5 years of smoking how much damage | complete information

5 years of smoking how much damage A new study from Columbia University in the United States has eshown that just a few cigarettes a day cause long-term lung damage .

In fact, the impact of smoking on lung function lasts for decades, contradicting the fact that it will only take a few years for the rate of decline in lung function to return to normal after smokers quit.

People who smoke fewer than five cigarettes a day cause long-term damage to their lungs, says a new study led by researchers at Columbia University’s Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons.

“Many people assume that smoking a few cigarettes a day is not so bad,” recalls study leader Elizabeth Oelsner , an assistant professor of medicine at the Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons at Columbia University.

The researchers specifically looked at lung function – the amount of air a person can breathe in and breathe out – in smokers, ex-smokers, and people who have never smoked. Lung function naturally declines with age (from the age of 20), and it is well known that smoking accelerates the decline.

Due to the large number of people in the study, more than 25,000, Oelsner and his colleagues were able to see differences in lung function between light smokers (less than 5 cigarettes / day) and heavy smokers (more than 30) than other studies did not. have been able to detect.

Smoking little, also risky

That means that a light smoker could lose about the same amount of lung function in one year that a heavy smoker could lose in nine months.

” Smoking a few cigarettes a day is much riskier than many people think,” Oelsner warns.

Smokers are at higher risk of COPD

The effect of smoking on lung function explains why smokers are more likely to develop chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), which is diagnosed when lung function falls below a certain threshold.

Light smokers may have a higher risk of developing COPD than most researchers have thought, Oelsner says. Most COPD studies have looked only at smokers with stronger habits (more than 10 years of smoking a pack).