Seven Deadly Myths

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(Video of a burning cigarette in an ashtray sounds of a female coughing in the background. Title reads, Myth #1 "It won’t happen to me.")

Female Voice: It won’t happen to me.

Female 1: Lung cancer is a possibility, you know, I do think about that. I have watched things on emphysema and, you know it’s very scary.

Female 2: I guess that’s just not the way I’ve visualized myself dying. Maybe that sounds weird, but I’ve always figured I’ll, you know, live till I’m old and get hit by a truck when I’m 70.

Christy Turlington: My father died of lung cancer. He was 64. It was a senseless death because it could have been prevented. Not every one who smokes will die from it, but as many as half of all long-term smokers will. Everyone thinks, "She won’t be the one." But why take chances?

Female 3: I really don’t think smoking is bad. Uhm, it pretty much depends on how often you do it.

Dr. Bill Lloyd: Lung cancer emphysema, heart disease… anybody that thinks that they’re going to be able to smoke and won’t develop some of these complications or diseases is delusional.

Female 3: I feel as though that I’m young and there’s no way possible I can get lung cancer, I’m only 24.

Christy Turlington: Meet Pam Laffin, who started smoking when she was just a kid.

Pam Laffin: I started smoking because I wanted to look older and I got hooked. Cigarettes gave me asthma and bronchitis, but I couldn’t quit. I didn’t quit until I got emphysema and had a lung removed. I was 24. I’m 26 now. The medication, which I’ll take for the rest of my life, left me with this fat face and a hump on my neck. I start smoking to look older and I’m sorry to say it worked. The things I didn’t understand about smoking related illness, first of all, the doctor doesn’t say you have cancer, or you have emphysema and then you die. It takes a while and it’s, uhm, not a pleasant way to live. The transplanted lung went into rejection, which means my body started to reject it and now my 13 year old daughter, uhm, kind of feels like she’s the head of the household. A lot of the responsibility of the household falls on her. And so I feel really bad, I feel really guilty that I took away their childhood. I feel really guilty that they have to worry about me. If I have to go to the hospital in an ambulance, and my kids watch me go away in an ambulance, they really don’t know if I’m ever coming home. So, they don’t know if they’re ever going to see me again.

Christy Turlington: When Pam understood how sick she was, she dedicated herself to educating women like you. She died just before we completed this video. She was only 31 years old. It’s heart breaking but true. If you smoke, it can kill you. Every cigarette hurts you. We’re not here to bring you down; we’re here to bring you the truth women to women.