As the month of November approaches, and with it the opportunity to quit smoking thanks to Operation No Tobacco Month, researchers from the American Cancer Society have sought to find out whether the age at which one decides to quit smoking had an impact on reducing the risk of early mortality.
“All smokers know they need stop smoking but it’s never the right time” explains Dr. John Pierce of the University of San Diego (California). “Their urge to stop is cut short with phrases like “I don’t need to following”. This is why the researchers wanted to quantify the benefits of quitting smoking by age, to encourage younger people to quit smoking.
Quitting smoking before age 35 completely reduces the additional risk of death
This study involved more than 550,000 US participants whose health data was collected from 1997 to 2018 by the US Centers for Disease Control. The researchers, among other things, collected data on the specific causes of death of the participants up to the end of 2019. “Among smokers, an estimated 44.0% of all-cause deaths, 52.2% of cancer deaths , 34.7% of deaths from cardiovascular disease and 86.9% of deaths from lower respiratory tract disease are attributable to smoking.Overall, it is estimated that 31.3% of deaths among men and 22.3% of deaths among women are attributable to smoking” underline the researchers.
After analyzing health data, the researchers established that smokers who stop smoking before age 35 cancel the risk of early death from smoking, until reaching non-smokers in the statistics. If they quit smoking between the ages of 35 and 44, the risk of death associated with smoking is reduced by 90%. If they quit smoking between the ages of 45 and 64, the risk is reduced by 66%.
Source : Association Between Smoking, Smoking Cessation, and Mortality by Race, Ethnicity, and Sex Among US AdultsJama network, October 2022