World No Tobacco Day 2021: Facts and Tips

World No Tobacco Day – The theme of this year’s World No Tobacco Day is “Commit to Quit”. According to WHO, more than 70% of tobacco users globally lack access to the tools for quitting successfully. This increased because our health workers are busy in handling Covid-19 pandemic. According to a study published in Lancet , It is a challenge in global health to end the global tobacco epidemic.

World No Tobacco Day 2021: Some Facts

• “One in six deaths are caused by smoking tobacco(non-communicable disease-related deaths)”.
• “Top 10 countries with the largest number of tobacco smokers(2019), together comprising nearly two-thirds of the global tobacco smoking population, were China, India, Indonesia, the USA, Russia, Bangladesh, Japan, Turkey, Vietnam, and the Philippines”.
• “Over the last 3 decades, smoking caused more than 200 million deaths, smoking’s annual economic cost exceeds US $1 trillion”.
• “Tobacco control has been identified as a crucial and necessary part of reaching global goals of 25% reduction in ”premature mortality from non-communicable diseases by 2025 outlined in the WHO global non-communicable disease monitoring framework and a third reduction by 2030 included in the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)”.

Sources: Lancet’s study

Diseases caused by Tobacco consumption

Everyone knows that smoking is injurious to health and causes cancer but there are many health problems caused by smoking. Smoking causes many diseases and may leads to disability and damages almost every part of your body. Below are the list of few diseases and health problems caused by smoking:

• Cardiovascular Diseases
• Lung cancer
• Mouth Cancer
• Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease(COPD)
• Persistent coughing leading to Tuberculosis
• Weakened Immune system
• Anxiety and Irritability
• Poor vision
• Infertility and erectile dysfunction

Tips to quit smoking

Below are the few tips that you can help you to reduce or quit your habit of smoking:

1. Meditate: According to a study published in Drug and Alcohol Dependence called “Mind-body practises: an alternative, drug-free treatment for smoking cessation? A systematic review of the literature”, it was found that meditation can help you to quit smoking. Activities like meditation, yoga, and exercises to calm your mind and relax your body are found to be very helpful.
2.  Keep Monitoring: Monitor your exercises to raise mindfulness. This can help tackle desires and activities that may prompt it. Learn how to say “no” to other people and yourself. Ensure that you mark even small achievements and monitor the milestone you’ve accomplished.
3. Make & follow the plan: Approaching things in a chronological and systematic order can help you in easing the process. Make a list of bad activities or habits which you want to get rid of and keep crossing them out one by one from the list.
4. Stress Management: According to smokers, Smoking relieves stress and generally stress is the main reasons for them to smoke. Keep yourself busy to manage your stress level, do some activities which is relaxing for you. Take a walk in the morning/evening, eat your favourite food or get a massage. But do not smoke to relive stress.
5. Take professional help: When nothing is working out, there is no shame in asking for help. Get professional help if possible. They can provide you the correct treatment methods, for example, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), which may be beneficial for you.

As an aside: I also recommend you to read: Black Fungus or Mucormycosis

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