One out every four preteens and teens who "experiment" with cigarettes is addicted by age 20. There is no doubt that cigarettes are bad for you—-but how bad are they? Smoking and secondhand smoke (when you breathe in the smoke of someone else’s cigarette) kill more people than AIDS, fires, suicides, murders, alcohol and drugs combined.

Cigarettes contain nicotine, which is an addictive drug. If somebody smokes, their brain is activated and regular brain activity is disrupted. The body gets used to the way the toxins in tobacco make them feel and they crave this addictive feeling. The addictive ingredient in cigarettes is called nicotine, and this is what smokers crave. In addition to nicotine, cigarettes and smoke contain tar, carbon monoxide, arsenic, cyanide and over 2,000 other harmful and deadly chemicals.

• What are the health risks of smoking?
• What about secondhand smoke?
• Addiction

What are the health risks of smoking?

• Cancer of the throat, lungs, mouth or esophagus, which can spread to other parts of the body
  
• Frequent colds
  
• Chronic bronchitis (meaning it doesn’t go away)
  
• Stroke
  
• Heart disease
  
• Asthma
  
• Stained teeth
  
• Bad breath
  
• Smoke smell on clothes, car, hair, hands and room
  
• Face wrinkles
  
• Decreased sense of smell and taste

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What about secondhand smoke?

Cigarettes also give off secondhand smoke. Nonsmokers breathe this in when they are around smokers. Secondhand smoke can be as damaging as smoking cigarettes, even though the person is not even smoking. Avoid being around smokers—they’re not only harming themselves, they’re hurting you, too.
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Addiction

It is hard to understand why people keep smoking when they knew how bad it was for themselves and those around them. Many smokers want to stop, but feel that they cannot. They are addicted to the way smoking makes them feel (because it makes their brain act differently and makes them feel different). They keep smoking so they can keep feeling stimulated.

It is hard to quit smoking because of addiction. The easiest way to avoid this challenge is to never start smoking. If you don’t start, you don’t have to stop.

Cigarette advertisers target young people because they want you to become a lifelong smoker and buy their products for years. Don’t buy in to this plan—fight back. Each time someone smokes a cigarette, his or her life becomes seven minutes shorter, which adds up to at least five years of life for the average smoker. If the average smoker never started smoking, they would live five years longer. Health and life are precious—don’t waste them.

Plain and simple, smoking kills. More than 400,000 deaths in the United States are linked to smoking each year. Don’t be a part of that statistic. Don’t start smoking.
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