Tuesday,
August 29, 2006 - As the nation celebrated the 86th
anniversary of granting women the right to vote this Women's
Equality Day, on Saturday, Aug.26, Smoke Free Society, is
asking women who smoke to quit for a healthier future and
to be more alert to their secondhand smoke effects on others.
The national,
nonprofit organization provides several free ways to help
smokers quit as well as offers free eCards for individuals
to send to their loved ones to pledge their love, support
and involvement in helping them quit smoking. Smoke Free Society
also offers a free online download of its "Proven Stop
Smoking Technique" to help smokers correctly and effectively
quit in just 17 days without any substance or drug. Individuals
should go to www.SmokeFreeSociety.org for the free download,
eCards and other lifesaving information.
"Everyone
knows smoking is bad for them and 70 percent, or 32 million
of all American smokers, want to quit on any given day. However,
many don't stop before it's too late and they are diagnosed
with lung cancer," said Linda Seyedin, founder of Smoke
Free Society. "Women need to get more involved and start
taking more control of their lives because 90 percent of female
lung cancer deaths are caused by smoking. With teenage girls
around the world smoking about the same rate as boys now,
and more and more women smoking overall worldwide and the
rate expecting to increase from 12 percent to 20 percent by
2025, we all must get involved to help educate our loved ones
on the deadly effects smoking has on people," she continued.
Each year,
Women's Equality Day brings more attention to women's earned
right to vote. And voting is a great way to get more involved
in helping to control issues that are important to the well-being
of their family and community. More and more women are entering
politics and the professional workforce to make a difference.
An estimated 50 percent of U.S. businesses are now owned by
women.
Women who smoke
run twice the risk of lung cancer as men who smoke. Lung cancer
is something everyone should be concerned about since you
don't have to smoke to acquire it. Non-smokers who reside
with a smoker have a 24 percent increase in risk for developing
lung cancer when compared with other non-smokers. Each year,
up to 3,000 lung cancer deaths are estimated to occur in the
U.S. that are attributable to passive smoking.
The National
Cancer Institute reports that about half of the smoke generated
by every cigarette smoked is sidestream smoke. Sidestream
or secondhand smoke contains the same carcinogens as mainstream
smoke, developmental toxins that alter the normal growth of
cells, and mutagens that change cell genetics. And according
to Katherine Hammond, Ph.D., University of California at Berkeley's
School of Public Health, non-smokers receive the following
equivalents of cigarette smoking:
- In the non-smoking
section of a restaurant equals 1.5 cigarettes
- In a pack-a-day
smoker's home equals three cigarettes
- In a smoky
bar for two hours equals four cigarettes
- Riding in
a car one hour with a smoker equals four cigarettes
Smoke Free
Society is a national, not-for-profit organization solely
dedicated to providing information and techniques to help
smokers quit smoking, educating children to prevent them from
starting to smoke or use tobacco, and uniting the community
to promote a healthy, tobacco-free lifestyle. Its web site
is www.SmokeFreeSociety.org.
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