breast cancer risk (higher weight raises the risk in postmenopausal women), the drop in risk is not because of weight loss associated with physical activity.

Blood levels of hormones (such as estrogen), insulin, and insulin growth factor-1 (IGF-1) may impact risk.

6. Watch the alcohol

Alcohol consumption is associated with a higher risk of breast cancer driven by estrogen or progesterone hormones. For example, a study of nearly 52,000 postmenopausal Swedish women discovered this:

Increased alcohol intake appeared associated with estrogen receptor-positive breast cancer, with a 1.35-fold increase (if you have a baseline risk of 12 percent, it will rise by about four percent).

Could folic acid intake decrease the alcohol-associated increase in breast cancer risk? Observational studies hint that those who consume alcohol should take a multivitamin with folic acid, but our grain has supplemental folate in the USA.

7. Get appropriate screening

Women between the ages of 40 and 44 should consider beginning annual mammograms. Women ages 44 to 54 years should have annual screening, and those 55 and older have the option to test every one or two years. Breast cancers discovered by annual mammograms are usually smaller and less advanced than those discovered during mammograms every two years.

8. Get to know your genes

Modern medicine has made assessing one’s risk of developing various forms of cancer much simpler. This understanding of risk can be especially helpful for women with inherited gene mutations that make them particularly vulnerable to breast cancer. The American Cancer Society explains, “When it comes to breast cancer risk, the most important inherited gene changes are in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes. Women (and men) with one of these gene changes are said to have Hereditary Breast and Ovarian Cancer (HBOC) syndrome.”

9. Risk-reducing surgery or medicines

Some medicines may significantly reduce the chances of developing the disease for women with a higher-than-average breast cancer risk. Because risk-reducing drugs such as tamoxifen, raloxifene, or aromatase inhibitors have potential side effects, you will need to balance the pros and cons of the medicine.

This approach of using medicines to help reduce disease risk is chemoprevention. If you are considering this approach, first have a health care provider help determine your breast cancer risk.

The American Cancer Society explains that some important breast cancer risk factors include:

• Older age
• Having close relatives with a breast cancer history
• Having more menstrual cycles
• Having a history of invasive breast cancer or ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS)
• A history of breast lobular carcinoma in situ (LCIS, atypical ductal hyperplasia (ADH), or atypical lobular hyperplasia (ALH)
• Having a gene mutation associated with a family cancer syndrome (such as a BRCA mutation)

10. Eat well

A limited number of studies suggest that there may be a connection between eating fruits and vegetables regularly and a lower risk of developing some aggressive forms of breast cancer.

I hope this article helps you understand how lifestyle influences breast cancer risk. Thank you for joining me today.

The post 10 Top Tips to Drop Your Breast Cancer Risk appeared first on Medika Life.

If you guessed air pollution, you are spot on. After smoking, air pollution is the second leading cause of lung cancer worldwide. That’s the finding of a new analysis.

Today we look at new data showing variability in lung cancer incidence by geography. You’ll learn which countries are the most affected, how coal affects risk, and how those of us who care about those with cancer can use our voices to fight back.

“So, whether the aliens explore with chemistry or with radio waves, they might come to the same conclusion: a planet where there’s advanced technology must be populated with intelligent life-forms, who may occupy themselves discovering how the universe works and how to apply its laws for personal or public gain.

Looking more closely at Earth’s atmospheric fingerprints, human biomarkers will also include sulfuric, carbonic, nitric acids, and other components of smog from burning fossil fuels. Suppose the curious aliens are socially, culturally, and technologically more advanced than we are. In that case, they will surely interpret these biomarkers as convincing evidence for the absence of intelligent life on Earth.”
― Neil deGrasse Tyson, Astrophysics for People in a Hurry

Lung cancer problem scope

Lung cancer is the third most common cancer in the United States. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention explains that skin cancer is the most common cancer type in the USA, followed by prostate cancer (among men) and breast cancer (among women).

Lung cancer is the leading cause of death due to cancer in the United States among men and women.

Across the globe, lung cancer is the second most common cancer. By sex, it is the leading cancer in men and the second most common cancer in women.

There are more than 2.2 million new lung cancer cases each year. Here are the countries with the highest incidences of lung cancer, according to the World Cancer Research Fund International (cases per 100,000):

1. Hungary 50
2. Serbia 47
3. France, New Caledonia 43
4. French Polynesia 41
5. Turkey 40
6. Montenegro 40
7. Belgium 38
8. Bosnia and Herzogovenia 38
9. North Korea 37
10. Denmark 37

The death rates are highest in Hungary, Serbia, French Polynesia, Turkey, and Guam.

Lung cancer causes

Smoking is the main cause of the two main forms of lung cancer: small and non-small cell. Cigarettes contribute to 80 percent of lung cancer deaths in women, and 90 percent of men, respectively.

Men who smoke are 23 times more likely to get lung cancer than non-smokers. Women are 13 times more likely, compared with never smokers.

Smoking can affect those of us who are non-smokers. In the United States, exposure to secondhand smoke is related to about 7,330 lung cancer deaths among non-smokers yearly. Non-smokers have a 1.2 to 1.3-fold risk of developing lung cancer if exposed to secondhand smoke at home or work.

Other lung cancer causes

Besides smoking and the factors detailed above, other proven causes of lung cancer include:

• Previous lung disease (such as tuberculosis, pneumonia, emphysema, or chronic bronchitis).
• Having antibodies to Chlamydia pneumoniae, bacteria that can cause chest infections.
• Exposure (such as at work) to asbestos, radon, crystalline silica, mixtures of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, and heavy metals are linked with an increased risk of lung cancer. Radon exposure is second only to smoking as a causative agent of lung cancer.
• Indoor air pollution (for example, from wood and coal burning for heating and cooking.

If you drink water containing arsenic, your lung cancer risk rises. Among current and former smokers, taking high doses of beta-carotene supplements increases lung cancer risk.

On the other hand, the World Cancer Research Fund International offers some potential risk-reducing strategies:

• Limit red meat, processed meat, and alcoholic drinks, as these substances may increase the risk of lung cancer.
• Increasing your fruit and vegetable intake for current and former smokers may lower your lung cancer risk.
• Foods [not supplements] with beta-carotene, carotenoids, or retinol may drop your lung cancer risk.
• In current users of cigarettes, vitamin C-containing food may lower the risk.
• For never-smokers, foods with isoflavones may drop the risk.
• Physical activity may decrease the risk of lung cancer.

Air pollution and lung cancer

Could pollution be the second leading cause of lung cancer? A novel study suggests that 14.1 percent of lung cancer deaths worldwide are directly linked to air pollution.

This new finding puts air pollution as the second leading cause of lung cancer, exceeded only by smoking.

The researchers report that the lung cancer death burden attributable to air pollution is lower in the USA, where 4.7 percent of deaths due to the disease are directly linked to pollution.

Unfortunately, we in the western USA have seen a recent increase in wildfires and can expect to pay the price for our exposure to this unpleasant air. The study authors also found an association between deaths from lung cancer worldwide and the proportion of national energy produced by coal.

The post The Second Leading Cause of Lung Cancer Will Surprise You appeared first on Medika Life.