Quitting smoking isn't easy, but you can do it

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GRAND FORKS AIR FORCE BASE, N.D. --  Quitting smoking isn't easy, but it's a fight you can win.

If you take advantage of the multiple services available to you, you increase your chances of quitting for good! Need a day to get started? The Great American Smokeout is Nov. 15, 2012.

Sign up now for Tobacco Cessation classes Nov. 13 at 11 a.m. and Nov. 15 at 4:30 p.m. You will receive a FREE quit kit plus an entry into a drawing for a free turkey.

Call 747-3853 or e-mail leah.melquist.2@us.af.mil to get registered.

Here is a list of reasons to quit smoking, provided by the Health & Wellness Center:
  1. Tobacco use is the leading cause of preventable death in the United States. Each year, smoking kills more people than AIDS, alcohol, drug abuse, car crashes, murders, suicides, and fires -- combined.
  2. At today's prices for cigarettes and healthcare, if you smoke one pack of cigarettes each day for ten years, you'll spend over $51,000 - easily enough to buy a new car or put a deposit on a house.
  3. Your run time increases by an average of 20-30 seconds on the 1.5 mile run if you smoke
  4. Lead by example -- More than 6 million children living today will die prematurely because of a decision they will make as adolescents -- the decision to smoke cigarettes.
  5. Think your kids are safe because you smoke outside? Research shows that children whose parents smoke outdoors absorb two times as much nicotine into their bodies as children of parents who don't smoke.
  6. Pregnant? Trying to get pregnant? Smoking increases risk for infertility, preterm delivery, stillbirth, low birth weight, and Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS).
  7. Smoking causes the following cancers: Acute myeloid leukemia, bladder cancer, cancer of the cervix, cancer of the esophagus, kidney cancer, cancer of the larynx (voice box), lung cancer, cancer of the oral cavity (mouth), pancreatic cancer, cancer of the pharynx (throat), and stomach cancer.
  8. Smoking causes coronary heart disease, the leading cause of death in the United States.
  9. Cigarette smoking causes reduced circulation by narrowing the blood vessels (arteries) and puts smokers at risk of developing peripheral vascular disease (i.e., obstruction of the large arteries in the arms and legs that can cause a range of problems from pain to tissue loss or gangrene).
  10. Smoking causes abdominal aortic aneurysm -- a swelling or weakening of the main artery of the body (the aorta) where it runs through the abdomen.
  11. Between 150,000 and 300,000 children under the age of 18 months get respiratory infections such as pneumonia and bronchitis from secondhand smoke; 7,500 to 15,000 of them must be hospitalized.
For more information:
http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/health_effects/effects_cig_smoking/

(Courtesy of the Health & Wellness Center)