Hey, you smokers: From my own former smoking experience, I know how many times I tried to quit smoking, but I needed a hook to get me started. Well, tomorrow can be your hook, because it is the annual American Cancer Society’s Great American Smokeout.

Here is your opportunity to commit to a healthy, smoke-free life, not for an hour or a day but for the rest of your life. And, get this, chances are that your life will be extended by quitting smoking now.

The Great American Smokeout is an event that not only encourages smokers to initiate a smoking-cessation plan, but it is also a time to educate smokers on the dangers of their continued habit to themselves and to those around them and to alert them to the many free tools available to help them quit.

Despite what you may have been told, it is never too late to quit. Medical professionals confirm that as soon as a person quits, his or her body begins to heal.

According to the American Cancer Society, two to three months after quitting, the risk of heart attacks begins to drop and lung function begins to improve. Between one and nine months after quitting, shortness of breath and persistent coughing decrease, a year after quitting heart attack risk drops sharply, two to five years after quitting, stroke risk is reduced to that of a nonsmoker’s.

The ACS also found that five years after a smoker has quit, his or her risk of cancer of the mouth, throat, esophagus and bladder is reduced by half. Ten years after quitting, the risk of dying from lung cancer is about half of a smoker’s, and the risk of cancer of the kidneys and pancreas decreases markedly. Fifteen years after quitting, the risk of coronary heart disease will have returned to that of a nonsmoker’s.

The Cancer Society has been sponsoring the Great American Smokeout as an annual intervention event on the third Thursday of November since 1977. It estimates that about 34.1 million Americans still smoke, and tobacco use remains the single largest preventable cause of disease and premature death in the country. In the latest figures, nearly 14 of every 100 U.S. adults age 18 or older smoke cigarettes. More than 16 million Americans live with a smoking-related disease.

The annual Smokeout event, always held a week before Thanksgiving, used to be a big deal, but in recent years, it has often come and gone without much notice. Maybe that’s because there are fewer smokers, or maybe we have grown weary of trying to convince those who are impacting their own health and ours through secondhand smoke to quit.

The idea for the Great American Smokeout grew from a 1970 event in Randolph, Massachusetts, at which Arthur P. Mullaney asked people to give up cigarettes for a day and donate the money they would have spent on cigarettes to a high school scholarship fund.

In 1974, Lynn R. Smith, editor of the Monticello Times in Minnesota, spearheaded the state’s first D-Day, or Don’t Smoke Day.

The idea caught on, and on Nov. 18, 1976, the California Division of the American Cancer Society successfully persuaded nearly 1 million people to quit for the day.

That California event marked the first official Smokeout, and the American Cancer Society took it nationwide in 1977. Since then, there have been dramatic changes in the way the public views tobacco advertising and tobacco use.

Most public places and work areas are now smoke-free. This protects nonsmokers and supports smokers who want to quit.

Because of the many individuals and groups that have led smoke-free advocacy efforts, there have been significant landmarks in the areas of research, policy and the environment.

One of the most significant occurred 21 years ago when the Master Settlement Agreement was passed, requiring tobacco companies to pay $206 billion to 45 states, including Pennsylvania, by the year 2025 to cover Medicaid costs of treating people who smoke. The MSA agreement also closed the Tobacco Institute and ended cartoon advertising and tobacco billboards.

Addiction to nicotine in cigarettes is one of the strongest and most deadly a person can have. Quitting is hard. It takes commitment and starts with a plan, often takes more than one attempt and requires a lot of support.

Believe me, I know. I was a pack-a-day smoker from 1957 until I quit for good in 1966. I tried every way known to humankind to quit. I tried the gradual approach - 20 cigarettes, 19 the next day, 18, 17 and so on. When I’d get to about four or five, I’d get a “nicotine fit” and was so irritable that I would throw up my hands in disgust, light up, inhale deeply and coo warmly - “aaahhhh.” I would not only have walked a mile for a Camel, I would have walked across the entire expanse of the Sahara Desert to get my hands on one.

Especially now, there should be added incentive for smokers to quit. COVID-19 is an infectious disease that primarily attacks the lungs. Smoking impairs lung function, making it harder for the body to fight off coronaviruses and other respiratory diseases. Available research suggests that smokers are at higher risk of developing severe COVID-19 outcomes and death.

I strongly urge smokers to take that important first step, and tomorrow will be a great time to start. For more information, call 1-800-227-2345.

By Bruce Frassinelli | tneditor@tnonline.com

The foregoing opinions do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editorial Board or Times News LLC.