“The Harmful Effects of Cigarette Filters on Lung Health: Debunking the Myth of Protection”

For the CSS, cigarette filters even do more harm than good: they give smokers a false sense of security, making them believe, wrongly, that the filter reduces the harmful effects of tobacco smoke. The filter does block part of the soot and nicotine particles, but in fact, changing the combustion mode even increases the formation of carcinogens.

In addition, smokers tend to draw more often and more deeply on their cigarette when it includes a filter. They thus compensate for the reduction in nicotine intake due to the filter.

Filters first appeared in the 1860s, but it wasn’t until the 1950s that the filtered cigarette became more popular. At the end of the 1970s, ventilated cigarettes, equipped with microscopic holes in the filters, arrived on the market. Often referred to as “light”, these cigarettes cause changes in combustion and the production of toxic substances.

The Superior Health Council points out, on the basis of several studies, that instead of protecting smokers against lung cancer, filters have mainly promoted a change in the type of lung cancer over the years, with an increased incidence of lung adenocarcinomas and a decrease in another type of cancer, squamous cell carcinoma. Today, in Belgium, this adenocarcinoma is the dominant type of lung cancer.