Skip to main content

Tobacco doesn't care whether you are a man, woman or child! It just KILLS!


Tobacco a slow and not-so-silent a killer surrounds most of us in our day to day life. Smoking tobacco or chewing tobacco is considered as normal and routine by many. Having a bad day, take a puff, tired of looking at the computer screens, let’s go out and draw some smoke. Smokeless tobacco which is available to be chewed as gutka and other products constitute yet another common break from work for many, or at times is chewed for “passing timeas well! And yes, just in case you don’t consume tobacco even then chances are that you might be under the radar of passive tobacco consumption because of someone near to you. You might be inhaling tobacco smoke emitted by your spouse at home, your colleague at work or by people around you in an authorized Hookah cafĂ©! Being engulfed in a cloud full of poison does sound bad for sure, but the good news is that this bad is totally and entirely in our own hands.

Tobacco in any form can have a plethora of ill-effects on the human body. From minor looking patches in the mouth to cancer that begins from these patches; from getting breathless on climbing stairs to inability to breath, and death, tobacco does it all. Talking about the mouth, changes inside the mouth begin as soon as one starts consuming tobacco even in minor amounts. These can be in the form of white or red patches, inability to tolerate spicy food or gradual reduction in the opening of the jaw. Unfortunately, these changes are often overlooked by the people consuming tobacco either because a hidden fear of unknown harbors them which restricts them from discussing it with their doctor or because they are completely ignorant of the ill-effects which makes them oblivious to these changes. Both smoking and smokeless tobacco are responsible for causing their share of deadly diseases in the human body. But imagine the level of addiction that these routinely selling materials cause, that despite the health warning that every pack of tobacco bears, despite the clear display of “Smoking kills” at right bottom corner of the big screen in cinemas, despite the public advertisements which exemplify how people’s lives change for worse due to this addiction one still continues to consume tobacco. And why? Probably in false hope, that their health won’t be affected by it. But the reality is, tobacco doesn’t spare anyone, it does affect everyone in some way or the other, and in worst cases, it leaves behind brooding families. Sadly despite all the stated facts, tobacco consumption has only increased in the past decade and the numbers continue to rise rapidly because it is now popularized amongst a section which was previously a bit aloof from it, which are women! Be it cigarettes, or the fashionable hookah which is considered harmless, tobacco has now gripped both the genders in high numbers.

There is no breakthrough medicine that one needs to discover to cure the tobacco-induced harms. All that one needs is, a strong will to avoid starting tobacco in any form, or a firm decision to quit it if one is already an addict. Quitting tobacco by will power alone can be difficult and rare, thus it’s advisable to take the help of a specialist who can make one quit in a graded manner or by using necessary alternative medications depending on the stage of addiction that one is in. Today on world no tobacco day, take that first and smallest step that you can, to say No this widely marketed product which does KILL!
Louis Pasteur a famous microbiologist and chemist once said that "when meditating over a disease I never think of finding a remedy for it, but, instead a means of preventing it." In this case, the prevention lies entirely in your hands; you just have to say yes to health and no to tobacco.
www.vanditasshelf.com
vanditasshelf@gmail.com

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Annoyed by children on board? This read is for you

A recent Instagram post by a well-known celebrity writer read “They should give away free birth control pills on all airlines as a public service.” I juggled for a long time to understand what it meant, but couldn’t until I saw the only hashtag the writer had used as a caption beneath, #annoyingchildrenonboard. This post came after almost a week of relaxing and luxurious holiday that he had in Thailand. As most of the posts by this writer are relatable, at times funny and witty, it took me a while to comprehend what he had written. How could he post such a thing ? I thought, and scrolled through the comments section. In the comments I saw outpouring negativity for little children and their parents inside airplanes. “It’s so irritating!” one comment read, “I wanted to sleep peacefully on my three-hour flight, but the child behind just couldn’t shut up. Why do people produce when they can’t teach their children basic etiquette!!!” “So relatable,” read another, “an annoying baby was cryin...

Veggies/Non-veggies! We choose or we follow!

Bored with my daily routine, and it being a Sunday I planned to go out to shop a little last week! On my way I stopped the auto fella to have a look at the plant nursery to see if I can get something to put in my terrace area. I was over whelmed by the way people were engrossed looking after plants there, someone was spraying water over the leaves while someone was mixing the manure with some insecticides, looking around I was about to step on a tiny sapling when one vendor interrupted me and said “Madam watch out, it will die” “Oops Sorry” I said and stepped aside. I was tempted to take some saplings for my home I sat there for some half an hour where I asked them about the different saplings they had and took three of them. After which I took some instructions on how I should nurture them, how many times to water, how much sunlight is needed etc so that they can grow the best. Within that very short span itself I felt the plants are alive! They need to be taken care of, they need t...

Health beyond COVID-19!

None of us had imagined that we would ever see a crisis in health as huge as the one that we are witnessing currently.   One disease and the entire world has come to a standstill. But then, what is life if we can predict it? Coronavirus, which has shaken everyone with its massive spread, has slowly moved towards community spread in India. Reasons for its relatively slower rise in numbers here can be various. The timely and stringent actions taken by the government, our immunity to survive it due to poor overall hygiene of the country; or the relatively larger number of infections that we already face. However, fear of rising numbers remains, because we are a densely populated land. The losses that COVID has caused are many and grave but then, there is one good thing that it has brought to us as a country. It is our efforts to improve our existing healthcare system. It will be premature to say if these efforts are temporary or permanent but it’s very positive to see how w...