Chinese Surgeon Shows the Lungs of a 52-Year-Old Smoker
Dr Chen Jingyu, a Chinese surgeon from Wuxi People’s Hospital, uploaded a video that shows the lungs of a 52-year-old smoker who died from multiple lung diseases. Under the hashtag ‘jieyan’ (Mandarin for ‘quit smoking’), his video has reached more than 25 million people on social media. His lungs turned black from the tar in his lungs after chain smoking for 30 years.
The video was recorded by the surgeons and doctors from the Wuxi People’s Hospital in Jiangsu (China). Many Internet users dubbed this video as ‘best anti-smoking ad ever.’
‘Look at these lungs – do you still have the courage to smoke?’ Graphic content warning
Before you click on this video, you must be aware of what you are going to watch. The images show the lungs of a patient suffering from lung pulmonary emphysema, among other diseases, after the doctors extracted the organs. The lungs of this patient were charcoal in color and extremely inflamed from decades of tobacco residue clogging them up, instead of showing a healthy pink color.
According to Dr Chen, many smokers have lungs which look like this.”Our team decided to reject these lungs for transplant. If you’re a heavy smoker, your lungs may not be accepted even if you choose to donate them after death,” he explained.
He said that medics may have also inflated the lungs with air or fluid prior to harvesting them for donation. This makes them look much larger than the normal deflated lung postmortem, he explained.
The impact of chain smoking for more than 30 years
This horrifying video shows what years of smoking can do to your lungs. Dr Chen Jingyu received the organs donated by a 52-year-old who had chain smoked for more than 30 years before he died.
According to a 2018 study by China’s Center for Disease Control and Prevention, 350million adults (27 per cent) are smokers.
Years of smoking causes heart, brain, circulation, stomach and lung problems. Smoking can cause fatal diseases such as pneumonia, emphysema and lung cancer. Smoking causes 84% of deaths from lung cancer and 83% of deaths from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), according to NHS.
In England, one in seven adults now smoke tobacco – around 5.9million people, down from 7.7million in 2011, when the figure was closer to one in five. This significant drop in the number of smokers in England is partially due to many adults switching to vaping.
According to a study published by Public Health England, vaping is at least 95 per cent safer than traditional smoking.
Alfonso Melero
Content creator and marketer. Originally from Spain, I lived a few years in Scotland and China where I started to work for the vaping industry. Vaping is not only a profession for me but also a passion. I quit smoking thanks to vaping almost 3 years ago. I helped many smokers to switch to vaping since as I am convinced vaping is a much healhier alternative to tobbaco smoking.
