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"Today is the 34th annual Great American Smokeout, and I know all you smokers out there are probably tired of hearing people telling you to quit. Look, I realize it&amp;#039;s an extremely hard addiction to kick. But I can&amp;#039;t emphasize how many times medical experts say to me the biggest thing you can do to reduce your risk of just about every illness is to quit smoking and steer clear of secondhand smoke.  It&amp;#039;s never too late: Once you quit, your health risks go down pretty quickly: 20 minutes after you smoke your last cigarette, your heart rate and blood pressure decrease. Twelve hours after quitting, the carbon monoxide level in your blood drops down to normal. You also put a dent in the major health risks that smoking elevates: Your risk of stroke goes back down to that of a non-smoker 5-15 years after quitting and 15 years later, your odds of developing coronary disease (that can lead to a heart attack) are as if you didn&amp;#039;t smoke. If those stats don&amp;#039;t motivate you to quit, maybe these will, especially if you&amp;#039;re a parent: Children age 2 to 5 absorb six times more nicotine than children 9 to 14 from the same levels of parental smoking, which causes damage to the inner lining of the arteries. Meaning, their risk of heart disease is already going up as toddlers!  OK, I&amp;#039;m off my soapbox now. But seriously, if you smoke, please, please try to quit. It might take several tries, and experts have said that using more than one quit method\u2014the patch and personalized telephone coaching, for example\u2014tends to work better. Check out Great American Smokeout website for more support and this article about how to help stop your kids from even starting smoking in the first place.  -Amy Brightfield, Health Director "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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