Heart disease, lung cancer risk tripled by even one cigarette a day, study says

• A new study published in the British Medical Journal has shown that just one to four cigarettes a day triples a smoker's risk of dying from heart disease and lung cancer, with women more likely to be affected by the habit.
• The study also quashes the notion that 'light' smokers escape the serious health problems faced by heavier smokers.
• Researchers tracked the health and death rates of almost 43,000 men and women aged between 35 and 49 from the mid 1970s up to 2002.
• Although a significant proportion of the light smokers increased their daily consumption, this had not exceeded 9 cigarettes a day.
• Almost as many had given up as had increased their consumption.
• Compared with those who had never smoked, those who smoked between 1 and 5 cigarettes a day were almost three times as likely to die of coronary artery disease or lung cancer.
• And women were almost five times as likely to die of the disease as their non-smoking peers.
• Light smokers also had significantly higher death rates from all causes - 1.5 times - than those who had never smoked, with the death rates corresponding to the number of cigarettes smoked every day.
• As the light smokers had smoked for fewer years than the heavy smokers, the researchers analysed the projected impact of smoking at this level for five years.
• This indicated that the risk of death from coronary artery disease would have been 7 percent higher, and the risk of lung cancer would have been 47 percent higher in women.