Smoking: what you need to know

• Tobacco kills up to 2 in 3 people who use it long term
• Each year, over 7 million people worldwide, including 80,000 people in the UK, die due to tobacco
• Smoking harms nearly ever organ in the body
• Cigarettes contain nicotine, which is addictive, as well as many chemicals which are extremely harmful to health
• About one in ten people in the UK smoke (9.8%)
• Smoking makes society less equal because disadvantaged people are more likely to smoke.
• The earlier someone quits smoking the better, but everyone can benefit from quitting.

Globally, tobacco kills up to 2 in 3 people who use it long term. It is the only legal consumer product that normally kills when used exactly as intended. Each year, 7 million people worldwide, including 80,000 people in the UK, die due to tobacco. On average, people who smoke all their lives will die 10 years younger than non-smokers.

Tobacco smoke causes cancer by damaging the lungs and airway. One in five cancer deaths in the UK are due to tobacco. Smoking can also cause deadly or life-limiting heart and breathing problems. Smoking harms nearly every organ in the body and causes a range of other diseases, such as diabetes, eye disease and dementia.

Breathing even a little tobacco smoke can be harmful. Exposure to other people’s smoke can harm health, and is especially harmful to children. Smoking in pregnancy can cause serious illness for both mothers and their babies. 

See also:

ASH Fact Sheet Smoking and Cancer

ASH Fact Sheet Smoking, the Heart and Circulation

ASH Fact Sheet Smoking and Respiratory Disease

ASH Fact Sheet Smoking and Other Health Conditions

ASH Fact Sheet Secondhand Smoke

ASH Fact Sheet Smoking, Pregnancy and Fertility

Cigarettes, cigars, cigarillos, pipe tobacco and shisha (hookah or waterpipe) all contain chopped up tobacco leaves which are burnt and inhaled. The tobacco leaves contain nicotine, which is addictive, as well as many chemicals which are extremely harmful to health. Cigarettes are by far the most common type in the UK. 

Heated tobacco products also use tobacco, but heat it without burning. Heated tobacco products are not risk-free and are not currently recommended for smoking cessation by NICE.

Oral tobacco products include chewing tobacco, dip, betel quid and snus and are intended to be chewed or held in the mouth without being burnt. Although they don’t produce smoke that reaches the lungs, they are still harmful to health.

See also:

ASH Fact Sheet What’s in a cigarette? 

ASH Key Topic Heated tobacco

Just under one out of every ten people in the UK smokes (9.8%). Smoking prevalence has been decreasing ever since 1974, when records began in the UK. Since 2011, the largest fall in smoking prevalence has been among 18- to 24-year-olds. 

Smoking is a key cause of inequity in health outcomes and financial status. One in six adults in the UK in routine and manual occupations smoke (16.9%) compared with one in seventeen in managerial and professional occupation (5.9%). Someone who rents through an LA or HA is four times as likely to smoke as someone who owns their house outright.

See also:

ASH Fact Sheet Facts at a glance

ASH Fact Sheet Smoking statistics

ASH Tool Inequalities Dashboard

Nicotine Replacement Therapy products (NRT), such as patches, gum and lozenges are used by smokers to help them quit smoking and are licensed as medicines.

Vapes, also known as e-cigarettes, work by heating an e-liquid which contains nicotine, flavourings, propylene glycol and vegetable glycerine. They do not contain tobacco. While vaping is not risk free, it is much less harmful than smoking in the short- and medium-term and is effective for helping adults who smoke to quit.

Nicotine pouches are placed inside the lip. They do not contain tobacco, but do contain nicotine. Nicotine pouches are not risk-free and are not currently recommended for smoking cessation by NICE. Snus, which is a similar product that contains tobacco, is illegal in the UK.

See also:

ASH Key Topic Vaping: What you need to know

ASH Key Topic Youth vaping: the facts

ASH Key Topic Nicotine Pouches

Smoking is highly addictive, and most people try many times to quit before they succeed. However, the chance of quitting successfully can be tripled with the help of behavioural support and pharmacological treatment.

The earlier someone stops smoking the better, but even those who are already ill from smoking related disease can benefit from quitting because it will reduce symptoms, improve treatment outcomes and increase chances of survival. 

Some of the benefits of quitting smoking can be felt quickly: within days breathing becomes easier and within weeks circulation improves. Ten years after quitting smoking, the risk of death from lung cancer falls to about half that to someone who continues to smoke.

See also:

ASH Key Topic Stopping smoking

Most adults who smoke first tried smoking when they were under 18. People who start smoking when young are more likely to become ill or die from smoking than those who start when they are older.

Young people growing up in households where caregivers smoke are twice as likely to try smoking and four times as likely to become regular smokers, transferring inequalities in smoking rates from generation to generation. Young people may also experience dangerous exposure to secondhand smoke from family members.

ASH Key Topic Youth Smoking

ASH Fact Sheet Young People and Smoking

ASH Key Topic Secondhand smoke

ASH Fact Sheet Secondhand Smoke