Cigars, Pipes Damage Lungs Like Cigarettes

Smoking a pipe or cigar can damage your lungs even if you don’t inhale, according to researchers who said that smokers are mistaken to believe that substituting one kind of tobacco use for another will protect their health.

WebMD reported Feb. 16 that researchers found that individuals who smoked cigars or pipes but not cigarettes were twice as likely as non-smokers to have decreased lung function, and were at higher risk of airflow obstruction. Pipe and cigar smokers also had increased levels of cotinine, a marker for nicotine exposure, in their blood.

“Some pipe and cigar smokers say they do not inhale, or inhale less, than cigarette smokers. The elevated cotinine levels in the current study, however, belie this notion and provide a biological measure of nicotine exposure,” according to researcher R. Graham Barr, M.D., of Columbia University and colleagues.

“Smoke, whether from cigarette, pipe, or cigar, will result in absorption of one of the most addictive chemicals known, nicotine, and will produce measurable lung damage,” added Michael B. Steinberg, M.D., of the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in an editorial. “The results are especially important because the tobacco industry is challenged by decreasing cigarette sales and is actively promoting product substitution and concurrent use as an alternative to complete tobacco cessation.”

The study was published in the Feb. 16, 2010 issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine.