Health Worries Of Cigarette Filters by Jane Thurnell-Read

Cigarette smokers are at danger of more than nicotine when they smoke. Tobacco smoke contains many different chemicals including benzene, formaldehyde, styrene, and carbon monoxide. Nicotine is broken down by the body to an even more addictive and long lasting substance cotinine.

But what about the filters? Are they safe? The filters are usually made from cellulose acetate, and studies have shown that smokers commonly ingest and/or inhale some of these fibres. This happensbecause small fragments of cellulose acetate become separated from the filter at the end face. The cut surface of the filter of nearly all cigarettes has these fragments. So every time you inhale cigarette smoke, you are also inhaling small fragments of cellulose acetate - that can't be doing your long term health any good, can it? Yet another reason to give up smoking.

Read what happens to your body when you give up smoking. Read about your heart and cigarettes.