ยง2 ยท 46 tips
How much life do smoking, drinking, sitting all day and staying up late really cost, how do you actually quit smoking and drinking, and how do you choose and use everyday cooking oil?
Tips from this section that apply in the United States. This section is about health and medicines. It is general information, not a substitute for a doctorโs diagnosis or prescription.
On average, people who smoke live more than 10 years less than people who don't. Quitting before 40 wipes out about 90% of the added risk of death from continuing to smoke. The earlier you quit, the more you get back. If you keep smoking after a broken bone, the odds that the bone fails to heal are about 2.3 times those of a non-smoker, so don't smoke until the bone has healed.
In 2004, about 600,000 (60ไธ) people worldwide died from breathing other people's smoke, and nearly three in ten of them were children. People who breathe secondhand smoke have a risk of high blood pressure, heart disease and stroke that is higher by about 30%. Smoke breathed at home does more harm than smoke breathed outside.
People who take varenicline succeed more than twice as often as people who take a placebo. People who use replacements such as nicotine patches or gum do about 50% better than people who use no medicine. Using the patch and the gum together adds more than another 20%.
Many people plan to smoke a few fewer cigarettes a day and slowly work down to zero. But at 6 months, 22% of the people who set a date and stopped all at once were still not smoking, against only 15.5% of those who cut down gradually. So set a date and stop all at once on that day.
Medicine and having someone check in with you regularly are two different things, and together they work best. People who take medicine while a specialist follows up with them succeed at nearly twice the rate of people who get only a short piece of advice. Phone support counts too: a quit line that calls you back can raise the success rate by 25% to nearly 40%.
Switching from cigarettes to nicotine e-cigarettes gets about 60% more people to quit than nicotine patches do, and this finding is very reliable. But the long-term safety data are not sufficient, and they can't be treated as harmless. These trials all compared people who wanted to quit smoking; if you don't already smoke, don't touch them.
In U.S. studies, people who drink two or more sweet drinks a day have about a 20% higher chance of dying over the same period than people who almost never drink them. For one to two a day, it is more than 10% higher. Switching to sugar-free shows no benefit either: people who drink two or more artificially sweetened drinks a day are actually about a quarter higher.
People who chew betel nut have about a 20% higher chance of dying over the same period than people who don't. Their risk of diabetes and metabolic syndrome is higher by nearly 50%. The risk of mouth cancer and esophageal cancer comes on top of that.
For people in rural China who have had a stroke or are 60 or older with high blood pressure, switching the salt at home to low-sodium salt, followed for nearly five years, lowers the chance of death by about 12% and of stroke by about 14%.
In one Japanese study, people who used floss or interdental brushes had about a 10% lower chance of dying over the same period. Older people who have lost all their teeth have about a 90% higher chance. Those with fewer than 20 teeth have about double. Electric toothbrushes remove 10% to 20% more plaque than manual ones and leave gums somewhat less inflamed, but how much that difference matters is still unclear.
People who walk about 7800 steps a day have about a 45% lower chance of dying over the same period than people who walk only 3500. Counted by time it is the same: 150โ300 minutes of brisk walking a week is about 30% lower than no exercise. Beyond a certain amount the risk stops falling, and for people over 60, 6000โ8000 steps is enough. Of the two ways of counting, meeting either one is enough.
For every 10 mmHg drop in blood pressure, the chance of death falls about 13% and stroke about 27%. Each 1-unit drop in LDL cholesterol on a statin lowers the chance of death by about 10%. People who take their medicine on schedule have a 30% to 45% lower chance of death than people who often miss doses. Get blood lipids tested every 2 to 5 years before 40, and every year from 40.
People who regularly sleep less than 7 hours have about a 10% higher chance of dying over the same period. The more irregular the schedule, the higher the risk. Everyone else has a 20% to nearly 50% lower risk than the most irregular group. How regular your schedule is tells you more about the risk of death than how long you sleep.
People who regularly play tennis, badminton or table tennis have about half the chance of dying over the same period as people who don't, and about 56% lower cardiovascular death. Swimmers are about 28% lower. Running and soccer showed no difference in this data.
For people who don't exercise at all, having three bursts of 1 or 2 minutes of vigorous activity a day is linked to about a 40% lower chance of dying over the same period than having none, and nearly half the cardiovascular death. Vigorous activity means things like climbing stairs or hurrying along at a fast walk.
People who do 30โ60 minutes of strength training a week have a 10% to 20% lower chance of dying over the same period than people who don't. More than that is not better. Doing strength and aerobic exercise together works best.
People who sit the most have 2.6 times the chance of dying over the same period of people who sit the least. Sitting for a long time in one stretch adds a separate risk. But with 60โ75 minutes of moderate activity a day, the extra risk from sitting is mostly canceled out.
People who eat the most ham, bacon and sausage have about a 20% higher chance of dying over the same period than people who eat the least. Each extra serving of processed meat a day also raises the chance by about 20%.
Beyond 100 g of pure alcohol a week, the more you drink, the earlier you die. 100 g of pure alcohol is about 2.5 L of beer. People who drink 100โ200 g a week at age 40 lose about half a year of life; those who drink 200โ350 g lose 1 to 2 years; those who drink more than 350 g lose 4 to 5 years. For overall health, the best amount is none.
If someone who drinks heavily every day suddenly stops, withdrawal sets in. Mild signs are shaking hands, sweating, a racing heart and trouble sleeping. Severe ones are seizures or delirium tremens, which is an emergency that can kill. Norway followed more than 30,000 (3ไธ) people, and among those who had had delirium tremens, 8% died each year afterward. If you want to quit, go to the hospital first and tell them how much you drink each day.
When a doctor spends a few minutes looking at how much you drink, explains the risks and helps you set a goal, a year later people drink an average of 20 g less pure alcohol a week, about half a liter of beer. Talking for longer did not help more. For people who can't stop, two drugs have been shown to work abroad; for roughly every 12 people treated, 1 more person stops going back to drinking, or to heavy drinking.
People who eat nuts regularly have about a 20% lower chance of dying over the same period than people who don't. Even once a week shows a difference, about 10% lower. The difference is largest at a handful a day.
Eating 2 more servings a week of processed or red meat raises the chance of dying over the same period by about 3%. Replace them with the same number of servings of fish or poultry and no increase shows up. The effect of this item is on the small side in this section; it is something to swap when it's easy, not to fuss over.
People who eat 90 g more whole grains a day have about a 17% lower chance of dying over the same period. 90 g is about 3 servings. The risk keeps falling up to about 200 g a day.
People who drink tea regularly have about a 15% lower chance of dying over the same period. Counting from age 50, they live 1.26 years longer on average and get 1.41 more years free of cardiovascular disease.
People who drink 3 to 4 cups of coffee a day have about a 17% lower chance of dying over the same period than people who don't drink it. In another study, people who drank their coffee mostly in the morning had about 12% lower risk, while people who drank it all day showed no difference. The caffeine in a cup of coffee varies a lot, so go by a total of no more than 400 mg a day.
People who eat 200 g more vegetables and fruit a day have about a 10% lower chance of dying over the same period. People who eat 5 servings a day are about 13% lower than people who eat only 2. In U.S. studies, eating more than that doesn't lower it further.
People who eat the most ultra-processed food have about a 20% higher chance of dying over the same period than people who eat the least, and a 50% higher chance of cardiovascular death. But this evidence is rated as fairly uncertain, so discount the numbers.
People who cook with coal or firewood have about a 10% higher chance of dying over the same period; those who heat with coal or firewood are about 14% higher. People who have switched to electricity or gas have a 13%โ33% lower chance of dying than people still burning coal or firewood.
In a study in an area of Iran where esophageal cancer is common, people who drank very hot tea had 8 times the chance of esophageal cancer of people who drank warm tea. Even merely โhotโ tea carried 2 times. Drinking within 2 minutes of pouring carried 5 times the risk of waiting 4 minutes or more.
In a Swedish study, women who deliberately avoid the sun have a life expectancy 0.6 to 2.1 years shorter than those who get the most sun. Non-smokers who avoid the sun live about as long as smokers who get the most sun.
The chance of dying is lowest at a BMI of 20โ25. At a BMI of 27.5โ30 it is about 20% higher, at 30โ35 about 45% higher, and at 35โ40 nearly double. For East Asians with a BMI above 25, each 5 points higher means about 40% higher risk.
In an Italian study, people who ate chili peppers more than 4 times a week had about a 23% lower chance of dying over the same period than people who rarely ate them, and about a third lower cardiovascular death.
People who have 2 or more servings of milk or yogurt a day have about a 17% lower chance of dying over the same period than people who don't drink it.
Each extra half a whole egg a day is linked to about a 7% higher chance of dying over the same period. Replace that half egg with egg whites, fish, poultry or nuts and the risk of death comes out lower instead. But another set of studies found no link between up to one egg a day and cardiovascular disease, so there is no need to give up eggs.
In a Japanese study, people who took a bath almost every day had about a 28% lower risk of a cardiovascular event, and about 46% lower risk of a brain hemorrhage, than people who bathed less than twice a week.
People whose naps are no longer than an hour show no higher risk of death or chronic disease, and their minds are somewhat sharper. For people who nap longer than an hour, the risk of coronary heart disease is about 30% higher, and of diabetes and obesity about 20% higher. So set an alarm and wake yourself after half an hour. If you can only get through each day with a 1- or 2-hour sleep, that is a signal to have your health checked.
People who slept too little and did not make it up the next night had about 15% higher risk of death than people with a regular schedule, and about 42% higher if the shortfall was severe and not made up. People who made it up showed no higher risk. So after a late night, go to bed earlier the next night.
People who work night shifts have about 13% more cardiovascular disease and about 27% more cardiovascular death than people who don't. And it adds up with years: every additional 5 years of night shifts adds about 7% more cardiovascular disease. So count it in years, and if you can move to another position, do it sooner.
Eating less saturated fat such as lard and butter and replacing it with vegetable oil means about 17% fewer heart disease and stroke events, but no change in overall risk of death was seen. Eating more of the main component of soybean and corn oil showed neither benefit nor harm. Eating more flaxseed oil also did not show a lower heart disease risk.
Among non-smoking Chinese women, those who cooked with the hood off or rarely on had about twice the risk of lung cancer of those who used it regularly. Those who had lived in a house with a poorly ventilated kitchen also had about 50% higher risk, most clearly in households that burned coal.
For hot flashes and night sweats around menopause, hormone therapy cuts the number of hot flashes by about 75% compared with a placebo. The cost is a little more breast cancer, blood clots and stroke, about 8 more cases of each per 10,000 (1ไธ) women per year. For people who start at age 50 to 59, overall mortality does not rise. It cannot be used to prevent heart disease or dementia.
People who have a dog have about a quarter lower chance of dying over the same period on average, and people who have had coronary heart disease have an even lower chance. But after other differences are removed, large studies in the UK and Norway see no difference, and having a cat shows no link. So don't get a dog just to live longer; if you already wanted one, count the daily walk as walking.
For people whose blood sugar is high but not yet diabetes, eating less, moving more and losing a little weight can cut the risk of getting diabetes by 30% to 60%. China's Da Qing trial followed people for 30 years, and those who did this had about a quarter lower chance of death and lived about a year and a half longer on average. But similar trials in the U.S. and Finland did not see a difference in death rates.
Moldy peanuts, corn and nuts grow aflatoxin, which can cause liver cancer. In a Shanghai study, people with this toxin found in their urine had about 3.4 times the risk of liver cancer of people without it. People who carried the hepatitis B virus and also had the toxin were at about 59.4 times the risk of people with neither. This toxin is very hard to remove by stir-frying, boiling or deep-frying.
Eating raw freshwater fish or shrimp can give you liver flukes. It is a parasite known to cause cancer, and infected people have about four to five times the chance of bile duct cancer of people who are not infected. Vinegar, liquor and wasabi do not kill it. Two days of medicine cures at least 90% of infections.
