WOMEN's AND TOBACCO---REFERENCE

• ACSH: Tobacco and Women's Health: A Survey of Popular Women's Magazines, August 1999-August 2000 - Follow-up to earlier ACSH research finds women's magazines still give little or no coverage to lung cancer or other health effects of smoking, and still take plenty of cigarette ads, and still dispense plenty of other health advice.
• Background on Women & Girls and Tobacco - Campaign For Tobacco-Free Kids backgrounder covers cigarette promotions targeting women and girls. [PDF]
• Background on Women and Girls and Tobacco - Pamphlet from the Partnership for Smoking or Health (Missouri health group).
• Catching Our Breath: A Journal About Change for Women who Smoke - Written by women for women; explores some of the problems women must overcome to quit smoking, or to reduce the amount they smoke. Also explores why women smoke as well as ways to cope and relax without smoking.
• Cigarette Ads Targetting Women - A collection of cigarette ads targetting women, from a gallery of cigarette ads.
• Cigarette Advertising and Magazine Coverage of the Hazards of Smoking: A Statistical Analysis - Research concludes that "cigarette advertising in magazines is associated with diminished coverage of the hazards of smoking. This is particularly true for magazines directed to women."
• Cigarette Smoking During Pregnancy - New evidence that cigarette smoking during pregnancy can cause attention deficit disorder, hyperactivity, aggressive behavior disorders and lower math and reading scores in children.
• Cigarettes Linked to Breast Cancer - Summary of recent research.
• Cigarettes More Dangerous to Women - According to recent research.
• Creating a Global Tobacco Culture Among Women - Book chapter explores tobacco industry promotion worldwide targeting women.
• Facts on Women and Tobacco - Fact sheet from the Center for Disease Control (CDC).
• Independence From Smoking - National Women's Health Information Center provides information and resources to empower women and girls, and the people they love, to gain independence from smoking.
• International Network of Women against Tobacco (INWAT) - Founded in 1990 by women tobacco control leaders to address the complex issues of tobacco use among women and young girls.
• June Russell's Health Facts: Smoking - Women - Factsheet on tobacco products and their effects on women, children, and families.
• Ladies Home Journal on Smoking - Smoking quiz, quitting tips, and dealing with withdrawal symptoms.
• The Marketing of Cigarettes to Women - Academic article documents trends and effects of tobacco industry marketing to women.
• Our Health vs. Their Profits: the Lure of Smoking Continues for Girls - Essay from editors of Our Bodies, Ourselves reflects on the progress not made when it comes to women, girls, and smoking.
• Philip Morris: National Expert on Women - Once-secret memo, the Virginia Slims Opinion Poll Public Relations Plan, documents a PR campaign that Philip Morris ran to position itself as the "most authoritative chronicler of women's issues".
• Pregnancy and smoking: a lethal combination - Information on how much harm tobacco products cause during and after pregnancy.
• Review - The Female Smoker: From Addiction to Recovery. - Book review.
• Rite Aid Is Taking A Stand - Photo essay takes a hard look at Rite Aid's claim that it's taking a stand against heart disease in women.
• Secondhand Smoke Causes Women Decreased Lung Function - Secondhand smoke causes decreased lung function in women, especially women with asthma, according to a recent study.
• Smoking: A Guide for Teens - Center for Young Women's Health in Boston provides short factsheet aimed at teen women.
• Smoking and Women: The Next Wave of the Global Epidemic - World Health Organization fact sheet.
• Smoking: Effects on Mothers and Babies in West Virginia - Matched Birth and Death Certificate data tell a grim tale, and a short discussion gives the story behind the data.
• Smoking is a Women's Issue - Report from the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids covers harm to women from tobacco products, promotion to women and girls by the tobacco industry.
• Smoking Is Ugly - Created Christy Turlington to raise awareness about the effects of smoking, smoking related diseases and lung cancer. "More women died of lung cancer in 2002 than of breast, uterine, and ovarian cancer combined" Facts and quitting info.
• Smoking-Related Deaths On The Rise Among American, French Women - Smoking-related illnesses and deaths among American and French women have risen sharply in recent years, despite vigorous anti-smoking campaigns on a global scale, says a Penn State researcher.
• Tobacco Advertising and Women: Virginia Slims Advertising - You've come a long way baby. A collection of Virginia Slims ads shows how cigarettes were pushed in the 70's.
• Tobacco and Women's Health - Book review of book of same title.
• Tobacco as a Problem for Women - Collection of articles on tobacco impacts on women.
• Tobacco Companies Exploit Women, says WHO - Tobacco companies are exploiting women's struggle for equal rights by creating the impression that tobacco makes women more confident, more sexually attractive, and more in control of their own destiny, says a World Health Organization report.
• The Tobacco Reference Guide: Pregnancy and Fertility - Factsheets on tobacco and congenital anomalies, fertility and menopause, general effects, miscarriage, and low birth weight.
• The Tobacco Reference Guide: Women and Smoking - Current and historical trends documented from a book on tobacco.
• U.S. Tobacco Makers Targetted Women Since '20s - ABC News article provides a quick summary of the long history.
• Virginia SLAM! - Brief biography of Leslie Nuchow who began a counter movement against the Virginia Slims record label, Woman Thing Music.
• 16. Women and smoking - Chapter in a book on smoking in Australia.
• Women and Smoking - American Legacy Foundation tobacco education campaign features real women battling very real tobacco-related illnesses light emphysema, lung cancer, and throat cancer, and highlights their real parting letters to their family and loved ones.
• Women and Smoking - Discusses effects of smoking on women and the steps to smoking cessation.
• Women and Tobacco - WHO report. Women as the tobacco industry sees them; health effects of tobacco specific to women; women's brands and 'light' cigarettes.
• Women, Girls and Tobacco: The Global Facts and the Challenge - Short paper on women and tobacco; tobacco promotion to women and girls; global impact of tobacco on women; recommendations for action.
• Women's Health Project: Tobacco Advertising and Women - NOW Foundation fact sheet.
• Women's Magazines Cover Up Health Risks - Congressional testimony on why women's magazines, while reporting widely on health topics, have a near complete lack of coverage on smoking.
• "You've Gone the Wrong Way, Baby" - Women's smoking, targetting of women in tobacco marketing, and resulting cancer rates, with a focus on Canada.
• Women More Vulnerable To Tobacco Carcinogens, New Results Show - Women may be more vulnerable than men to the cancer-causing effects of smkoing tobacco, according to new results. (, 2009)
• Women More Vulnerable To Cigarette Harm - Twin studies reveal that women are more susceptible to lung disease caused by tobacco product. (March 5, 2009)
• Christy Turlington: Not Just A Cover Model- A Role Model - Turlington writes about her own story of tobacco addiction and losing a loved one to lung cancer.(May 14, 2001)
• This Kills Women: Do Feminist Groups Even Care? - Washington Post article examines why women's groups say little about the leading cause of preventable death among women; one factor covered is tobacco industry money accepted by women's groups. (April 11, 2001)
• The New Face of Tobacco: Women - Znet article surveys tobacco industry marketing to women in the US and worldwide. (February 14, 2001)
• You're Going Too Far, Baby: Cigarette Makers Woo Women in the Developing World - Village Voice article. Tobacco industry developed its "smoking = liberation" message for women in the U.S. in the 1970's; now it's exporting that message to promote tobacco to women globally. (August 15, 2000)
• OnHealth: Smokeless Tobacco Increases Breast Cancer Risk - Spit tobacco increases a woman's risk of breast cancer. (May 9, 2000)
• Why Cigarettes Can be a Woman's Worst Enemy - Smoking increases your risk of cervical and rectal cancer; worsens your period; damages your fertility; hurts your unborn baby; ages you; attacks your heart. (November 8, 1999)
• You've Come a Long Way...or Have You? - From the American Council on Science and Health a survey of 13 magazines over two years shows that women's magazines still downplaying health effects of smoking. The ratio of cigarette ads to articles on smoking is actually increasing. (March, 1999)

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WOMEN AND SMOKING

An epidemic of smoking-related cancer 

and disease in women

When calling attention to public health problems, we must not misuse the word "epidemic." But there is no better word to describe the 600-percent increase since 1950 in women's death rates for lung cancer, a disease primarily caused by cigarette smoking. Clearly, smoking-related disease among women is a full-blown epidemic. --
David Satcher, MD, PhD 

Smoking is the most preventable cause of early death in this country. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), smoking-related diseases causes the deaths of about 178,000 women in the U.S. each year. On average, these women died 14.5 years earlier because they smoked. 

The most recent CDC survey (from 2008) showed that more than 1 in 6 American women aged 18 years or older (18.3%) smoked cigarettes. The highest rates were seen among American-Indian and Alaska-Native women (22.4%), followed by white (20.6%), African-American (17.8%), Hispanic (10.7%), and Asian women (4.7%). The less education a woman has, the more likely it is she will smoke. For instance, women with less than a high school education are more than twice as likely to smoke as college graduates. 

Overall, women are less likely to smoke than men. But it has been found that smoking is more popular among younger than older women. This is an alarming trend that will affect the future health of these young women. About 21% of women ages 25 to 44 smoke; only about 8% of women 65 and over do. If these younger women continue to smoke as they get older, they will have more smoking-related illness and disability. Smoking rates are slightly lower among women aged 18 to 24, about 19%.



Women who smoke nearly always begin as teenagers -- usually before high school graduation. And the younger a girl is when she starts, the more heavily she is likely to use tobacco as an adult. Teenage girls are just as likely to smoke as boys. The most recent CDC surveys showed that 19% of female high school students and 6% of middle school girls had smoked at least one cigarette in the past 30 days. More than 9% of 12th grade girls reported that they had smoked at least one cigar in the past month. Nearly 29% of the senior girls had used some form of tobacco in the past month.

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INFERTILITY and SMOKING      

Is a baby part of your future plans? Many women today delay childbirth until they are in their thirties or even forties, which can cause fertility problems even for nonsmoking women. But women who smoke and delay childbirth are putting themselves at a substantially greater risk of future infertility than nonsmokers.

The fact is women smokers have around 72 percent of the fertility of nonsmokers. When all other factors are equal, it is 3.4 times more likely that smokers will require over one year to conceive.

Increasingly, studies are showing that decreased ovulatory response, as well as the fertilization and implantation of the zygote may be impaired in women who smoke. Thought is also given that chemicals in tobacco may alter the cervical fluid, making it toxic to sperm causing pregnancy to be difficult to achieve.

We can't leave the men out on this one, though. Men smokers are 50 percent more likely to become impotent. Some of the toxic chemicals found in cigarettes may result in gene mutations that can cause miscarriage, birth defects, cancer, and other health problems in their children.

WOMEN AND SMOKING-2

Pregnancy and Smoking

Chemicals in tobacco are passed from pregnant mothers through the blood stream to the fetus. These toxic chemicals present serious risks to the unborn child, as well as the mother. According to "Our Bodies, Ourselves for the New Century," by the Boston Women's Health Book Collective, "Smoking during pregnancy is associated with preterm delivery, low birthweight, premature rupture of membranes, placenta previa, miscarriage, and neonatal death. New borns whose mothers smoked during pregnancy have the same nicotine levels in their bloodstream's as adults who smoke, and they go through withdrawal during their first days of life."

Children born to mothers who smoke experience more colds, ear aches, respiratory problems, and illnesses requiring visits to the pediatrician than children born to nonsmokers.

WOMEN AND SMOKING-5

Oral Contraceptives and Smoking

Do you use oral contraceptives or another hormonal method of birth control? Women smokers who use oral contraceptives risk serious consequences including increased risk of developing cardiovascular diseases such as blood clots, heart attacks, and strokes. This risk increases with age and women over 35 who smoke should not use oral contraceptives.

Historically, a mild elevation in blood pressure often occurred in pill users. However, blood pressure often returned to normal "prepill" levels once oral contraceptives were discontinued. New studies indicate that high blood pressure is not a common problem for todays Pill users, nonetheless all women using oral contraceptives should have their blood pressure checked every six to twelve months.

WOMEN AND SMOKING-4

Cigarettes May Be More Damaging to Women

Women may be especially susceptible to the toxic effects of cigarette smoking, U.S. researchers said on Monday.

 

 

 

 

 

Read more: http://www.momlogic.com/2009/05/cigarettes_may_be_more_damaging_women.php#ixzz0lTEOoh2d

They said women who smoke develop lung damage earlier in life than men, and it takes less cigarette exposure to cause damage in women compared with men.

"Overall our analysis indicated that women may be more vulnerable to the effects of smoking," said Dr. Inga-Cecilie Soerheim of Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston and the University of Bergen in Norway.

Soerheim, who presented her findings at the American Thoracic Society meeting in San Diego, California, said researchers had suspected this but until now had lacked proof.

Her team analyzed 954 people in Norway with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, which includes lung problems from chronic bronchitis to emphysema.

COPD affects an estimated 210 million people worldwide. The most common symptoms include shortness of breath, coughing and a limited ability to exercise.

In the study, about 60 percent were men and 40 percent were women. All were current or former smokers.

Overall, both groups had similar lung impairments. But when they looked at younger people -- those under age 60 -- or those who had been lighter smokers, they found women had more severe disease and worse lung function than men.

Read more: http://www.momlogic.com/2009/05/cigarettes_may_be_more_damaging_women.php#ixzz0lTE8SzNY

WOMEN AND SMOKING-1

Smoking:

The Women's Health Perspective

WARNING!

If You Are a Woman, Don't Smoke Cigarettes!

We all have heard the warnings-- cigarettes can cause cancer and increase our risk of heart disease. But the sad fact is that approximately 23 million women in the US (23 percent of the female population) still smoke cigarettes. Smoking is the most preventable cause of death in this country, yet more than 140,000 women die each year from smoking related causes. The highest rate of smoking (27 percent) occurs among women between twenty-five and forty-four.

Despite all the warnings today's teens have heard about the dangers of smoking, the reality is that almost all of the new smokers today are teenagers; over 1.5 million teenage girls smoke cigarettes.

Women smokers suffer all the consequences of smoking that men do such as increased of risk various cancers (lung, mouth, larynx, pharynx, esophagus, kidney, pancreas, kidney, and bladder) and respiratory diseases, but as women we need explicit cognizance about the numerous smoking-related health risks which are uniquely ours. This article explores these risks and, hopefully, provides women smokers the further perception and inducement, perhaps, needed to stop smoking.