Final answer:
Smoking is the most significant cause of respiratory disease, cardiovascular disease, and cancer. It also increases the risk of other health problems such as stroke, blindness, gum infection, and fertility issues. Smoking causes chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and damages the cardiovascular system, leading to high blood pressure and an increased risk of heart attack and stroke.
Step-by-step explanation:
Smoking is the most significant cause of respiratory disease as well as cardiovascular disease and cancer. Exposure to tobacco smoke by smoking or by breathing air that contains tobacco smoke is the leading cause of preventable death in the United States. Regular smokers die about 10 years earlier than nonsmokers. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) describes tobacco use as "the single most important preventable risk to human health in developed countries and an important cause of [early] death worldwide."
Smoking is known to cause many different cancers and chronic diseases such as stroke, blindness, gum infection, aortic rupture, heart disease, pneumonia, hardening of the arteries, chronic lung diseases, reduced fertility, and hip fracture. In addition, long-term exposure to the compounds found in cigarette smoke, such as carbon monoxide and cyanide, is thought to be responsible for much of the lung damage caused by smoking, leading to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Smoking also damages the cardiovascular system and increases the risk of high blood pressure, blood clots, heart attack, and stroke.
A wide diversity of additional adverse health effects are attributable to smoking, such as erectile dysfunction, female infertility, and slow wound healing.