Study: Death risk remains elevated for decades in ex-smokers

Summarised by Centrist 

A recent study involving over 438,000 adult US citizens from 1997 to 2019 suggests that it takes about 30 years for ex-smokers’ mortality risk to approach that of individuals who never smoked regularly. 

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the research, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, found that cardiovascular, cancer-related, and respiratory-related deaths were significantly more common among continuous smokers compared to nonsmokers. 

After quitting smoking, within a decade, cardiovascular mortality risk decreased by 36%, cancer-related risk by 47%, and respiratory-related risk by 43%. Over the second decade, these risks continued to decline, but only after 30 years did cardiovascular-related mortality risk return to normal. 

However, the study’s authors acknowledge potential limitations in self-reported data accuracy.

Read more over at Medscape