Conducting further research concerning women’s health is necessary. For example, does exposure to environmental tobacco smoke increase the risk for breast cancer? Some previous studies confirmed such possibility, however, this thesis remains controversial, because association between active smoking and breast cancer is hardly confirmed by existing evidence.
Health problems resulting from exposure to environmental tobacco smoke may be important especially among women in developing countries, where the vast majority of women do not smoke but most men do. The cigarette brands that have been most heavily promoted to women smokers, may differ considerably in the levels of known carcinogens. However, almost no data exist on how much brands vary in toxicity and whether any of them can be related to the changes in lung cancer histology over the last decades. Further study is necessary to assess if the changes in the tobacco product and increased exposure to tobacco-specific nitrosamines may be related to the increased incidence rates of adenocarcinoma of the lung. More information is also needed about reproductive outcomes among women who work with tobacco during pregnancy. This issue is not covered in the present report due to lack of data. Generally, much better data are necessary on the health effects of smoking among women. Are the effects similar to those reported in the literature to date, which is based largely on studies of women smokers in the developed world, or are they modified by differences in lifestyle and environmental factors such as diet, viral exposures, or other sources of indoor air contamination?
The reporting of gender-specific results from studies of factors influencing smoking behavior, smoking prevention and cessation interventions, and the health effects of tobacco use, including use of new tobacco products should be encouraged. As far as evidence is concerned, more similarities than differences exist between women and men in the factors that influence smoking initiation, addiction, and smoking cessation. Taking into account differences in smoking history, health consequences also are generally similar. These conclusions are tempered by the fact that many studies do not report gender-specific results. However, some studies; thus, issues concerning gender differences are not resolved completely. It is still not known, for instance, if susceptibility to lung cancer is higher among women smokers than among men smokers, or whether women are more likely than men to put on weight after giving up smoking. Scientists are encouraged to use existing data sets to assess results by gender and to do so in future studies. Where these additional analyses suggest relevant gender differences, more studies are needed to concentrate on the development of interventions tailored to the special needs of girls and women. It will also be relevant to learn if gender differences exist in the appeal and use of such products, as well as the health consequences of their use, as new “reduced-risk” tobacco products are marketed in the future.
We must understand that socioeconomic status, race, ethnicity, and sexual orientation influence smoking prevalence among women of different groups, and learn how to cope with this. Women with only 9 to 11 years of education are about three times as likely to be smokers as are women with a college education. According to statistics, American Indian or Alaska Native women are much more likely to smoke than Hispanic women and Asian or Pacific Islander women. Limited data also indicate that lesbian women are more likely to smoke than are heterosexual women. White teenage girls are much more likely to smoke than blacks. How to discourage less well educated women to cigarettes? Why are smoking rates so high among American Indian women? What contributes to such situation? What positive influences contributed to the vast majority of black teenage girls resisting smoking throughout the 1990s, in stark contrast to the relatively high smoking prevalence among white girls during the same period? The main goal is to reduce smoking to the lowest possible level across all demographic groups, all over the world. The answers to these questions will provide crucial information for intervention efforts.
