London - Health experts on Monday urged
smokers to quit and cigarette companies to stop producing and
selling tobacco products to help reduce the risks from Covid-19.
"The best thing the tobacco industry can do to fight
Covid-19 is to immediately stop producing, marketing and selling
tobacco," Gan Quan, a public health specialist and a director at
the International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease,
said in a statement.
The group, which links international respiratory and lung
specialists, officials and health agencies, said it is "deeply
concerned" about Covid-19's impact on the world's 1.3 billion
smokers, in particular those in poorer countries whose health
systems are already overburdened.
Smoking is known to weaken the immune system, making it less
able to respond effectively to infections. Smokers may also
already have lung disease or reduced lung capacity which would
greatly increase the risk of serious illness.
Quan said governments around the world had a "moral
imperative" to advise smokers to stop.
"This is the absolute
best time to quit smoking," Quan said.
The Union's statement cited emerging evidence from
preliminary studies of Covid-19 patients in China and elsewhere
that suggest smokers infected with the new coronavirus become
more severely ill and suffer more serious complications such as
breathing difficulties.
It said a study of more than 1,000 Covid-19 patients
published in the New England Journal of Medicine in February
found that smokers - both past and present - fared poorly, with
smokers comprising more than 25% of those that needed mechanical
ventilation, admission to an intensive care unit, or who died.
The World Health Organization and the European Centre for
Disease Control and Prevention have also warned that smoking can
expose people to serious complications from Covid-19.