Smoking related illnesses have claimed a lot of lives in UK Essay

Smoking related illnesses have claimed a lot of lives in UK - Essay Example For women the activity of smoking renders severe implications to the process of pregnancy impairing the reproductive process (Smoking and Health, n.d.). The growth of smoking activity in United Kingdom alone claims around 106,000 lives on an annual basis. Large numbers of people get affected by fatal ailments like cancer, cardiac and pulmonary problems which contribute to the growing deaths in the region. The growth in deaths owing to smoking problems has scaled such heights in United Kingdom that it has become a serious public health concern in the region. Again the frequency and growth of smoking ailments happens to become an economic and social burden for the country (Peate, 2007, p.218). In United Kingdom the treatment and care rendered to smoking diseases demand around 5 billion pounds of annual expenditure during 2005. This expenditure incurred during 2005 accounted for around 5.5 percent of the total health budget prepared by National Health Service in United Kingdom for the p eriod 2005 to 2006. (Smoking disease costs NHS 5 billion Pounds, 2009). Public Health Impacts of Smoking Related Diseases The policies and practice of Public Health Systems in the context of United Kingdom gained importance with the works of the Labour Party during 1997. In fact, the labour government of Britain made the public health practices as one of the key health and social needs of the region. Enhancement of the scope of the National Health Service in the region was done to reduce the impact of economic and social inequalities in getting access to better health services. (Lloyd, Jones & Douglas, 2009, p.10). Growth in the consumption habits of tobacco and nicotine products in different countries has been observed to occur because of difference in the social settings of the large communities. The main social inequality factors like deprivation from better living and economic standards, spread of unemployment in the regions and increase in solitude are observed to be the major reasons which accounts for the growth of smoking habits. People take to these habits of consuming nicotine through smoking to get rid of feelings of depression and loneliness. However on the contrary increased incidence to such objects renders economic impact on the poor people by causing a rise in the emergence of fatal diseases pertaining to heart and lungs. It also happens to cause cancer in many patients, which thereby claim many lives. Poor people suffering from such smoking ailments fail to gain access to better treatments owing to which the number of deaths in the region starts rising. A study made on the smoking characteristics of the people in United Kingdom during 1993 shows that the number of smokers in the deprived community were greater than the people belonging to affluent types. The above observation made during 1993 in United Kingdom can also be graphically represented as follows. It is found that the habit of taking drugs and products like nicotine were much prevale nt in deprived communities of Britain during the 1993 period (Wilkinson & Marmot, 2003, pp.24-25).