Climate change is a global issue that affect environments and human health in surprising ways. There are other global health issues such as, disease pandemics, infectious diseases like malaria cholera, et cetera. Some public health issues attempt to create conditions that lead to potentially fatal malnutrition and diarrhea in large populations; and increase the likelihood of heat waves and floods. The Precaution Adoption Process Model (PAPM) is a convenient framework for assessing where a person is in the process of deciding to take action on a health behavior. PAPM can be used to explain health behavior of tobacco consumption.
The issue of tobacco smoking in the United States (US) is both a personal and environmental health issue that affect health in shocking ways. There are many ways behavior change theories have been used to explain environmental and public health effects of tobacco consumption. Tobacco smoking is the practice of burning tobacco and inhaling the smoke (consisting of particle and gaseous phases). A more broad definition may include simply taking tobacco smoke into the mouth, and then releasing it, as is done by some with tobacco pipes and cigars. Initially, there are many scholarly researches that explore and analyze health effects of tobacco consumption to humans. There are psychological effects of smoking tobacco. Tobacco consumption has a long term addiction rate. Tobacco smoking can lead to lung cancer, chronic bronchitis, and emphysema. It increases the risk of heart disease, which can lead to stroke or heart attack. Smoking has also been linked to other cancers, leukemia, cataracts, and pneumonia. All of these risks apply to use of any smoked product, including hookah tobacco. The pathophysiologic possessions of the numerous ingredients of cigarette smoke activate on the respiratory structure at many stages. Cardiovascular disease is one of the most common types of sickness related with environmental tobacco smoke: the occurrence of heart infection attributable to environmental tobacco smoke is predictable to be about 10-fold higher than the frequency of ETS-associated lung infection. For example, in most studies of the health effects of cigarette smoking, exposure is determined by asking subjects if they smoke, and if so, how many cigarettes per day. Typically, people who recognize that smoking is undesirable underestimate the amount they smoke. Some even claim to be nonsmokers. When we classify these people as light smokers or nonsmokers, we unintentionally mislabel them.
The case of cigarette smoking provides a fascinating example of how government policies not specifically aimed at health outcome may have little to do with smoking cessation. Originally U.S. policies addressing cigarettes had little or nothing to do with population health, but much to do with agriculture and commerce. As smoking increased, likely due at least in part to wrong policies, evidence suggesting that the concurrent increase in chronic disease might be related to smoking began to mount. Though it took decades before smoking causality was eventually determined. But even as consensus grew, many doubted that it was technically, politically or ethically feasible to reduce the consumption of cigarettes. In the end, efforts outside the traditional realm of health – from taxation to restrictions on where and when people could advertise, buy, and use tobacco products – proved more feasible and cost-effective than medical attempts to somehow block the adverse effects of tobacco smoke.
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