Smoking and illness: is there a link?

A new report indicates that one in 10 smokers in Victoria, Australia, do not connect tobacco smoking with certain illnesses usually associated with smoking.

According to a report by Amy Bainbridge for the Australian Broadcasting Corp., Cancer Council Victoria (CCV) has published its new research to mark the anniversary of the publication of the 1964 report by the U.S. surgeon general into smoking and health.

The survey of 4,500 Victorians was conducted by the charity and was said to have included a cross-section of smokers and nonsmokers.

CCV’s Todd Harper was quoted as saying that about a quarter of the smokers surveyed could not “spontaneously say that heart attacks were caused by smoking.”

He said also that the survey data showed that less than 10 percent of current smokers could connect smoking with “asthma, gangrene, eye problems or pregnancy problems.”

And only half of all smokers surveyed could “spontaneously link smoking with lung cancer.”

“Given that smoking still kills 15,000 people every year, given that smoking will kill one in two long-term users, I think it shows the importance and the urgency of keeping up the fight on tobacco,” said Harper.

“We can’t assume for a second that this job is done when we have 15,000 a year in Australia dying because of smoking.”