Healthcare Tips and News| Daily Health Tips | Nutrition Tips | Welthi

1. Smoking - A Global Public Health Menace Second-hand smoke is causing the death of 6 lakh non-smokers every year. The effects of second-hand smoke are very wide, and it is proving to be a major disaster as the affected are women and children. Women are affected as it leads to problems in pregnancy and even the success rate of IVF is found to be low. Dr Nirmala Agarwal, Head of Juhi Fertility Centre, explained, "When a man smokes, there lies a serious threat to female fertility as the number of egg cells in the IVF reduces. The outcome of IVF for women whose partner is smoking has been very poor. Hence, the first thing we ask the couple to do is to make the male partner stop smoking. Only then can we expect good results." Dr Manish Banker, Co-Chairman and Medical Director of Nova IVF Fertility, explained, "Tobacco consumption and smoking cigarettes releases compounds such as nicotine and cotinine into the human body. When this interacts with the testes, the production and quality of sperms is affected." Various studies have linked tobacco use to low sperm count, altered sperm motility and morphology, bad eggs in women and also poor IVF outcomes. The increasing fertility problems are an indication that smoking is playing a major role apart from other factors like stress, obesity and other underlying diseases. Tobacco consumption leading to diseases is one of the eight global public health problems according to World Health Organization and it requires behavioural change, dealing and coping with stress, sudden changes in life and inculcating a positive attitude to deal with the problems.

2. Smoking - A Global Public Health Menace  12 crore smokers in India and of them 30 per cent of them are adult males.  Smoking is the reason for 20 percent male deaths and 5 percent female deaths in the age-group of 30 to 69 years.  Wrong notions and myths that smoking helps to destress are leading a lot of youngsters to pick up the cigarette.  The majority of problems faced by smokers are dental problems, respiratory problems, lung cancer and infertility. low as this addiction is very difficult to give up. Treatments like nicotine replacement therapy are available but the success rate is comparatively