A lot of people tend to think social smoking isn’t as bad as chain-smoking, but a new research has found that social smokers’ risk for high blood pressure and high cholesterol is identical to those who smoke every day.
The research was carried out by researchers from Ohio State University. To conduct the research, more than 10 percent of 39,555 people surveyed said they were social smokers, meaning they didn’t smoke every day. That’s on top of the 17 percent who called themselves current smokers.
Among current and social smokers (after researchers adjusted for differences in factors including demographics and obesity), about 75 percent had high blood pressure and roughly 54 percent had high cholesterol.
“Not smoking at all is the best way to go. Even smoking in a social situation is detrimental to your cardiovascular health,” said lead author Kate Gawlik, assistant professor of clinical nursing at The Ohio State University.
“One in 10 people in this study said they sometimes smoke, and many of them are young and already on the path to heart disease,” she said.
Smoking is a risk factor for unhealthy blood pressure and cholesterol and both are significant contributors to cardiovascular disease, the leading killer of men and women worldwide.
The study was published in the American Journal of Health Promotion.
S.O.Z