Whether you smoke cigarettes, you don't smoke cigarettes, or you smoke something else, you probably know the harmful effects of tobacco on the human body.
You probably also know the BENEFITS of quitting smoking and kicking tobacco for good. So we won't be going on about the benefits of quitting or the harmful effects of tobacco. Instead, we're looking at what happens to your body as you keep smoking - from day 1 to day 10,000 - how does your body change?
What happens to your body if you don't quit smoking? What happens with each passing day as you smoke cigarettes?
On World No Tobacco Day, this infographic FIT created in collaboration with a tobacco cessation expert and a pulmonologist and deaddiction specialist will help you understand the slow decline of health that happens with tobacco use.
A closer look at how smoking affects your body over time.
(Infographic: Deeksha Malhotra/FIT)
A Timeline Of How Smoking Changes Your Body
FIT spoke to Dr Surabhi Somani, a Tobacco Cessation Trainer and Treatment Counsellor, as well as Dr Bhagwat Rajput, Neuropsychiatrist and De-addiction Specialist.
Here's a brief look at what changes in your body as you keep smoking.
Day 1: When you smoke your first cigarette ever, you'll cough. As you inhale smoke, it irritates the cilia that line your lungs. Your body coughs to keep the smoke out. This is your body's defence mechanism, says Dr Somani. In time, as you smoke more regularly, this cough disappears, because the cilia in your lungs get destroyed by the smoke.
Day 10: Addiction can happen in the first week or the first few weeks, and it depends entirely on the person, Dr Somani adds. Nicotine triggers the release of dopamine and becomes habit-forming very quickly.
Day 100: You now find yourself reaching for a cigarette when you're stressed, or when you're hungry, or after you've eaten. Around this time, you'll start seeing the stains from tobacco on your teeth, you'll smell like smoke, and even if you're a light smoker, your skin shows the signs of smoking, appearing visibly older. This is because smoking inhibits your cells' ability to repair and heal.
Day 500: Dr Bhagwat says that between 1 and 5 years of smoking your blood vessels suffer damage and become narrower. Your risk of suffering a stroke increases, your risk of suffering a potentially deadly blood clot increases, your lung capacity falls, your cells age faster and your immune system starts to suffer, making you more prone to infections.
Day 10,000: By this point your risk of all cancers has risen by over 30 times, Dr. Bhagwat says. You've lost at least 10-15 years of your life and the damage to your skin, your lungs, your internal organs, and your immune system, is catastrophic.
Between Day 500 and Day 10,000 many changes take place in your body. Read the infographic for a detailed look at what will happen to your body if you keep smoking.
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