Cigarette Smoking and Reading

A recent article in Reuters Health Information (RHI) states that cigarette smoking increases the risk of developing age related cataracts, clouding of the lens in the eye that impairs vision. Study results published in the August 9 issue of The Journal of the American Medical Association suggest that quitting does reduce cataract risk. Cataracts impairs the ability to read, even with reading glasses. It also provides evidence that only some smoking related damage to the lens is reversible. The use of reading glasses might not ameliorate the problem.

Compared with men who continued to smoke, men who had quit less than 10 years before study entry had an approximately 20% reduced risk of cataract diagnosis after adjustment for other cataract risk factors and average number of cigarettes smoked per day or age at starting smoking, according to Dr. William G. Christen of Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts, and colleagues.

The study found that men who had quit smoking had a 23% reduced risk of cataract diagnosis and a 28% reduced risk for cataract extraction -- a surgical treatment -- compared with men who currently smoked.

The researchers conclude that their findings show that smoking cessation reduces the risk of cataract primarily by limiting total smoking-related damage to the lens, but also that some damage in the lens may not be reversed with smoking cessation, underscoring the importance of early cessation of smoking and, preferably, the avoidance of smoking altogether.

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