Thread: Cancer Gene Mapped – Will this encourage or discourage smoking?

A question to active smokers, passive smokers, smokers wanna be, the pro & anti smoking lobby, and most importantly to the people who think that huffing and puffing in copious amounts of carbon monoxide and tar is just retarded.

In the past few days cancer has been the buzz; the gene mapping of the two most widespread cancers – lung and skin have been done, and this confirms two things :-



No. 1) All the people who stressed that smoking doesn’t cause cancer (it’s just a teensy risk factor they argued) were wrong.

Here’s the gist of what the scientists had to say on this – Smoking roughly 15 cigarettes causes one gene mutation (And it isn’t the cool type of mutation like the X – Men, so don’t get your hopes up!). On average, the lung cancer genome has 23000 mutations.

So here’s the math – smoke around 6 cigarettes a day for 10 years and you have a high risk of getting cancer.

The reason it is ‘high risk’ and not guaranteed is because the mutations are divided into two types – ‘passenger’ mutations and ‘driver’ mutations. ‘Driver’ mutations occur less comparative to ‘passenger’ mutations, and these ‘driver’ mutations are what give you full blown cancer. ‘Passenger’ mutations would at most give you few benign tumors.

No. 2) Cancer treatments are going to improve dramatically in the next few years and there is even talk of a cure on the horizon.

It is speculated that with more research we will be able to generate a complete cancer chart of patients from just a simple blood test, and hence “their treatment can be tailor made.”

Thoughts? To smoke or not to smoke?

If you are a smoker are you relieved?

Or does the confirmation that smoking does cause cancer make you want to think twice?

Oh yes i am relieved. although i feel bad for the people who have cancer somewhere else besides lungs and skin and cannot treated.

I hope they will be able to cure cancer soon. And i have the feeling they will very soon although there will always be a downside to this.

Anything can cause cancer. Smoking is just a better way to get cancer because of all the active chemicals and such. I think people would continue smoking because its their choice.

Edit: This is my reply to s2cuts comment about my post. s2cuts, there is a difference between the words anything and everything.

Members, please don't be fooled by haughtiness.

I have a family member who has lung cancer and it's been hard to see this person deteriorate before my eyes. It's unlikely this person will make out of December.

I also have a few close friends who've been smoking for quite a few years and it's very annoying to see what they're doing to themselves. And one of them is a NURSE! You figure they would know better.

It sickens me that cigarettes are even legal when it's PROVEN (obviously) that they cause cancer. Ontario is doing a few good things as it pertains to smoking. You can't smoke in public places or in front of any public places (bars included). That's a start at least. A full blown ban would be preferable.

No real person seriously doubted the causality between smoking and lung cancer in the past. The people who don't won't be convinced by another study.

Here’s the gist of what the scientists had to say on this – Smoking roughly 15 cigarettes causes one gene mutation (And it isn’t the cool type of mutation like the X – Men, so don’t get your hopes up!). On average, the lung cancer genome has 23000 mutations.

So here’s the math – smoke around 6 cigarettes a day for 10 years and you have a high risk of getting cancer"""

Assuming an average mutation rate, that's correct. But, as cancerous populations acquire more mutations, their new mutation rate accelerates exponentially.

Cancer treatments are going to improve dramatically in the next few years and there is even talk of a cure on the horizon.

Cancer treatments have already improved dramatically, but speculating on when there will be a cure is ridiculous.

i smoke, but have cut down enough to only have cigs when i drink or after i smoke a pipe. im not too worried about it at the moment. lungs can almost completely heal if the user is to quit now.

also, cancer is caused by so many things. it is hard to think about it from only one aspect.

one day i hope we find cures, but with this comes stronger disease.. it seems to be a never ending game...

Originally Posted by tehnardian

i smoke, but have cut down enough to only have cigs when i drink or after i smoke a pipe. im not too worried about it at the moment. lungs can almost completely heal if the user is to quit now.

also, cancer is caused by so many things. it is hard to think about it from only one aspect.

one day i hope we find cures, but with this comes stronger disease.. it seems to be a never ending game...

Dude you can't heal cancer.

Originally Posted by tehnerd

Dude you can't heal cancer.

People have been cured of cancer. Do a search on google and find out for yourself. My ex's mom had cancer and was cured.

Originally Posted by Curse

People have been cured of cancer. Do a search on google and find out for yourself. My ex's mom had cancer and was cured.

You didn't read what I was responding to. Cancer doesn't get magically "healed" if you get it when you're young and 5-year survivorship rates are <50% for many lung cancers.