The Nation - News from Oct. 30, 1987

Cigarette smokers who want to lower their risk of heart disease and cancer should quit tobacco entirely, rather than switch to cigars or pipes, scientists reported after a six-year study. In a report in the November issue of the American Journal of Public Health, four scientists compared pipe and cigar smokers who had been cigarette smokers with those who had never smoked cigarettes. Looking at levels of smoke-derived compounds in the blood of the smokers, the scientists found that pipe or cigar smokers who previously used cigarettes had levels of smoke compounds significantly higher than smokers who had never used cigarettes. The study, led by Judith Ockene of the Division of Preventive and Behavioral Medicine at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, attributed the higher levels of exposure in previous cigarette smokers to deeper inhalation of pipes and cigars.