does smoking really cause lung cancer?

shouldbecleaning · Aug 3, 2006

as i said, i wasn't saying that the man was right at all......it just seemed to me that he cited certain studies that could lead one to be on the fence about the whole thing and most people who are on the anti-smoking side do not want to hear it.

i, on the other hand, have been to the acs site and others online because of my dad's emphysema, so i have read material there as well - though i admit it has been a period of time since i last read anything there.

i also am quite frustrated that the amount of money given from the settlements from the tobacco companies has not been spent the way it was supposed to be spent - therefore, you may see my problem as i think some of the cancer claims could be fraudulent and motives could be tainted.

other things noted were about how we have more advanced technologies to diagnose, so that is why you see the cancer rate so high now. also, less people smoke now, yet cancer rates have not declined - are these incorrect as well (i'm asking here honestly.)

elkpark, thank you for your insight. i may have to do more research on pathology to come to a conclusion. can you tell me if a non-smoker has lung cancer, are his lungs still pink?

thanks

cardiacRN2006, ADN, RN · Aug 3, 2006

As I said, I wasn't saying that the man was right at all......it just seemed to me that he cited certain studies that could lead one to be on the fence about the whole thing and most people who are on the anti-smoking side do not want to hear it.
Thanks

No, you said that all who did not choose to view your link were part of the "'in' crowd of anti-smoking Nazi's". That's a direct quote from your post. How can you possible be taken seriously when you flame us before we can even finish reading your post? I'll tell you what, anytime someone calls me a Nazi, I just laugh. It make you look ignorant (and small minded, but I think I have beaten the "open-minded" comment to death).

LydiaNN · Aug 3, 2006

It was known (yes known, as in proven empirically) that smoking causes lung cancer LONG before there were any tobacco settlements. As recently as ten years ago, the notion that tobacco companies would ever be called to account for their actions seemed like utter fantasy to most people. One can hardly cite the availability of tobacco settlement dollars as motive for the non-smoking movement, which began many years before a single lawsuit had been filed.

cardiacRN2006, ADN, RN · Aug 3, 2006

...and since when is a anti-smoking group a bad thing???????

caroladybelle, BSN, RN · Aug 3, 2006

Just to make everyone aware - my father has emphysema so I will watch him die from this. Now....my question to you is did you read the article? I thought not. You cannot possibly read that article with an open mind and come away without at least a possibility that things aren't how they seem.

And my father died of emphysema in his late fifties, after smoking for over 40 years.

It has only been in the last few decades that smoking rates have shown any major decrease. That does not change the fact that those rates of 20-40 years ago are the deathes that we see now. We will not see a decrease in cancer related to the decrease in rate of smokers for many years, due to time lag.

In addition, we are diagnosing more people with lung ca, because we have better diagnostics. Previously, many cases of cancer (lung/ovarian/colon, etc) did not get diagnosed or were not (and sometimes still aren't) listed as cause of death. There are large numbers of people that have hereditary risk factors for ovarian, breast and colon cancer that do not know about it, as people used to not discuss "those types" of cancer. Cancer was also considered a shameful thing, to earlier generations.

MDs write alot of "Respiratory Failure" or "Heart failure" as cause of death. They rarely provide major details of actual reasons for death.

And as I previously noted, lung cancer and emphysema are not the only problems associated with smoking. Cancers of the breast, ovaries, stomach, esphogus, larynyx, head and neck, and of the bladder are increased significantly in smokers. Not to mention such problems as hypertension, cardiomyopathy, stroke and other cardiovascular disorders.

My father and his family (most of whom are heavy smokers) were heavily in denial about the damage that smoking causes. My father died, weighing 72 pounds, at over 6 feet tall. And even on 6L NC O2, he (and the stepmother) continued to sneak cigerettes. And his family smoked like chimneys at the funeral home.

Perhaps you need to open your mind. And find evidence/science based evidence from reputable sources.

shouldbecleaning · Aug 4, 2006

I am trying to do just that caroladybelle.

I just read a study (http://www.jco.org/cgi/content/full/21/5/921 ) where they were trying to determine if cessation in women gave them a lower risk of getting cancer and how long they would have to go before the risk was that of a never-smoker.

It didn't seem to me that they had an exact conclusion, but it did look like cessation "could" be a good thing, however even some women who had been quit for 30 years still developed lung cancer.

I found another site that has the actual studies (some of them talked about in the article I first posted). What I am finding from reading these - and they look to be the actual scanned in documents word for word is it doesn't appear to me that any actual conclusions have been made in any of them, only assumptions because you can't control everything you need to in order to get a difinitive yes or no.

Anyway - I'm done posting here but will check for more information as I have time. I appreciate the insight.

shouldbecleaning · Aug 4, 2006

I am trying to do just that caroladybelle.

I just read a study (http://www.jco.org/cgi/content/full/21/5/921 ) where they were trying to determine if cessation in women gave them a lower risk of getting cancer and how long they would have to go before the risk was that of a never-smoker.

It didn't seem to me that they had an exact conclusion, but it did look like cessation "could" be a good thing, however even some women who had been quit for 30 years still developed lung cancer.

I found another site that has the actual studies (some of them talked about in the article I first posted). What I am finding from reading these - and they look to be the actual scanned in documents word for word is it doesn't appear to me that any actual conclusions have been made in any of them, only assumptions because you can't control everything you need to in order to get a difinitive yes or no.

Anyway - I'm done posting here but will check for more information as I have time. I appreciate the insight.

elkpark · Aug 4, 2006

As I said, I wasn't saying that the man was right at all......it just seemed to me that he cited certain studies that could lead one to be on the fence about the whole thing and most people who are on the anti-smoking side do not want to hear it ...
... Other things noted were about how we have more advanced technologies to diagnose, so that is why you see the cancer rate so high now. Also, less people smoke now, yet cancer rates have not declined - are these incorrect as well (I'm asking here honestly.)
elkpark, thank you for your insight. I may have to do more research on pathology to come to a conclusion. Can you tell me if a non-smoker has lung cancer, are his lungs still pink?
Thanks

Yes, Mr. Colby cites lots of "studies" (his interpretation of those studies, at least), but he doesn't list any sources for where you can find those original studies. Also, as I mentioned earlier, I saw so many obviously wrong "facts" just glancing casually over the material on his website that, frankly, I would have a hard time taking anything he said seriously (one of the anecdotal sources he quotes is an "engineer" who used to do autopsies in a hospital??? -- that sounds extremely, um, suspicious to me). Talk about having an agenda!

Frankly, most healthcare professionals "on the anti-smoking side" do not want to spend time listening to how smoking might not be so bad because we know that there really isn't any valid argument or science on the other "side." The only people who still seriously question the v. significant dangers of tobacco use are a few tobacco executives and a few "scientists" in their employ. Since Mr. Colby has a disclaimer on his site saying that he has nothing to do with any of the tobacco companies, I have no idea what dog he feels he has in this fight -- maybe he's just a conspiracy theorist. Maybe he's fibbing in his disclaimer -- he certainly has plenty of other misleading info on the site. Who knows?

As caroladybelle noted, there are numerous reasons why cancer rates are as high as they are. In addition to the reasons she mentioned, one factor is, ironically, increased longevity of the population in general. It used to be that you had to live a very long time to develop cancer, and most people just didn't live that long. Accident or infectious disease killed you off before you had a chance to develop cancer. Now that we've dramatically decreased the deaths from infectious disease and reduced accident rates, more people are living long enough to develop some type of cancer. Also, cancer (in general) is occurring in younger and younger people as time goes on, and that may be related to other environmental exposure factors in our modern society. For instance, even as "recently" as when I was in nursing school (~25 years ago), breast cancer was an old woman's disease -- it was quite unusual for a woman younger than her 60s or so to develop it, and even a woman in her 60s was considered "young" for breast cancer. However, over the last 25 or 30 years, it has been "creeping down" through the age ranges and it's now not uncommon at all for women in their 30s and 40s (and even younger) to develop breast cancer. I don't have a clear explanation for why that is, but that's what has been happening ... So, as people live longer, and cancer strikes younger and younger people, yes, more people are going to develop cancer of one type or another, inc. lung cancer.

It sounds like you are sincerely seeking information, which is why I am trying to discuss this in a reasonable way and not get adversarial. Please do do more research (somewhere other than Mr. Colby's website! :) ) Since you ask specifically about the appearance of cancerous lung tissue, don't just take my word for it -- if you use the "Images" feature on Google to search for "lung cancer" or "lung carcinoma," you will access many photos of the various types of lung cancer (of course, many of the photos will, necessarily, be of smokers' lungs, since 85-90% of lung cancers occur in smokers, but you will see that Mr. Colby's comments about cancer "turning lungs black" doesn't really jibe with real life).

Best wishes for your search for answers.

caroladybelle, BSN, RN · Aug 24, 2006

A very recent report in "The American Journal of Epidemiology" provides more ammo against male smokers.

Risk of childhood leukemia (ALL and AML) is increased in those children whose FATHERS smoked (preconception and postnatally). The increase was higher for AML than ALL.

vladimir · May 31, 2008

http://www.vialls.com/transpositions/smoking.html

Im a cassual smoker... one or two cigars (yes, not cigarettes) per a week.

Just supporting your cause Elkpark.

*No proofs that smoking is bad. Period. Im paying...not being paid by anyone.

Offcourse, since this escalated to a worldwide madness, i dont expect for majority to understand me.

Greetings from Eeastern Europe.

elkpark · May 31, 2008

http://www.vialls.com/transpositions/smoking.html
Im a cassual smoker... one or two cigars (yes, not cigarettes) per a week.
Just supporting your cause Elkpark.
*No proofs that smoking is bad. Period. Im paying...not being paid by anyone.
Offcourse, since this escalated to a worldwide madness, i dont expect for majority to understand me.
Greetings from Eeastern Europe.

Welcome to allnurses! :balloons: I hope you'll enjoy the site.

I'm not sure what you mean by "supporting my cause," but please don't refer to me in any connection to a pro-smoking website (like the one you posted above) -- I don't know what you think my "cause" is, but I am vehemently anti-smoking and anti-tobacco. Perhaps you misunderstood my posts.

vladimir · Jun 1, 2008

Thanks for the welcome.

Perhaps you are anti-smoker, but you are no fascist, like more of the others...

You started this topic with " There's no proof that smoking causes lung cancer " ... and i saw that as a truth.

So, when i say, im just supporting you... i'm supporting the truth from my perspective... and i didnt saw that link as a one reffering to a pro-smoking site... just a site with a diffrent view from many others.

Smoking aside... i dont want tomorrow, to feel the strange looks on me, because i drink the unhealthy coke or pepsi.

So, ok... you dont like the smell of tobacco, i respect that... but saying some media-guided lies about the dangers of smoking...i just cant go with that. Sorry if you are one of them and i've missjudged you.

Last of all, excuse my bad english. Cheers.