The World Health Organization (WHO) reported that 60 million people died between 1950 and 2000 due to smoking-related diseases, more than the number of deaths caused by World War II.
Since 2005, efforts have been made to minimize the harms caused by smoking according to the Public Health Treaty under the "World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO-FTCC)". Within the scope of this convention, WHO has developed the 'MPOWER (Monitor, Protect, Offer, Warn, Enforce, Raise Criteria - National Committee on Smoking and Health)' implementation package prepared according to the WHO-TCTCS criteria to control smoking worldwide. Today, approximately 3.9 billion people living in 91 countries, including Turkey, benefit from the practices included in this package.
In 2009, the "Tobacco Control Act" came into force, authorizing the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to regulate tobacco products. At the time of enactment, it was noted that tobacco products are the leading preventable cause of premature death in the United States. The FDA also enacted restrictions on youth access and labeling and advertising restrictions to help reduce the appeal of tobacco products to youth, noting that the advertising, marketing, and promotion of tobacco products "are particularly directed at attracting youth to use tobacco products, and these efforts have resulted in increased youth use of such products."
The most widely used tobacco product is traditional cigarettes, and traditional cigarette smoke contains over 6,000 chemicals, more than 150 of which are classified as harmful or potentially harmful. For this reason, traditional cigarettes cause serious health problems even in people who do not smoke but are exposed to cigarette smoke. These problems include heart attacks, other cardiovascular diseases, various cancers (lung cancer, pancreatic cancer, bladder cancer, laryngeal and breast cancer, etc.), respiratory diseases, circulatory diseases, vascular diseases and hypertension.
Smoking is one of the biggest public health threats the world faces, killing more than 8 million people a year. More than 7 million of these deaths are directly attributable to smoking, while nearly 1 million are due to passive exposure to smoke by non-smokers. At this rate, it is estimated that this number will double by 2030.
Smoking rates vary across countries and regions. Recent studies have shown that 84% of traditional smokers are in developing countries. Gender- and age-related differences in smoking were also observed. In both sexes, the age-specific prevalence of cigarette use has shown a steady increase in the 45+ age group, with the highest rates in the 45-54 age group for men and the 55-64 age group for women.