this post was submitted on 27 Aug 2024
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In some studies, at the end of them, I see:

"quitting smoking reduces your chance of dying from all causes."

So if I quit smoking I'm less likely to get hit by a bus?

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[–] [email protected] 262 points 2 months ago (4 children)

As a former ICU nurse I can tell you that someone who has been taking good care of their body, is fit and healthy, has a better chance of survival and less complications while recovering as someone who didn't. No matter the injury.

If you get hit by a bus and your lung is compromised it has a harder time compensating for the injury if it was already damaged.

So yes. You might have a better chance to survive a car crash if you haven't been smoking.

[–] [email protected] 82 points 2 months ago

That's interesting. I hadn't thought of that. Thanks.

[–] [email protected] 29 points 2 months ago (3 children)

You might have a better chance to survive a car crash if you haven’t been smoking.

That's probably why I've survived so many car crashes.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago (1 children)

It sounds a bit like your poor driving is the cause for you to survive so many car crashes.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago (2 children)

But not poor enough to cause any fatal crashes. There's a driving skill sweet spot where you have maximum crash survival.

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Yeah. Came here to write exactly this.

What OP misunderstood is the old tale of mortality vs. lethality.

In a simplified explanation: Mortality defines the percentage of deaths in a population by a cause.

Lethality is the percentage of deaths of people suffering from a cause.

In our case:

  • Smokers might only get hit by a bus slightly less often or slightly more often(1) (Mortality)

  • But they have a far greater chance of dying from it when they get hit. The same can be said for being shot,etc. Being a smoker always reduces your statistical chances.

(1:Actually quite fascinating - there is conflicting evidence on that one, as smoking is often statistically associated with substance abuse and bad health - which increases the likelihood of major trauma events, but on the other hand smokers die earlier,leaving more old people to walk in front of vehicles due to reduced cognitive abilities)

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago (3 children)

We must do something about all these old people getting run over by buses.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Less busses, more big trucks. Truck-Chan will isekai them safely.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I wonder what happens when the truck driver and the old person both smoke. Does that cancel them out? 🤔

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago

Puff, puff, pass away

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

Free cigarettes! Should help reduce the number of old people getting run over by buses

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 months ago

Wild and well put, thanks!

[–] [email protected] 54 points 2 months ago (4 children)

You should ABSOLUTELY quit smoking. Also, you should stop getting hit by buses. Neither one are good for you.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Totally agree, buses suck! More to the other one, I haven't had a real cigarette since 31 July; it had been 28 years of smoking with a few short breaks scattered in.

It is insane the tastes I've tasted recently, as a die hard Dr Pepper fan I don't know if I'll be able to keep drinking it, it's just too sweet now. Quitting smoking might lead to a healthier lifestyle all around.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Congratulations on quitting smoking. I quit about 20 years ago. I tried a cigarette after being off of them for awhile. It tasted so nasty I don't know why I ever started.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago (1 children)

He is trying to build immunity.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Gotta start small. Get hit by e-scooters and mopeds, then move up to sedans and eventually SUVs. Starting with a bus won't be good for you at all.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago

Just make sure you don't develop an allergic reaction. Could happen with too much exposure

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago

I have cut down on my bus addiction. I feel much better now.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago

Bus force trauma.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Yes. Everyone knows the bus comes when you light a cigarette.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (2 children)

One of my "modern" folk song is about exactly this phenomenon.

Edit: here it is, if someone is interested, it's an old-styled, descending, parlando rubato hungarian folk song. I noted it down using solmization.

         A
  2/4||: la,/8 mi/8 mi/8 re/8 | mi/4+ mi/8 | ti,/8 do/8 re/8 mi/8 | ti,/4 la,/4 | ti,/2* :|
         B
     ||: do/8 do/8 ti,/8 la,/8 | mi/8 re/8 do/4 | ti,/2* | do/8 do/8 do/8 re/8 | mi/8 re/8 do/8 | ti,/2* |
         C
     || so,/8 so,/8 so,/8 so,/8 | so,/4* do/8 ta,/8* | la,/2** ||

(the comma after the solmization indicates the note being in a lower octave. Plus sign after a not length value means it's dotted. Asteriks means fermata. Also, there is one strange solmization note (used in relative solmization) which I marked as "ta", it's a flat ti.)

And the lyrics (in hungarian)

"Várakozom én a százötvenegyes buszra, ( A )
Kezemben készen a sodort cigaretta, ( A )
Meg is gyújtom azon nyomban, ( B )
Szippantok belőle hosszan, ( B )
Ah, de megjött már az a busz." ( C )

Which translates to this (I used ChatGPT for the translating, told it to be a bit more... free or poetic or idk):

"Standing at the stop, the one-fifty-one in sight,
In my hand, a cigarette rolled tight.
I light it up, breathe in the smoke,
A long, deep breath, with every toke,
Ah, but now the bus is here, just right."

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 2 months ago (3 children)

Lights Cigarette

Immediately assassinated by Truck-Kun

Gets Isekai Anime with Absurdly Specific Title

Profit?

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago

How did truck-kun hit me while I was out here in international waters? Damn.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago
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[–] southsamurai 15 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I'm going to echo korimee, and add that it's statistics.

When you're tallying causes of death, like cancer, heart disease, stroke, organ failure, pathogens, whatever; if you factor in whether or not people smoke, smokers die younger from those things, and are a higher percentage of deaths like that as opposed to old age.

Non smokers get those things later, statistically, and have better chances of not only surviving, but recovering. Take stroke as an example. On average, the chances of severe disability from a stroke goes up the more risk factors you have. Smokers are less likely to survive a stroke, and if they do, have worse outcomes when they're stabilized. Then they have less resilience during the recovery process, leading to worse disability statistically.

The final question you asked only applies obliquely, and others have covered that it would only apply in limited cases. Accidental death, the uptick for smokers is essentially meaningless. For the specific "hit by a bus" kind of accidental death, distraction is how it usually happens anyway, but smokers trying to light up might have a slight extra chance of distraction, but I couldn't see any data on that with a quick DDG search

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago

Ok, it's kind of worded weird. I guess that makes sense.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 months ago (1 children)

It means all causes collectively, not each and every cause individually.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Buses drive outside.

People tend to step outside for a smoke.

So yeah, you actually might be more likely to get hit by a bus if you smoke, your smoking spot is anywhere near a bus route, and you are ducking out there 2-4 times a day to stand there smoking while you play with your phone.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

If you got hit by a bus your chance for recovery would be better as a non-smoker than a smoker.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Let's say you're a smoker and your workplace says you have to go outside to smoke.

It's the middle of November, it's cold, it's rainy, you're outside smoking and get pneumonia.

Your lungs are already weak from smoking and the pneumonia kills you.

If you quit smoking, you would have been inside, dry, safe, less likely to contract pneumonia and less likely to die from it if you get it.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 months ago

It references general body health and the sorts of things that make you age and die. Heart health, lung condition, oral health, stroke risk, skin quality, etc. All of that stuff is affected negatively by smoking. Stopping nearly instantly makes these things better, and they improve over time. So basically if you stop smoking, any way you could die of natural causes drops.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I'd think it would be pretty hard for one person to die from all of them

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

Oh yeah? Try and stop me!

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Dying from all causes sounds like a really rough last page.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

Doctor, what did he die of? ... Everything!

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago

It means your life expectancy immediately increases. There are some things that, depending on your age, improving won't improve life expectancy. ie, a 99 year old doing something that reduces their risk of colon cancer but nothing else will not reduce their chances of dying because something else will kill them first with 100% certainty.

Quitting smoking decreases risk of death for absolutely everyone in every circumstance

[–] xmunk 6 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Smoking makes you more visible because of the trail of smoke giving away your location - cessation makes it harder for cars to hunt you down and run you over.

Less sarcastically it's a way of saying that your overall life expectancy is increasing as it decreases the probability that you'd die from a pretty wide array of causes... that bus is going to hit you regardless of how much you smoke but it's less likely something else kills you first.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

That explains why I keep getting shot while smoking in my fox hole. The enemy can see my smoke rings like a target.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago

Yeah sure, when you get a coughing fit so hard that you can barely breathe and a bus crashes into ya.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago

Less likely to die from being hit by a bus*

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago

Basically yeah, obviously no. Cause of death isn't broken down nearly as far as people think it is. You can check it out on the CDC's Web portal. So while you can get the results for motor vehicle accidents, you may not get the results for motor vehicle versus pedestrian.

So all they're actually claiming is that in the statistics, people who quit smoking are less represented in every category.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I first read it as "dying for a cause". I guess cigarettes make you more revolutionary or something

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, down with patriarchy!

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago (5 children)

It means the overall death rate in the sample group was decreased substantially. The number of people who survived because they didn't get lung cancer or blood clots was so large that it had a noticeable impact on the number of total survivors, even when you include death by bus. This is a useful measure for a couple of reasons. One, it accounts for the prevalence of the disease being prevented - cutting all pork from your diet prevents 100% of deaths by trichinosis, which accounts for like 0.00001% of deaths from all causes (completely made up numbers and example, without consulting any sources). Two, it could account for net change in survival, for a treatment or behavior that has both positive and negative effects - giving radiation therapy indiscriminately to everyone with any kind of lump might decrease rate of dying from breast cancer, but increase death "from all causes" because it causes more problems than it solves.

I guess an additional way it might be useful is if we don't yet have data on the exact mechanisms by which the treatment helps or what exactly its preventing - all we know is that we gave group A the treatment and not group B, and after 20 years there were a lot more people alive in group A, but we haven't yet found a pattern in which causes of death were most affected and how.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

Ever heard of what they had to do to take Rasputin out? I think its that

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago

If it was R.J. Reynolds Tobacco and Philip Morris they would prepend that statement with

"A federal court has ordered Philip Morris USA and R.J. Reyolds Tobacco to state:"

I laugh every time I see that weak ass statement displayed in convenience stores.

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