Mun 1 Hyunji Mun 2018 Science Mr.

Parsons Dec 6 2013 Word Count: 882 Smoking and Cardiovascular Health Smoking is one of the significant causes of a cardiovascular disease. In United States, 1 in 5 deaths are caused by smoking. (URMC, 2013) Oxygen and nutrients come in to the heart through coronary arteries and their branches. After time, plaque can pile up in the arteries and narrow them, which will lessen the flow of blood and increase the risk of heart attack. The process of this is called atherosclerosis. Smoking helps the coronary arteries to block and narrow. A heart attack happens when a clot of blood blocks the blood from flowing in the coronary artery. (BHC, 2011) Smoking can also cause peripheral arterial disease (PAD). This happens when pile of plaque builds up in the arteries that are connected with the head and the organs. People with this disease have higher risk of heart disease, heart attack and stroke. (National Heart, 2011) Ross and Glomset were the first ones to come up with the chronic endothelial injury hypothesis. They said that it happens in response to localized injury in the artery wall. There are three stages to atherosclerosis. First, the smooth muscle cells in the artery wall start multiplying. Then the connective tissue will form and fats will assemble around and in the cells. Ross thought that the process starts when cells on the artery wall became damaged, and start to mix with white blood cells called monocytes. The monocytes stick to the wall and will move under the surface layer and change to macrophages. Some of them will change into a globe with a foamy look, which are called foam cells. The foam cells helps form a lump in the artery wall called fatty streak. (Pathbreakers, 1996) Also, the chemicals in cigarette such as nicotine and carbon monoxide lessen the amount of oxygen going to the tissues and increase the heart rate. (Cardiovascular Disease, 2008) About 35 million smokers try to stop smoking every year, but very few of them are successful. (Leshner, 1998) In 2003, a Chinese pharmacist called Hon Lik invented a device called electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes). (MNT, 2013) It has small storage where it contains liquid nicotine solution that vaporizes when the user inhales it. The user will feel the same sensation as smoking cigarette by puffing on the vapor but without the harmful chemicals that are in cigarette smoke. (Tierney, 2011) The battery makes the e-cigarette to work and it is connected to the vaporization chamber where has an atomizer and the atomizer creates the vapor. (Cassidy, 2013) Many countries use this product such as China, Korea, US and UK. In 2016, e-cigarettes will be licensed as medicine in UK. (Hogenboom, 2013) A survey done by American Journal of Preventative Medicine showed magnificent results. 31% of the respondents were still not smoking cigarettes after 6 months of e-cigarettes. Also the respondents who were using ecigarettes had 70% of quitting rate of cigarettes, but this is only in US. (EcigAlternative, 2013) A data from Korea Youth Risk Behavior Web-based Survey showed that out of 75,643 students, only 1% of them had experience with e-cigarettes in 2008. In 2011, it increased to 9%. They say that using e-cigarettes might lead to smoking regular cigarettes and get addicted to nicotine than helping the students to quit smoking. (ScienceDaily, 2013)

Mun 2 One of the social problems with smoking is secondhand smoke (SHS). Secondhand smoke is the smoke that comes from a other smokers breath and the smoke that comes from the tip of a burning cigarette. SHS can cause or increase the risk of coronary heart disease, lung cancer, acute stroke, and eye and nasal irritation. (Smokefree, 2013)This SHS causes about 50,000 deaths each year. (ALA, 2013) The three main places of SHS exposure are at work, public places and home. A lot of non-smokers can be affected by SHS in these places. People who avoid cigarettes, and are very careful about it, will be also affected by SHS. Especially at home where your children are, the chemicals in SHS can be very harmful to growing children. (ACS, 2012) Other problem of smoking is economic problems. Rutgers University calculated that a $10-a-day smoking habit will set you back $3,650 each year (Dowell, 2010) This is a lot of money that is just spent on smoking. The indirect costs that smokers have to pay are not that small. Smokers have to pay more for health insurance than a non-smoker. A survey by the Society of Human Resource Managers, and cited by MSN Money, revealed 5 percent of employers prefer not to hire smokers and 1 percent will not hire them under any condition. (Dowell, 2010) Employers dont see smoking as a benefit or a good thing. So it will be less easy for smokers to get a job than a non-smoker. Also, the costs for health problems caused by smoking are a great deal of a problem. The major causes of cardiovascular diseases are smoking and it does a lot of harm to the human body. There are a lot of other problems than health that are caused by smoking and they are not yet solved. But many countries are coming up with solutions such as e-cigarettes and banning smoking in restaurants. Science will help the smoking problems and decrease the rate of risks of diseases.

Mun 3 Bibliography "Smoking and Heart Disease." Better Health Channel. Heart Foundation, Apr. 2011. Web. 02 Dec. 2013. "How Does Smoking Affect the Heart and Blood Vessels?" National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute. N.p., 20 Dec. 2011. Web. 01 Dec. 2013. "Getting to the Heart of Atherosclerosis." Pathbreakers. N.p., Nov. 1996. Web. 02 Dec. 2013. Cardiovascular Disease. Burnside: n.p., Jan. 2008. PDF. Leshner, Alam. "Addiction Research Can Provide Scientific Solutions to the Problem Of Cigarette Smoking." NIDA. NIH, July 1998. Web. 03 Dec. 2013. Tierney, John. "A Tool to Quit Smoking Has Some Unlikely Critics." The New York Times. The New York Times, 7 Nov. 2011. Web. 3 Dec. 2013. Hogenboom, Melissa. "Electronic Cigarettes 'could save Millions of Lives'" BBC News. BBC, 12 Nov. 2013. Web. 02 Dec. 2013. "What Are E-Cigarettes (Electronic Cigarettes)?" Medical News Today. MediLexicon International, 10 Sept. 2013. Web. 02 Dec. 2013. Cassidy, Susan. "How Electronic Cigarettes Work." HowStuffWorks. HowStuffWorks, n.d. Web. 03 Dec. 2013. "E-cigarette Success Rate." Ecigarette Success Rates. EcigAlternative, n.d. Web. 03 Dec. 2013. "Electronic Cigarettes: New Route to Smoking Addiction for Adolescents." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 26 Nov. 2013. Web. 03 Dec. 2013. "Smoking and Cardiovascular Disease." University of Rochester Medical Center. N.p., 3 Dec. 2013. Web. 01 Dec. 2013. "Second-hand Smoke." Smokefree. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Dec. 2013. "Secondhand Smoke." American Lung Association. Convio, 2013. Web. 01 Dec. 2013. "Secondhand Smoke." American Cancer Society. American Cancer Society, 12 Oct. 2012. Web. 03 Dec. 2013. Dowell, Derek. "Financial Problems Caused by Smoking." EHow. Demand Media, 13 Oct. 2010. Web. 04 Dec. 2013.