ONE of the region’s top chest specialists has warned young smokers that unless they stop now, they could end up with a cruel and debilitating illness that will ruin their lives.

Dr Chris Stenton, a consultant chest physician at Newcastle’s Royal Victoria Infirmary, issued his warning at the launch of a new publicity campaign.

Every Breath, a £200,000 campaign inspired by the Sting hit Every Breath You Take, will use TV and radio to get across a hard-hitting message that young smokers are likely to develop a littleknown but devastating lung disease called chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

“While you are young and beautiful, that is the time to stop smoking – to stop you getting this horrific, unpleasant disease that will shorten your life,” said Dr Stenton.

He said the campaign – organised by the North-East stop smoking agency Fresh, backed by the British Lung Foundation and paid for by all 12 North-East primary care trusts – was deliberately targeting young people.

“If you are in your 20s and 30s and you are a smoker, you might feel all right, but that is the stage where the damage to your lungs is done,” the consultant said.

Dr Stenton said his patients, some in their 40s, were experiencing severe breathing difficulties, anxiety, stress, social isolation and an early death.

He said: “People have to be aware COPD will not get better if you stop smoking but if you stop smoking early enough it never gets bad enough to cause breathlessness.”

Ailsa Rutter, director of Fresh, said it was time for a campaign to highlight “an invisible killer” that killed more people than breast, bowel or prostate cancer every year.

Even though 80 per cent of COPD cases are caused by smoking, Ms Rutter said she was “horrified” at the results of a North-East survey carried out by Fresh which showed that 67 per cent of young smokers had not even heard of it.

Mr Rutter, who lost her father to COPD aged 61 ten years ago, said the really frightening thing about the disease, which causes irreversible damage to the lungs, is that most smokers thought the symptoms – breathlessness and a cough – were just a normal part of smoking.

Pearl Smith, 54, from Seaham, County Durham, says living with COPD is “utterly exhausting”.

Before she was diagnosed with the irreversible lung condition – which is strongly linked to smoking – she thought her cough was just what her father called a “miner’s cough”.

But in her 40s, she began to suffer from severe breathlessness, which left her gasping for air.

She said: “It was really frightening because I felt like I was suffocating. It was only when I was diagnosed with COPD that I realised exactly what smoking had been doing to my health over the years. I quit on the spot.”

Mrs Smith says she is unable to do the simple things in life, such as carrying a bag of shopping, without struggling to cath her breath and is “too tired” to play with her grandchildren.

She says that if she had known about COPD when she had her first cigarette at 14, and how it would affect her life in the future, she would never have started smoking.

“My son and daughter continue to smoke. I have pleaded with them to quit and have told them one day they will end up in the same position as me if they don’t quit now.”

Anyone who wants to quit smoking can contact the NHS Smokefree Helpline on 0800-011612.