Skin Aging Prematurely,
Wrinkles
And Smoking

Melissa Dahl, "Smoking really does make you look older, a twin study confirms" (TODAY, 29 October 2013). Researchers "identified a few major areas of accelerated aging in the faces of the smoking twins: The smokers' upper eyelids drooped while the lower lids sagged, and they had more wrinkles around the mouth. The smokers were also more likely to have jowls, according to the study, which was published today in the journal Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery. Smoking reduces oxygen to the skin, which also decreases blood circulation, and that can result in weathered, wrinkled, older-looking skin, explains Dr. Bahman Guyuron, a plastic surgeon in Cleveland, Ohio, and the lead author of the study."

"Smoking bad for you inside and out" (13 July 2008) (article by a doctor on damage that smoking does to the body, inside and out, including the skin, e.g., causes wrinkles--an effect reported as long ago as 1857.)

CHICAGO, Ilinois (Reuters) -- Smoking not only can wrinkle the face and turn it yellow -- it can do the same to the whole body, researchers reported Monday.

The study, published in the Archives of Dermatology, shows that smoking affects the skin all over the body -- even skin protected from the sun.

"We examined non-facial skin that was protected from the sun, and found that the total number of packs of cigarettes smoked per day and the total years a person has smoked were linked with the amount of skin damage a person experienced," Dr. Yolanda Helfrich of the University of Michigan, who led the study, said in a statement.

"In participants older than 65 years, smokers had significantly more fine wrinkling than nonsmokers. Similar findings were seen in participants aged 45 to 65 years," Helfrich's team added in their report.

The researchers tested 82 people, smokers and nonsmokers, taking pictures of the inner right arms. They ranged in age from 22 to 91 and half were smokers

Independent judges decided how wrinkled each person's skin was.

When skin is exposed to sunlight, notably the face, it becomes coarse, wrinkled and discolored with a pale yellow tint, Helfrich's team wrote.

Several previous studies have found that cigarette smoking contributes to premature skin aging as measured by facial wrinkles, the study said, but little has been done to measure the aging of skin not exposed to light.

The report did not discuss the mechanism involved but previous research has found that cigarette smoke, among other things, causes blood vessels beneath the skin to constrict, reducing blood supply to the skin.

Smoking can also damage the connective tissue that supports both the skin and the internal organs.

Copyright 2007 Reuters. All rights reserved.

A century ago, the term for what smoking does to facial skin was "cigarette face." This referenced the distinctive premature aging and deterioration of facial skin due to smoking.

          Smoking leads to alcoholism, drug abuse, mental disorder. All of these impair judgment.

          Cigarettes contain toxic chemicals. Deaths are "natural and probable consequences." Pursuant to standard lawbook definitions, nonsmokers' involuntary foreseeable deaths constitute murder. The high number of deaths is a "holocaust" according to the Royal Society of Physicians' 1971 criteria, and is part of the total genocide problem.

         Michigan Governor John Engler and staff have been supportive of action to enforce Michigan's 1909 cigarette ban law, issuing five pertinent memoranda.

Exec Order 1992-3
Law Support Letter # 1
Anti-Cigarette Smuggling Finding
Law Support Letter # 2
Governor's Overview

Related Medical Data Web Sites
Cigarettes' Toxic Chemicals
Medical Statistics
Prevent Crime
Prevent Heart Disease
Prevent SIDS
Smoker Addiction
Smoker Brain Damage
Smoker Mental Disorder

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Copyright © 1999 Leroy J. Pletten