Although cigarette smoking is somewhat on the decline, about 20% of the U.S. population continues to smoke. Twenty percent of the population pencils out to be tens of millions of people (over 60 million). Studies indicate, however, that 70% of them would like to quit. A telling report written in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA. 2004;291:1238-1245), called "Actual Causes of Death in the United States, 2000" indicated that tobacco cigarette smoking was the leading cause of death in 2000, about 435,000 deaths.

An article written this week in U.S. News and World Report offers "3 Convincing Reasons to Quit Smoking."

Love Fluffy?
3 Convincing Reasons to Quit Smoking (By Katherine Hobson) [abbreviated] New research suggests additional incentives to kick the smoking habit

There are plenty of reasons to quit smoking, but if you haven't yet kicked the habit, you may not have found the one that clicks with you. This week, new research suggested other incentives for permanently putting down the butts.

1. To protect your pet's health. You're probably sick of hearing that smoking is bad for you, but what about Fido and Fluffy? A study published this week in Tobacco Control found that more than 28 percent of smoking pet owners said information about the harmful effects of secondhand smoke on their pets--exposure has been linked to cancer, allergies, and respiratory problems--would motivate them to try to quit. And more than 24 percent of nonsmokers living with smokers said that kind of information would prompt them to ask their cohabiter not to smoke indoors.

2. To get some cash. Pay people enough to quit, and they may actually do it, says a study published this week in the New England Journal of Medicine. Previous studies offering cash incentives have been too small to pick up anything but drastic differences in quit rates and didn't offer much money, says Kevin Volpp, director of the Center for Health Incentives at the University of Pennsylvania's Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics and an author of the NEJM study. This study, whose subjects were 878 workers at GE, offered incentives of up to $750 for remaining abstinent for nine or 12 months. And after that time, 14.7 percent of people in the incentives group had quit compared with 5 percent of the people who received only information about smoking-cessation programs. (Smoking isn't the only behavior motivated by incentives; Volpp and colleagues published research last year on how financial incentives affect weight loss.)

GE is working to roll out some kind of incentive program for smoking cessation in 2010, says Robert Galvin, director of health benefits for GE Worldwide. At the level of incentives offered in the study, it would take between three and five years for the program to start paying for itself, he says, making it a long-term investment rather than a quick cost-savings measure. He says employees who participated in the program appreciated the innovation of the incentive (and the fact that it was extra cash probably didn't hurt, either). "Almost every smoker wants to quit, has tried multiple times, and hasn't been able to do it," he says.

3. Because of an "aha" moment about your health. Smokers recently diagnosed with stroke, cancer, lung disease, heart disease, or type 2 diabetes were more than three times as likely to quit as those with no new diagnosis, according to a study published this week in the Archives of Internal Medicine . (Smokers were more likely to quit than the overweight were to lose significant weight following a diagnosis of a serious disease.) And the more diagnoses the smokers received, the more likely they were to quit. But don't wait for a major disease to persuade you to quit. [End of article]

On Wednesday we will cover some tips to help you quit smoking, including lifestyle changes and nutritional supplementation that will help you in the transition. Remember, in addition to being a major risk factor for many life-threatening health conditions (like strokes, cancer, and heart disease), smoking negatively affects your mental clarity, skin, and sex life.

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