Effects Of Tobacco Smoking On Women

Effects Of Tobacco Smoking On Women

Cigarette smoking is a deadly habit which many people engage in despite numerous enlightenment and awareness campaigns on the dangers both to the smokers themselves and non-smokers. It is, indeed, strange that manufacturers of a product could plainly tell consumers that their product is deadly, and the consumers would still go ahead to purchase and consume the product. Even though tobacco manufacturers are free to advertise and sell their products, they have been mandated by government to warn consumers of the dangers of using their products. And so, on every pack of cigarette, bill board, and immediately after promoting tobacco products on radio and television, you see and hear “WARNING: The Federal Ministry of Health warns that tobacco smoking is dangerous to health”, or “The Federal Ministry of Health warns that tobacco smokers are liable to die young”.

In spite of these scary warnings, however, smokers are not deterred from engaging in their risky habit. They puff on the cigarette as though their lives depend on it, totally indifferent to the hazards inherent in cigarette smoking. And as they get addicted to the habit, they become more and more dangerous not only to themselves, but also to non-smokers around them who are forced to inhale the smoke.

Cigarette smoking constitutes serious danger to human health. Aside from lung cancer which is the number one side effect of smoking, kidney problem, stroke, complicated pregnancy, infertility in men and women are some of the problems associated with the habit. The carbon monoxide from smoking also robs the muscles, the brain and body tissues of oxygen, thus weakening the entire human system and over-working the heart.

Statistics have shown that tobacco smoking kills more than HIV/AIDS and malaria combined! And sadly, both the young and old, males and females are involved in this dangerous habit of cigarette smoking. Gone were the days when only men smoked cigarettes. These days, aside from professional prostitutes, our institutions of higher learning are replete with female students smoking cigarettes freely in a most disgusting manner. The repulsive habit seems to make them feel like they are more sociable than their non-smoking counterparts. They care less about the fact that millions of people die yearly around the world from diseases caused by smoking. Moreover, it has been discovered that one in two lifetime smokers die from their habit and half of these deaths occur in the middle age.

It was in realisation of the desperate need to save cigarette smokers from themselves, and indeed, the entire human race from the dangerous effects of tobacco smoke, that the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared 31st May of every year as the World No Tobacco Day. The Day is aimed at creating awareness on the health risks of tobacco consumption and evolving effective strategies to reduce the harmful trend.

This year’s World No Tobacco Day, being commemorated today, has the theme “Stop illicit trade of tobacco products”. There are years that the theme of the World No Tobacco Day targets the feminine gender to focus attention on the danger tobacco smoking poses to the womenfolk.

One of such years was 2010, when the World No Tobacco Day was commemorated with the theme “Gender and Tobacco with an Emphasis on Marketing to Women”. It was intended to draw particular attention to the harmful effects of tobacco marketing to women and girls as well as its consumption by the feminine gender.

Infertility and foetal injury

Briefing newsmen to mark that 2010 World No Tobacco Day, the Secretary of Social Development at the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Secretariat, Mrs. Blessing Onuh, disclosed that women constitute about 20% of the world’s over 1 billion smokers! She added that these women and teenage girls had become the targets of the tobacco industry which needs to recruit new users to replace the nearly half of current users who would die prematurely from tobacco-related diseases.

In his book, “The Effect of Cigarette Smoking”, a medical scientist, Prince Joseph Nnaji, said women who smoke heavily show a 43% decline in fertility, and that women smokers are three times more likely to be infertile than non-smokers. He also revealed that women smokers have fewer reproductive years as they reach menopause much earlier than non-smokers.

According to the researcher, pregnant women have an increased sensitivity to the effects of carbon monoxide inhaled in cigarette smoke as it decreases the ability of the blood to carry oxygen to the tissues, thereby causing headaches, nausea, dizziness, weariness, rapid breathing, unconsciousness and death! On the effects on babies in the womb, he said smoking by pregnant women may result in foetal injury, premature birth and low birth weight. He added that cigarette smoke can be passed from even the man to a developing foetus indirectly by passive smoke inhaled by the mother, or directly in semen, possibly leading to adverse development outcomes such as congenital anomalies and childhood cancer.

How innocent babies suffer for the sins of their parents!

Prince Nnaji advised smoking partners planning to have children to stop the habit for about four months before the planned pregnancy to ensure that the reproductive systems are as healthy as possible before conception takes place, and also ensure the health of the unborn child.

From the foregoing, it is clear that it is not safe to smoke or hang around smokers. Women smokers are, therefore, advised to quit the risky habit and warn their partners to do the same, while non-smokers especially pregnant women should avoid any exposure to cigarette smoke. It was a great relief when the FCT Administration declared a ban on public smoking in 2010, but it said it could not enforce the ban until the National Assembly passed the revised bill on smoking into law. Mrs. Onuh said the administration would arrest and prosecute offenders of the ban on public smoking no matter how highly placed.

By 2011, the Senate passed the National Tobacco Control Bill, which frowned at tobacco advertisements, smoking in public and smoking by the underage among other things, but unfortunately, the executive did not sign it into law.

WOMANHOOD calls on the new government of Nigeria to collaborate with the incoming 8th National Assembly to revisit the Tobacco Control Bill with a view to making it into a law. The government should do whatever it takes not only to ban smoking in public places but also to enforce the ban in the interest of the health of all Nigerians.

Women on their part must avoid smoking and hanging around smokers because of the harmful effects of tobacco smoke on the feminine gender.



By Nike Oluwole.