FAQs and Facts

Canadian labels tell the truth

If you've seen a pack of cigarettes lately you'll notice they all come with a powerful message printed right on the front. The packs show photos and facts that help smokers remember exactly what they're doing to their bodies when they light up. Like lung cancer. Impotence. Emphysema. The government requires that all tobacco companies include these warnings on cigarette packs because when you know the truth, smoking just doesn't seem cool or sexy anymore.

Cigarettes cause mouth disease

Lung cancer isn't the only disease you get when you smoke. If you want to have a healthy mouth -- or just want to keep your teeth -- you know what you have to do. Quit. Or don't start in the first place.

• Note: Health Canada is not the copyright owner of the photograph used in the label shown above. Therefore, reproducing or downloading this image is prohibited.

Idle but deadly

There's no other way to put it. Second-hand smoke is deadly. It's known to carry 4,000 chemical compounds and at least 50 may cause cancer. So if you won't quit for yourself, think about the friends and family around you.

Tobacco use can make you impotent

Think you're a hot guy? Don't count on it if you smoke. Sexual functioning needs the coordination of the nervous system, hormones and the vascular system which pumps blood into the muscle tissue that keeps the erection. Smoking hinders every area. The effect? Impotence.

Cigarettes cause lung cancer

Tobacco is the single most important preventable cause of lung cancer. Don't smoke and you probably won't get lung cancer. Something to think about before taking that next drag.

• Note: Health Canada is not the copyright owner of the photograph used in the label shown above. Therefore, reproducing or downloading this image is prohibited.

Find out about the other 12 labels and the information inside the packs.

Lung image courtesy Australian National Tobacco Campaign. Mouth photo courtesy Government of British Columbia.