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If you're thinking of making a New Year's resolution to quit smoking, it may be helpful to know that new research may extend your life expectancy.
A new study of British smokers found that each person smoking a cigarette can take an average of 20 minutes.
After accounting for socioeconomic status and other factors, researchers at University College London estimated that a single cigarette could add up to 17 minutes of life expectancy for men and 22 minutes for women, Sunday. Journal Addiction.
This means that if a person smokes 20 cigarettes a day, “smoking 20 cigarettes per pack for 20 minutes can cost seven hours of life,” said lead researcher Dr Sarah Jackson. UCL Alcohol and Tobacco Research Group and the lead author of the newspaper.
“The time you lose is the time you spend with your loved ones in good health,” Jackson said.
“A person who smokes, tends to live in poor health, will not eat later in life. Instead, it seems to erode a relatively healthy part of life in the middle of life,” she says. “When we talk about the loss of life expectancy, the life expectancy tends to be in relatively good health.
The research, commissioned by the UK Department of Health and Social Care, includes mortality data for men from the British Doctors Survey and data for women from the Million Women Study. These studies show that, on average, lifetime smokers lose about 10 years of life compared to non-smokers.
Similarly, in the United States, the life expectancy of smokers is estimated to be at least 10 years shorter than that of non-smokers. According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Overall, the new data from the UK suggests that the effects of smoking appear to be cumulative. And the life expectancy that comes back from quitting can depend on a number of factors, such as age and how long a person has smoked.
“To get this lost life back, it's complicated,” Jackson said.
“These studies show that people who quit at a young age – so in their 20s or early 30s – have the same life expectancy as non-smokers. But as you get older, you lose little by little that you can't get back by quitting,” she says. No matter how old you get, if you keep smoking, you'll live longer, so you're not undoing a lost life They are making sure they don't lose.
In their paper, Jackson and her colleagues found that a person who quit smoking 10 cigarettes a day on January 1st could prevent a complete loss of life by January 8th. Until February 20th, it prevents the loss of a whole week of life. And a whole month until August 5th. By the end of the year, they would have lost 50 days of life expectancy.
“Quitting smoking is without a doubt the best thing you can do for your health,” Jackson said. And the sooner you quit smoking, the longer you'll live.
even if The smoking rate is decreasing Since the 1960s, smoking still remains Prevention of disease and the main cause of death It kills more than 480,000 Americans every year in the United States. But stopping smoking before the age of 40 reduces the risk of dying from smoking by 90%, according to the CDC.
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A separate study was published last year In the journal NatureThey found that smoking can have both short- and long-term effects on a person's immune system, making them more susceptible to infections, cancer or autoimmune diseases. Research shows that the more a person smokes, the more their immune system changes.
When the smokers in the study quit, their immunity improved to a degree, but did not fully recover for years, said study co-author Dr. Darragh Duffy. Who leads Division of Translational Immunology at the Institute Pasteur.
“The good news is it's starting to pick up again,” he said. When the study comes out. There is never a good time to start smoking, but if you are a smoker, now is the best time to quit.