Around 14 million major medical conditions of adults in the U.S. have been attributed to tobacco smoking, says a recent study, also describing the habit as the “leading cause of preventable diseases” in the country.
Among the smoking-related health conditions are colon cancer, diabetes, emphysema, heart attack, stroke, and chronic bronchitis, according to the study.
Basis of the study were figures from the National Health Interview Survey in 2006-2012, the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), and the U.S. Census Bureau in 2009.
“This figure is generally conservative owing to the existence of other diseases and medical events that were not included in these estimates,” reads the study published in JAMA on Oct. 13.
Study authors, led by Brian Rostron, PhD, MPH, discovered that the biggest cause of illnesses attributed to smoking remains to be the chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). An estimate of 7.5 million COPD cases was accounted to smoking, which is 70 percent higher as opposed to estimated cases that were based on self-reported prevalence data.
The study also states that the health burden of smoking in the U.S. remains huge and that the updated estimates only went to show that COPD could be considerably underreported in the health survey.
In an invited commentary, Steven A. Schroeder, M.D., meanwhile says the new study “should serve to keep tobacco control and its 2-fold aims of preventing initiation and helping smokers quit as the most important clinical and public health priorities for the foreseeable future."
He says that combining the COPD cases from the NHANES and National Health Interview Survey showed that 57 percent of it was accounted to women, regardless of only four to five percent prevalence rates of smoking as compared to men in the previous decades.
He adds that although women’s life spans may explain for some of such discrepancy, female smokers are likely more vulnerable to pulmonary complications of the bad habit, which include lung cancer and COPD.
He also mentions that the COPD prevalence rate in women has currently exceeded the prevalence rate of men, based on a 2014 Report of the Surgeon General.
Tobacco control, says Schroeder, has been referred to as among the most important achievements in health for the last 50 years. Nevertheless, he says “there is still much more to be done, with the number of smokers worldwide now just short of 1 billion people,” adding that the study is a glaring reminder of such unfinished work.
The commentary also states that smoking causes around 480,000 deaths yearly in the U.S. and about 5.7 million deaths annually worldwide.
The authors finally underscore the need to have ongoing and dynamic efforts to prevent smoking.
The study, Estimation of Cigarette Smoking–Attributable Morbidity in the United States, is available online at JAMA Internal Medicine.
