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Women who smoke are more likely to get blood cancer
Last reviewed: 01.07.2025
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Women who smoke have a sharply increased risk of developing certain types of cancer of the blood, immune system and bone marrow, according to scientists from Oxford University (UK), who analysed data on 1.3 million middle-aged women who participated in the UK Million Women Study.
Over more than a decade of observation, 9,000 subjects developed leukemia, a cancer of the immune system or bone marrow. One of these cancers struck six out of every thousand women who had never smoked, while among smokers, nearly eight out of every thousand women fell victim to cancer.
It also turned out that the risk of developing Hodgkin's lymphoma and some types of bone marrow cancer is twice as high in those representatives of the fairer sex who smoke about 20 cigarettes a day. The likelihood of developing other types of blood cancer in those with a bad habit is also increased, but to a much lesser extent.
The findings add to the growing body of evidence that smoking affects the risk of developing Hodgkin lymphoma and shed light on the link between smoking and the development of other types of lymphoma, leukemia and bone marrow cancer.
The results of the study were published in the British Journal of Cancer.
Let us also recall that recently it was established that smoking can cause not only wrinkles and sagging skin, but also a factor that provokes one type of skin cancer. In particular, smoking increases the risk of developing squamous cell carcinoma by 52%. And another sad fact: many patients with lung or intestinal cancer continue to smoke even after being diagnosed with the disease…
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