Running head: CIGARETTE SMOKING

CigaretteSmoking
TravisPaulRosario
WestCoastUniversity

CIGARETTE SMOKING

Good day. My name is Travis Paul Rosario. Today, I will talk about cigarette
smoking, its effects on ones health, and the relevance in the public health. The article that I
found is entitled Howresearchontobaccoandhealthshapedepidemiologyandcanbefound
onAmericanJournalEpidemiology.IspecificallychosethisarticlebecauseIbelievethat
smokingisanincreasingproblemofthecommunityandnotmuchofattentionhasbeengivento
solveortominimizeit.
Inthisarticle,themainpurposeoftheauthor,JonathanSamet,istoprovideaperspective
onthetobaccoepidemicandepidemiologybydescribingtheimpactofthetobaccocaused
diseaseepidemiconthefieldofepidemiology.Cigarettesmokingisoneoftheongoingand
increasingproblemsinpubichealth.Itisoncesaidthatcigarette smoking shaped disease pattern
of the 20th century. People of different ages attest to having at least smoked once a cigarette or
has continued to smoke. There is an enormous body of epidemiological evidence on associations
of smoking health, but little systemic attention has been given to it. The research conducted by
Samet will provide perspective on tobacco epidemic and describe impact of tobacco caused
disease.
One of the statements that the article has argued is that smoking can cause diseases such
as lung cancer. In the early 1950s, several studies have addressed smoking and its contribution
to development of lung cancer. Unlike infectious diseases, such as tuberculosis, chronic diseases
such as lung cancer, cardiovascular diseases and respiratory distresses usually have multiple sets
of causes that may contribute to the development of the disease. The initial conclusion is that
smoking causes lung cancer and subsequent conclusions related to smoking as the cause of other

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diseases are widely viewed as some of the first successes of epidemiology in addressing the
etiology of noncommunicable diseases (Samet, 2016). The evidence of the association between
smoking and lung cancer was evaluated systematically and results were published in several
reports and publications during the 1950s, beginning early in the decade. It was first published in
the Journal of the National Cancer institute in which it concludes a systemic evaluation of the
evidence of the effects of smoking on ones health. The findings in epidemiologic studies, some
of which were conducted by Johns Hopkins investigators, were key in characterizing the role of
tobacco smoking in driving the rising rates of noncommunicable diseases across the 20th
century (Samet, 2016).
The research was done by using a case control design. This design could be easily
implemented through hospitals. This method specifically uses questionnaires. For instance, the
questionnaire asks a persons smoking status inquiry (never, current, or former), age at initiation
of smoking, amount smoked daily, and age at cessation if applicable. However, the problem with
this method is the fact that misreporting smoking behaviors can alter the results of the research.
Samet also mentions that other methodological and conceptual advances were derived from
epidemiologic research on smoking; for example, the description of the odds ratio, the concept of
attributable risk, the concept of the empirical induction period (2016). In fact, in the paper in the
Journal of the American Medical Association that was published in the 1950, authors Wynder
and Graham provided their full questionnaire that contained 15 items. In this questionnaire, they
have established a pattern in cigarette smoking that adolescence and young adulthoods smoking
habits tended to be quite stable.
As evidences accumulated, consistence evidence of studies of lung cancer reflected the
strength of cigarette smoking as one of the causes of lung cancer. For these same reasons,

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epidemiological research proved equally useful in identifying many other disease caused by
active smoking.
In response to the emerging evidence on risks of smoking, cheating controversy and
doubt have been one of the speculations in the tobacco industry. It was argued that the industrys
interest in peoples health and denied health consequences of smoking. Tobacco industry has
reported to recruit researchers and employed/recruited epidemiologists and biostatisticians to
undermine the scientific evidence of the association between smoking and health. Epidemiologic
research also motivated actions by the tobacco industry brought both positive and negative
impacts on the field. The tobacco industry created entities to fund researchers, strategically
supporting studies that would deflect attention from smoking as the cause of lung cancer disease.
However, the tension created by the tobacco industrys actions assured that epidemiologists
carefully explored bias in studies and possible alternative causes for associations of disease with
active and passive smoking.
In this research, I have learned so much about cigarette smoking. Although cigarettes
smoking has declined, I believe that it still poses risk to ones health and the community.
California has recently passed a law to restrict and to solve problems with increased cigarette
smoking in in high school. It is now mandate that ages 21 and over are the only age group
allowed to buy any cigarettes or accessories to cigarette smoking. Although cigarette smoking
has declined, I believe that this is due to an increase demand in electronic cigarettes and vape
which do not account to the survey. Epidemiologic research is still needed to trace epidemic
globally and to quickly begin to assess real world consequences of the rapid use of electronic
nicotine delivery also known as electronic cigarettes. The enormity of the disease epidemic

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caused by smoking, as documented by epidemiologic research, was a powerful motivating force

for action.

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Reference

Samet,J.M.(2016).Epidemiologyandthetobaccoepidemic:Howresearchontobaccoand
healthshapedepidemiology.AmericanJournalofEpidemiology,183(5),394402.
doi:10.1093/aje/kwv156.