smoking (Page 11)

Here’s a new reason to quit: You’re killing your pets. We’vereported here before that secondhand smoke cangive your catcancer. Now we’ve learned that a couple decided to stopsmoking because it was killing their parrot.

Kevin Bartley and Sharon Wood quit smoking after theirparrot Jay Jay had to be put on a machine to help himbreathe. They only had him three days before he became ill.Kevin says, “For the first few days he was perky. Then hegot all wheezy and coughy and then he got really laboredbreathing. I thought he was actually going to die, he wasthat bad.”
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Most smokers find it much easier to cut down their number of cigarettes a day than they do to quit smoking entirely. Now scientists know why: they’re actually still getting the same amount of nicotine and cancer-causing agents because they’ve unconsciously changed their smoking style so that the inhale more deeply.

Cancer researcher Karen Ahijevych says, “The human body really is a miracle. It knows when it is not getting what it’s used to, and it automatically does something about it.”
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Why do so many teenagers start smoking, when adults all around them are trying so hard to quit? It’s not just because they’re rebellious and more easily fooled by advertising, it’s also because of the state of their developing brains.

Shaoni Bhattacharya writes in New Scientist that teens who start smoking are more likely to become hooked. They find it harder to quit later, so they’re more likely to become lifelong smokers (and develop health problems).
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A company is developing “safe” cigarettes that reduce the risk of emphysema, using research done by the big tobacco companies. Why didn’t these companies use their own research to make cigarettes safer? They were afraid it would be seen as a confession that their other cigarettes were harmful, at a time when they were being sued by smokers.
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