Horrifying video reveals how smoking leaves your lungs black, shrivelled and ‘steeped in tar’

WE’RE constantly warned about how smoking can destroy our lungs and health.

There are certain outward signs we’ve come to recognise as consequences of the habit: a smoker’s perpetual hacking cough, sagging skin, yellowing teeth.

Now a horrifying video has laid bare just how much damage cigarettes can cause to the inside of your body, showing how smoking can leave the lungs blackened, shrivelled and coated in tar.

It comes as MPs prepare to vote on legislation that aims to create a “smokefree generation” by raising the age of sale for tobacco in England by one year every year.

If the legislation comes into effect, it would mean children turning 15 this year or younger will never be able to legally buy cigarettes.

The bill is due to be debated in parliament for the first time tomorrow, April 16.

PM Rishi Sunak previously said: “We must tackle the single biggest entirely preventable cause of ill health, disability and death.

“And that is smoking, and our country. Smoking causes, one in four cancer deaths.”

The harrowing clip showing the extent to which smoking can wreak the lungs was posted to the Instagram account @businessgrowthmentor and shows two sets of lungs hooked up to an air pump.

It shows a healthy, pink lung, representing the organs of a non-smoker.

A blackened set of lungs representing those of a smoker is shown next. It appears that both organs are real.

Aside from the colour, the difference between set of each is remarkable – the pink lung appears fuller, while the blackened one hangs limply from the pump.

And that’s before air is puffed into them.

When a puff of air is blown into the smoker’s lung, only a small portion of them swells up slowly.

Meanwhile, the healthy pink lung quickly puffs to twice that size when air is pushed into it.

The caption accompanying the clip stated: “Smoking can cause a variety of lung problems, such as chronic bronchitis, emphysema, and decreased lung function.

“These changes can lead to reduced oxygen intake, increased susceptibility to infections, and increased risk of lung cancer.”

It’s no wonder that cigarettes wreak havoc on your lungs, as tobacco smoke contains a toxic mix of over 5,000 chemicals, according to Asthma + Lung UK.

“People who smoke do so because they are addicted to nicotine, but the harm comes from the tar, carbon monoxide, and other chemicals in the smoke,” the charity explained.

Meanwhile, the Food and Drug Administration warned that cigarette smoking can have major consequences on the lungs at any age.

It can start from infancy, as babies whose mothers smoked during pregnancy may have lungs that develop abnormally, while teens who smoke cigarettes can develop smaller, weaker lungs that never grow to full size and or reach peak capacity.

In addition, smoking can destroy the cilia – tiny hairs in your airway that keep dirt and mucus out of your lungs – leading to what’s known as “smoker’s cough”.

The damage doesn’t stop there.

According to Asthma + Lung UK, smoking and breathing in second-hand smoke – also known as passive smoking – causes many lung conditions, including:

• Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) – a group of lung condition that cause breathing difficulties, such as emphysema and bronchitis
• Obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA)
• Pneumonia
• Lung cancer

People who smoke are at higher risk of getting chest infections, including flu, pneumonia, and Covid-19, the charity said.

And if you’re a smoker and you get an infection, you’re more likely to have severe symptoms.

According to the NHS, up to 35 per cent of all deaths from respiratory conditions are linked to smoking.

It’s not just your lungs that bear scars from the habit.

The American Lung Association said puffing on cigarettes can harm nearly every organ of your body.

It can put you at risk of:

• Heart attacks
• Strokes
• Other cancers
• Skin ageing
• Erectile dysfunction
• Infertility

Lungs steeped in tar

The harrowing clip making the rounds on social media is not the first to expose the reality of what smoking does to the lungs.

The American Lung Association recently put together a demonstration to show how smoking wreaks havoc on lung health by comparing the lungs of a healthy nonsmoker versus those of a smoker.

Freedom From Smoking trainder Jennifer Hobbs Folkenroth explained that a “full cup of tar is filtered through your lungs” if you smoke a pack of cigarettes a day for a year.

Showing a smoker’s lung, which was blackened due to the tar produced by smoking cigarettes, she explained how parts of it were “completely been shut off due to the damage”.

Doing every day activities like going up a flight of stairs is much more strenuous and challenging when your lungs have been damaged by smoking, Jennifer said.

On top that, the lung specialist pointed out a tumour on the blackened lung.

“In more than 87 per cent of cases, by the time lung cancer is diagnosed it’s already spread throughout the body,” she warned.

She also showed how air sacs in the smoker’s lung had burst open, creating little porous holes.

“With each puff you take out of a cigarette, you pop those air sacs,” Jennifer said.

This is called emphysema and it’s the only tobacco related illness that’s not reversible, she stated.

But Jennifer said all the other damage caused to the lungs is reversible after you quit.

You can clean out the tar and improve your lung function by up to 30 per cent in the first few weeks, the lung specialist said.

“It’s never too late to quit,” she stated.