Smoking kills. But do you know How many minutes of life do you lose for each cigarette consumed?? New research from University College London (UCL) has made the calculation: Smokers who quit this harmful habit on January 1 could gain a whole day of their life by January 8 (assuming they smoked 10 cigarettes a day). .
Research commissioned by the UK Department of Health and Social Care shows that smoking is more harmful than previously thought and that each cigarette steals on average approximately 20 minutes of life for smokers. This is equivalent to almost 7 hours of life lost when smoking an average pack of 20 cigarettes.
If you quit smoking on New Year’s Day, you could get a week of your life back on February 20 and by the end of the year you could have avoided losing 50 days of life.
“Evidence suggests that people lose, on average, about 20 minutes of life for every cigarette they smoke. The sooner a person stops smoking, the longer they will live. Quitting smoking at any age substantially improves health and the benefits begin almost immediately,” says Sarah Jackson, senior researcher at the UCL Alcohol and Tobacco Research Group.
The research has been published just after the introduction of the landmark Tobacco and E-Cigarettes Bill in the United Kingdom, which recently passed its second reading in the House of Commons. The world-leading bill includes measures to create the first smoke-free generation, gradually banning the sale of tobacco products across the UK to anyone born after 1 January 2009.
‘Smoking has an immediate impact on the health of your lungs and heart, as well as significantly increasing your chances of suffering from chronic illness or disability and dying young. Just 72 hours after quitting smoking, you will breathe easier and your energy will increase. After 12 weeks, your blood circulation will improve and, by the time a year arrives, your risk of having a heart attack will have been halved compared to a smoker,” highlights Dr Jeanelle de Gruchy, deputy chief medical officer for England.
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