Smoking News

December 24, 2024

Top Headlines

Persistent Tobacco Smoking from Childhood May Cause Heart Damage by the Mid-Twenties

Dec. 11, 2024 — The majority of children who started smoking tobacco at age 10 years or in their later teens continued to smoke until their mid-twenties. Continuous smoking from childhood significantly increased the ...

Soda Taxes Don't Just Affect Sales: They Help Change People's Minds

Dec. 10, 2024 — The city of Berkeley's first-in-the-nation soda tax a decade ago, along with more recent Bay Area tax increases on sugar-sweetened drinks, have not only led to reduced sales. They are also associated with significant changes in social norms and ...

Cigarette Smoke Alters Microbiota, Aggravates Flu Severity

Nov. 20, 2024 — A new study shows that cigarette-smoke induced changes to the microbiota resulted in increased severity of disease in mice infected with influenza A ...

Maternal Exercise During Pregnancy May Protect the Child Against Asthma

Oct. 10, 2024 — The risk of asthma in the child can be reduced by nearly half if the mother engages in active physical exercise at least three times a week during pregnancy, compared to a child of a mother who is less active, a new study ...

Latest Headlines

updated 10:53pm EST

Cannabis Use Tied to Head and Neck Cancer

Aug. 8, 2024 — A new study suggests that cannabis, the most commonly used illicit substance worldwide, is associated with an increased occurrence of head and neck ...

Are Cardiovascular Risk Factors Linked to Migraine?

July 31, 2024 — Having high blood pressure, specifically high diastolic blood pressure, was linked to a slightly higher odds of ever having migraine in female participants, according to a new study. Diastolic ...

New Study Finds 40-Percent of Cancer Cases and Almost Half of All Deaths in the US Linked to Modifiable Risk Factors

July 11, 2024 — A new study finds four in 10 cancer cases and about one-half of all cancer deaths in adults 30 years old and older in the United States (or 713,340 ...

Cannabis Use Tied to Increased Risk of Severe COVID-19

June 21, 2024 — A new study shows that people with COVID-19 who used cannabis were more likely to be hospitalized and require intensive care than those who did not use the ...

Colorless, Odorless Gas Likely Linked to Alarming Rise in Non-Smoking Lung Cancer

Apr. 11, 2024 — Although lung cancer is traditionally thought of as a 'smoker's disease,' a surprising 15-20% of newly diagnosed lung cancers occur in people who ...

Cannabis Use Linked to Increase in Heart Attack and Stroke Risk

Feb. 28, 2024 — More frequent use of cannabis was associated with higher odds of adverse cardiovascular outcomes, finds new ...

Smoking Has Long-Term Effects on the Immune System

Feb. 14, 2024 — Like other factors such as age, sex and genetics, smoking has a major impact on immune responses, according to a new study. In addition to its short-term impact on immunity, smoking also has ...

How Gum Disease Aggravates Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease

Jan. 14, 2024 — A new study shows how periodontitis, an oral disease, activates immune cells associated with aggravated progression of ...

Thirdhand Smoke May Harm Children

Jan. 8, 2024 — Researchers tested the surfaces in smoking households where children reside and found troubling ...

Smoking Causes Brain Shrinkage, Study Finds

Dec. 12, 2023 — Smoking shrinks the brain and effectively causes premature brain aging, according to a new study. Quitting smoking prevents further loss of brain tissue but doesn't restore the brain to its original ...

Methods to Quit Smoking Effective Regardless of Mental Health History

June 4, 2024 — Researchers conducted a survey to study how mental health relates to methods people use to quit smoking, also known as smoking cessation aids. While the number of adults who smoke cigarettes has ...

Understanding Youth Nicotine Use to Prevent Initiation and Escalation

May 1, 2024 — Using multiple nicotine products can be associated with higher levels of nicotine dependence among youth and increased mortality in adults, compared with the use of one product alone. Researchers ...

Risk of Premature Birth from Smoking While Pregnant More Than Double Previous Estimates

Sep. 28, 2023 — Researchers have found that women who smoke during pregnancy are 2.6 times more likely to give birth prematurely compared to non-smokers -- more than double the previous estimate. The study also ...

Study Finds High Blood and Urinary Metal Levels Among Exclusive Marijuana Users

Aug. 30, 2023 — New research has detected significant levels of metals in the blood and urine among marijuana users, concluding that marijuana may be an important and under-recognized source of lead and cadmium ...

COVID-19 Pandemic Has Long-Lasting Effects on Adolescent Mental Health and Substance Use

Mar. 14, 2023 — The COVID-19 pandemic has had a long-lasting impact on adolescent mental health and substance use, according to a new population-based study based on survey responses from a sample of over 64,000 13- ...

New Study Identifies Risk Factors Associated With Low Birthweights

Feb. 15, 2023 — Multiple births, a short interval between pregnancies and mothers with a maternal physical or mental health condition are more at risk of having a low birth rate baby. Every year 20 million children ...

Machine Learning Identifies Drugs That Could Potentially Help Smokers Quit

Jan. 30, 2023 — Medications like dextromethorphan, used to treat coughs caused by cold and flu, could potentially be repurposed to help people quit smoking cigarettes, according to a new study. Researchers developed ...

Smoking Increases Chances of Mid-Life Memory Loss, Confusion

Dec. 21, 2022 — Middle-aged smokers are far more likely to report having memory loss and confusion than nonsmokers, and the likelihood of cognitive decline is lower for those who have quit, even recently, a new ...

Carbon Ultrafine Particles Accelerate Lung Cancer Progression

Nov. 29, 2022 — While it may seem common knowledge that smoking is bad for your lungs, if and how ultrafine particles present in cigarette smoke impact the development and progression of lung cancer remains unclear. ...

Marijuana and E-Cigs Can Harm the Heart Like Traditional Cigarettes, Research Finds

Nov. 15, 2022 — E-cigarettes and marijuana have similar harmful effects on the heart as tobacco cigarettes, opening the door to abnormal heart rhythms, researchers ...

Emphysema More Common in Marijuana Smokers Than Cigarette Smokers

Nov. 15, 2022 — Airway inflammation and emphysema are more common in marijuana smokers than cigarette smokers, according to a new study. Researchers said the difference may be due to the way that marijuana is smoked ...

New Research Shows E-Cigarettes Cause Cardiac Arrhythmias

Oct. 25, 2022 — A new study has found that exposure to e-cigarette aerosols can cause heart arrhythmias in animal models -- both in the form of premature and skipped heart beats. The study findings suggest exposure ...

Pregnancy Could Curb Desire to Smoke Before It Is Suspected or Recognized

Oct. 17, 2022 — Pregnant smokers reduced their smoking by an average of one cigarette per day before becoming aware they were pregnant, reports a new study of more than 400 pregnant people. Then, in the month after ...

Proposed Menthol Ban in U.S. Would Cut Littering by 3.8 Billion Cigarette Butts Annually

Oct. 13, 2022 — Discarded cigarette butts are a top source of plastic pollution, and a new study estimates that banning menthol cigarettes in the United States would lead to 3.8 billion fewer littered cigarette ...

Thirdhand Smoke Can Trigger Skin Diseases, Study Finds

Oct. 11, 2022 — Researchers have found that acute exposure of the skin to thirdhand smoke -- residual pollutants from tobacco smoke that remain on surfaces and in dust after tobacco has been smoked -- elevates ...

Smoking Increases the Risk of Illness and Viral Infection, Including Type of Coronavirus

Oct. 5, 2022 — New findings by tobacco researchers may lead to urgent recommendations for doctors to help patients quit smoking as a way of countering ...

Smoking to Blame for Most of England's Socioeconomic Disparity in Cancer Incidence, Study Finds

Sep. 21, 2022 — The majority of the socioeconomic disparity, or deprivation gap, in cancer incidence could have been prevented in England between 2013 and 2017 if nobody had smoked, according to a new ...

Second-Hand Smoke a Possible Asthma Risk for Future Generations, Study Finds

Sep. 15, 2022 — Children are more likely to develop asthma if their father was exposed to second-hand smoke when he was a child, according to a new ...

Bronchodilators Don't Improve Smoking-Related Respiratory Symptoms in People Without COPD

Sep. 5, 2022 — Researchers have found that dual bronchodilators -- long-lasting inhalers that relax the airways and make it easier to breathe -- do little to help people who do not have chronic obstructive ...

Smoking Is Even More Damaging to the Heart Than Previously Thought

Aug. 25, 2022 — Smokers have weaker hearts than non-smokers, according to new research. The study found that the more people smoked, the worse their heart function became. Some function was restored when people ...