The number of people who die each day from smoking related illnesses equates to a jumbo jet crashing every 10 hours and not one person surviving. Now if this is the case then why do people even start smoking in the first place? To look cool? To be like their friends? Or to even relieve stress? Whatever the case is it is pointless.

If the reason you smoke is look cool then you have a weird perception of coolness. If you start smoking to be like your friends then you should go and find some new friends because the ones that you have are just acting like fools and hurting your friends that don’t smoke. And if the reason you start smoking is to relieve stress then have you ever chose the wrong thing to relieve your stress with, in the long run you will just be getting more stressful because of all the problems and diseases that smoking causes you.

Lighting up a cigarette is like signing your own death warrant because once you start it is addictive and very hard to stop. Every year at least 400,000 people die from smoking, that is more than AIDS, murder, suicide, alcohol, drug abuse and car accidents put together. Not only is that a lot of deaths, it is a lot of deaths that could be avoided with great ease. They can be avoided by people not starting and it is not as hard as people make it out to be. And right now the government is helping just by being greedy. By them raising the prices of cigarettes every few months it is helping lower class citizens slowly cut back on smoking because they can’t afford to blow their whole income on cigarettes.

If you are smoking just to be perceived as cool by the people then you look up to then you are not only hurting yourself but you are hurting everyone around you who does not smoke. If a non smoker is around 2 people who do smoke it is equivalent to smoking two cigarettes on your own a day. And if you are a parent and you leave your ashtray sitting there within your babies reach and your baby somehow gets a hold of it as little as nine cigarette buts would be enough to kill it. And you hurt yourself even worse because you are the one who all the toxins are going straight too, in just the smoke from a cigarette there are over 4700 different compounds.

There are many cities that are trying to ban smoking in all public places, they are trying to make it so you can only smoke in houses. There are a lot of people who like that but there are a lot of smokers who disagree and say that it is wrong and that if they want to go out and eat they have the right to have a cigarette after they are finished their meal. Now there are good things about banning smoking in public places but there are also bad things. A few examples of each are, good things are that they outside air will be much more cleaner, there will not be cigarette buts all over the streets, a bad thing is that some people who have smoked for a long time will not be able to handle going without a cigarette.

Banning cigarettes altogether though in my opinion has some good things, but it also has its flip side just like everything else. A few good points are that was less people will die of heart disease and lung cancer, more pregnant women will have healthy babies and more people will want to leave their homes and go places. For all good things there are bad thing though, a few bad things about cigarettes being banned altogether and not just in public places would be that people who have smoked for many years will suffer whilst trying to withdraw and get very sick, people who make ashtrays will be out of jobs and if this was to happen the government would lose a lot of money and therefore have to raise taxes on other things that people need therefore the cost of living would go up for people everywhere. And if this was to happen there would be a lot more people who would not be able to afford the basic needs and people would wind up living on the streets and whatnot. And if this was to happen more and more people would wind up going to homeless shelters and getting stuff from there which in turn would cost the government money.

And then there is chewing tobacco, something that many people find it a harmless substitute for smoking, but they could not be more wrong because chewing tobacco may not be as harmful to your lungs but it is very harmful to your mouth. When you start your gums start to pull away from your teeth and eventually they will fall out. Another thing about chewing tobacco is that you have to spit it out and this looks rather digusting when you are spitting it in public places or anywhere for that matter. Also throat and mouth cancers are caused by chewing tobacco also. If these cancers aren't caught right away, major surgery is often needed to take out parts of your mouth, jaw and tongue. So unless you want to be known as the Faceless Wonder, don't use smokeless tobacco.

In 1992, the American Heart Association reported that second hand smoke caused heart disease and aggravated pre-existing heart disease. Second hand smoke kills about 40,000 people a year through heart disease, and it has been linked to cervical cancer, brain tumor, birth defects, and sudden infant death syndrome. And if people know all of this stuff why do they continue to smoke? If people know all of this stuff why do they continue to go out and waste their money on something that is going to kill them? If people know all of this stuff why do they act so stubborn and just blow it off like it is not important? If so many people know that they are going to hurt themselves and everyone around them whenever they smoke why do the continually do it?

I have never smoked and I never do plan on starting so if I can do it why can’t everyone else who smokes think the same way I do. Why do they have to go and start and ruin their lives, every time they light up a smoke they are taking ten minutes away from their life. So in each pack of smokes that you smoke you are losing 200 minutes of your life, may not seem like much to you at first but it will add up and after awhile it will be at 1000, then 2000 and then time will run out and you will die and odds are it will be a smoking related disease that kills you.