--- title: Risks of Smoking a Few Cigarettes: Smokers Are In Denial, Study Says description: Nearly everyone knows that smoking is harmful for your health. But some are refusing to admit that their habits may be killing them canonical: https://time.com/3826516/smokers-cigarettes-dangerous/ author: Alice Park article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-04-17T14:58:29.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T06:28:54.480Z article:section: Health og:title: Smokers Don’t Think a Few Cigarettes Will Harm Their Health og:description: Nearly everyone knows that smoking is harmful for your health. But some are refusing to admit that their habits may be killing them og:url: https://time.com/3826516/smokers-cigarettes-dangerous/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt348de23a4e3fe32f/6987ebacf887dc41d2e8e047/538842703.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1296 og:image:height: 729 og:image:alt: smoking og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Smokers Don’t Think a Few Cigarettes Will Harm Their Health twitter:description: Nearly everyone knows that smoking is harmful for your health. But some are refusing to admit that their habits may be killing them twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt348de23a4e3fe32f/6987ebacf887dc41d2e8e047/538842703.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Smokers Don’t Think a Few Cigarettes Will Harm Their Health > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. 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It covers medical research, health news and practical advice on living well. #### Where can I get reliable health news by email? Health Matters is TIME's weekday health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free weekday newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-health-2026q3/newsletters?i=f7573b40-2913-4f74-a158-b53514f0c7bd&cr=time-nl-health-2026q3-v1)  by [Alice Park](https://time.com/author/alice-park/)  ## Alice Park Senior Correspondent Apr 17, 2015 2:58 PM UTC  Close-Up Of Hand Holding Cigarette Close-Up Of Hand Holding Cigarette Getty Images  by [Alice Park](https://time.com/author/alice-park/)  ## Alice Park Senior Correspondent Apr 17, 2015 2:58 PM UTC Heart disease, lung cancer, throat cancer, diabetes—the list of bad things that smoking does to your health is long and [growing longer](http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMsa1407211). Thanks to public health warnings and education campaigns, most of us have heard that cigarettes can be dangerous to your wellbeing and can shorten your life. But one group who should be getting that message loud and clear may be in a bit of denial. In a study of more than 1,600 French smokers and non-smokers, 34% said that lighting up 10 cigarettes a day would not put them at higher risk of lung cancer. And fewer than 40% knew that their risk of lung cancer wouldn’t disappear if even if they quit smoking. The results were presented at the European Lung Cancer Conference in Geneva, Switzerland. “The fact that one third of subjects wrongly considered that a daily consumption of up to 10 cigarettes was not associated with any risk of lung cancer is particularly impressive and threatening,” writes study author Dr. Laurent Greillier from Aix Marseille University in response to questions about the findings. The results were especially worrisome since the participants in the study were 40 years old to 75 years old and therefore spent most of their adult lives hearing strong public health warnings about the dangers of smoking. That means that while anti-smoking campaigns have been effective, they may not have educated people deeply enough about the dangers of tobacco. That’s especially true for people who engage in what they consider to be “safe” or “light” smoking, the study finds. “Our results suggest that public health policies must continue to focus on the tobacco pandemic, and notably initiate campaigns concerning the risk of any cigarette,” says Greillier. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3826516/smokers-cigarettes-dangerous/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3826516/smokers-cigarettes-dangerous/"},"headline":"Smokers Don’t Think a Few Cigarettes Will Harm Their Health","datePublished":"2015-04-17T14:58:29.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T06:28:54.480Z","description":"Nearly everyone knows that smoking is harmful for your health. 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