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Jose A. Chavez

Katia Monterrey

ENGL 5-74

11 July 2021

Solution To Stop Lung Pollution

An issue I see a lot in my community and others, is the addiction to using tobacco

products. According to the CDC, approximately more than four hundred eighty thousand

individuals pass away each year due to smoking or in some cases, second-hand-smoking.(2018).

The most common tobacco product that is used in the US would be cigarettes, which is going to

be the main spoken product of the essay. I have read many articles that have come up with

solutions to get rid of smoking or lower the death toll caused by it and I have wanted to share

some of my thoughts on the topic and also provide a solution. There have been many programs

created to teach the youth the negative effects that come with using cigarettes and also programs

to help people who might have gotten out of the habit of smoking and need help but, the death

toll has never really changed, so is there any easy way this issue can be resolved?

I found out that there were many groups of people that wanted change and had the same

view as I did on the issue. For example, there is an organization called WHO (World Health

Organization), and also a popular group that is part of the CDC which is called OSH (Office of

Smoking and Health). We had common interests and common reasons for why we cared about

finding solutions and most were based off of how we saw the damage that cigarettes caused to

human health and the some financial issues that came along with it. With knowing the cost of all

treatments done to help smokers, there is no possibility that anyone would agree that someone
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should go through that financial problem. It is estimated that more than one hundred billion

dollars are used to treat people with damages caused by cigarettes and some one has to pay for

those treatments and that usually is the family of the patient and the health care cost is not

cheap.(“Cost of Smoking'') Something else that is not cheap would be the amount of tobacco

products that people buy which on average is about two hundred eighty dollars a week which can

total to be around more than ten thousand dollars a year. That might not sound all bad because

people are allowed to spend money on what they want, but when that total cost of cigarettes

takes up about a third of your annual earnings, then that might become a financial issue and

cause stress. Smoking does not just affect the person doing it, it also affects others' health and

also affects the people who take care of them and who have to cover their expenses. Issues like

this can be prevented by finding help for people with an addiction and helping people stay away

from dangerous products like cigarettes.

Some people may say that smoking is all terrible and has no benefits but others may think

otherwise. Some say it is to relieve pain or stress, or for pleasure, or for doing it just because. On

some occasions, people do it only at social encounters when others are doing it as well. The only

real benefit of smoking would be that smoking helps prevent cartilage and joint deterioration

(2020). That is the only researched benefit that someone would get when they smoke and that

does not even compare to all the benefits you would get if you do not smoke at all. Some benefits

would be the prevention of fatal diseases such as pneumonia, emphysema, and lung cancer.

(2020) According to the American Lung Association (ALA), smoking causes about eighty-seven

percent of deaths due to lung cancer and eighty percent of all deaths from chronic obstructive

pulmonary disease. Not smoking prevents so many diseases from entering your body. For

example, in the article “Does Smoking Increase the Risk of Severe COVID-19 Illness?”, it was said
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that smoking could cause the symptoms of Covid-19 to be worse in the patients who smoked due

to their respiratory system already having an issue with having smoke in the patient's lungs from

smoking tobacco products. But it is not only the respiratory system affected by smoking, it also

includes the heart, blood vessels, the eyes, mouth, reproductive organs, bones, bladder, and

digestive organs. This means that lung cancer is not the only cancer that some one can get from

using cigarettes, oral cancer and liver cancer are the most common forms. Honestly, the list goes

on and on for the benefits of not smoking but people still decide to continue and researchers have

no idea why but it does not mean that people do not need help quitting or that it can not be

prevented.

Some solutions to solve this issue would be to create more programs and presentations

that could help teach the youth the dangers of smoking cigarettes so they can stay away from

those products and not have the urge to use them. These programs would be introduced into

schools where it can most easily access kids and also most benefit the kids. The way it would be

made possible would be through either private funding or government funding given to the

school so they can set up the programs. There are a lot of small but major actions that can be

done to help lower the use of cigarettes, for example, by raising the sales tax on cigarettes which

can lead people to think twice before purchasing such an expensive item. Another example

would be to limit or lower the amount of advertisements that are shown so the temptation of

purchasing or considering using cigarettes can be lower. There are many ways to prevent people

from smoking, but what about the people who have been smoking and want to leave the habit of

using it? One solution would be to create more rehab centers or create more rehab programs that

can reach out and help individuals with this addiction and possibly save lives. These solutions

have all been put into play before and it seems that it has worked over the years because the use
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of cigarettes has lowered over the past sixteen years with about a seven percent difference based

on every one hundred Americans. That does not change the lethal percentage cigarettes have but

it does lower the number of people who may be affected by the use of cigarettes.

A very extensive and difficult solution would be to pass a bill and get a ban on the

production and sale of cigarettes. It would have a huge impact on everyone because it would

cause tobacco companies to shut down which also means unemployment for some. A major

change would be health care costs which would be significantly lower and also the death toll for

smokers would lower as well. Another impact it would have would be that second-hand smoking

would not be a problem and that would also change the legislature for smoke-free zones because

they would serve no use any more due to the ban. The way that this ban would even happen

would have to be by creating a bill which then goes on to be a law, that bans the use of cigarettes.

This idea or the very beginning of the bill would start off with a group of people with similar

ideas which then find a representative to present their bill to the house of representatives, which

then goes to a committee then goes through the whole process that any other bill would go

through. After it gets accepted and signed upon, the way this law would be enforced would be by

using law enforcement to enforce this new law and monitor any illegal activity. This would also

mean that tobacco companies will shut down and stop production which would be like cutting

the roots off a plant and stopping this epidemic at its source. Some major complications would

include the removal of the entire product off the market and also enforcing the new law would be

a challenge because it would not be simple. Another complication would be convincing congress

and federal candidates that would be against the bill due to the revenue that tobacco companies

make which is around eight billion two hundred million dollars. Other places or people who

would not benefit from this bill would be bars and casinos whose main customers would be
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smokers. But with that much revenue being brought in, who wouldn’t want to receive a part of

that money when all you have to do is deny accepting a bill similar to the one that was

presented? There are many small solutions that can reduce the use of cigarettes but to make it

extinct would be nearly impossible.

After looking at some of the solutions, are there any legitimate and easy solutions that

someone could do to either prevent or help someone stay away from cigarettes? The answer is,

of course not. A difficult issue like this does not have an easy solution, it would take a lot of

time, money and effort for rehab programs and youth programs to become efficient. Some

efficient solutions would be the increase in sales tax for cigarettes and also reducing the amount

of advertisements there are to brand cigarettes. Creating a law to ban the use of cigarettes seems

far from reality and it truly is but as long as there are people who are willing to help others, the

idea of banning cigarettes seems less impossible to accomplish.

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Works Cited

Savgreenmak, Savgreenmak. “Reasons Why Smoking Should Not Be Banned.” Smoking, 27 Sept.
2020,Reasons why smoking should not be banned (thatcigarplace.com).

“Infographics.” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention, 10 Dec. 2019,Infographics | Smoking & Tobacco Use | CDC.

“ALCOHOL AND TOBACCO.” National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services, Jan. 2007, NIAAA Publications (nih.gov)

“Alcohol Facts and Statistics.” National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services, Current Cigarette Smoking Among Adults in the
United States | CDC

“Cost of Smoking.” Tobacco, 17 June 2016, tobaccofreelife.org/why-quit-smoking/cost-smoking/

“10 Of the Worst DISEASES Smoking Causes: State of Tobacco Control.” State of Tobacco
Control | American Lung Association, 10 of the Worst Diseases Smoking Causes | State of Tobacco
Control | American Lung Association

Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. “Does Smoking Increase the Risk of Severe COVID-19 Illness?” Does
Smoking Increase the Risk of Severe Covid-19 Illness?, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, 9 Sept. 2020,
www.cedars-sinai.org/newsroom/does-smoking-increase-the-risk-of-severe-covid-19-illness/.
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