Despite of constant warning from the health workers on the hazards of smoking, the incidence of smoking among Indians is rising unabatedly. Smoking is responsible for killing millions of Indians every year. According to a study by researchers of the Centre for Global Health Research, Toronto, the demography of the smokers in India is different from that in Europe and America.

In India, bidis or the traditional cigarettes made of ‘kendu’ leaves are popular among the poor. The unfiltered tobacco smoking using bidis is more hazardous than the filtered brands of cigarettes. The result is unlike in the west larger number of deaths in India among smokers is from tuberculosis and not from lung cancer. Smoking unfiltered bidis cause enough damage to the lungs that makes it difficult for the body to contain latent infections that causes asymptomatic tuberculosis.

According to latest estimates, from 2010 around 1million people will die every year from smoking. Smoking will account for one-fifth of all male deaths and one out of every twenty female deaths. Cigarettes and bidis are not the only form of consumption of tobacco in India, in fact a large number of Indians chew tobaccos present in gutkhas that are popular among the young and aged Indians.

Spreading social awareness and strengthening of the Indian Tobacco Regulatory Authority are the only ways of enforcing strict anti-tobacco laws in the country.

Via:reuters