Smoking Can Greatly Affect One's Life Insurance Rates

For decades, smoking has been known as one of the unhealthiest habits a person can adopt, and also as something that can result in dramatically higher life insurance rates for people.

However, an article by HealthDay News cites studies from Harvard University and Norway's University of Bergen which found that women smokers were more inclined to be diagnosed with lung cancer or to come down with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease at a younger age than their male counterparts.

The report noted that other studies over the past couple of decades have reached similar conclusions, although researchers are apparently still undecided on why this is the case.

Regardless of one's gender, smoking can lead to other problems such as heart disease while greatly shortening one's life span and contributing to significantly higher medical treatment costs over time.

According to the American Lung Association, 392,000 people die each year from smoking, while thousands more are said to die from secondhand smoke.

For reasons such as this, life insurance rates for smokers are generally more likely to be far higher than for those who quit the habit or avoid it altogether.