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The Smoker's Guide to
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Sample Chapter
Chapter 1 - How Smokers Can Protect Their HealthDear Smoker,
After decades of health warnings from the Surgeon General and other health authorities few people would now deny that smoking carries health risks. However despite these risks over 46 million Americans, about one fourth of the adult population choose to smoke. It is for you dear reader, one of this much neglected and persecuted group that this book is written.In it you will find a summary of the results from more than 200 scientific studies on smoking, vitamins and health. A great number of these studies show a strong and consistent link between a high intake of antioxidant vitamins or fresh fruits and vegetables rich in antioxidant vitamins and reduced risk of smoking related diseases. Also included are other simple changes you can make in the foods you eat which offer health protection for smokers.
Increasing your intake of fruit and vegetables, taking vitamin supplements or changing your food choices are all simple and inexpensive ways you can protect your health.A little history
Medical science has conquered the major infectious diseases smallpox, tuberculosis, typhoid, cholera by finding an antidote to the microbe or foreign invader responsible for the infection. We now have vaccines to prevent these diseases or treatments to clear them up quickly when they occur.Unfortunately the ailments from which most people in the industrialized world now suffer are the degenerative diseases such as cancer, heart disease, arthritis and cataract. Unlike infectious diseases which can lay you low or kill you in a matter of weeks or even days, it takes years or in some cases decades for the degenerative diseases to get the better of you. The infectious diseases of old have now been conquered, but unfortunately for the degenerative diseases, modern medical science has no quick and easy answers.
It is now widely accepted that these degenerative diseases are the result not of a single foreign agent invading the body but come about when a number of factors overwhelm the body's defenses. As this is a book for smokers, let's take lung cancer as an example. Most people, including smokers, now accept that smoking is a cause of lung cancer. However not all smokers get lung cancer and on the other hand about 8% of people who have never smoked are struck down with this disease. Factors other than smoking must play a part. What you eat, atmospheric pollution, lack of exercise, lack of sleep, stress and probably several other factors all contribute to weaken our bodies defense system and increase vulnerability to this cancer and many other diseases.The importance of what you eat
In the 1970s population surveys began to show a consistent link between a diet rich in fruit and vegetables and lowered rates of cancer and heart disease. Attention then turned to examining the results of these studies nutrient by nutrient to uncover the link with specific ailments.Vitamin C, vitamin E and beta carotene, known as the antioxidants, soon took center stage as the evidence continued to build. The point has now been reached where several hundred scientific studies link a high intake of these antioxidant vitamins or foods rich in them with reduced risk of heart disease and cancer, especially lung cancer. There is little need to remind you here that as a smoker these are the ailments from which you are most at risk.
Smokers and vitamins - the bad news and the good newsThe bad news - Several large scale surveys have measured the antioxidant vitamin status of smokers compared to nonsmokers and consistently report the following:
In other words smokers are nearly always deficient in the essential antioxidant vitamins which have shown a strong and consistent link with reduced risk of heart disease, lung cancer and a wide range of other ailments associated with smoking.Smokers have lower intake of antioxidant vitamins
The good news - Fortunately increasing your intake and raising your blood and tissue levels of the antioxidant vitamins is not difficult. Broadly speaking you have three choices:
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Change your diet. Increasing the amount of fresh fruits and vegetables you eat will raise your intake of vitamin C and carotenes. This is the best way to get your daily needs of these two vitamins as scientists believe fruits and vegetables may contain other as yet undiscovered protective nutrients. |
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Take vitamin supplements. If you are unable, or do not choose to eat the recommended quantities of fruits and vegetables to get sufficient vitamin C and beta carotene then you have the option to take supplements. As it is nearly impossible to get sufficient vitamin E from foods to reach the level at which protective effects have been found, taking supplements is the only way to go for this vitamin. |
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Combine the two. Do your best to increase your intake of fresh fruits and vegetables and take vitamin supplements to ensure your intake of these nutrients reaches the level which gives optimum health and provides maximum protection from disease. |
| What the Experts Say (brief quotes) | Sample Chapter |
| About the Author | Forewords |
| Book Main Page |
The Smoker's Guide to Vitamins and Health $9.95
144 pages