It has always been thought that there might be a connection between smoking and damage to cognitive function and most recently, the habit has been strongly linked to dementia in men. Men who smoke are particularly at risk seemingly and their cognitive health declines at a much faster rate than that of someone who has never smoked before or who had kicked the habit 10 or more years before.
Surprisingly, there no link between women who smoke and a decline in their cognitive function in old age and experts say that this could be down to men smoking more tobacco than women. There is so little known about the relationship between smoking and cognitive decline in men due to the fact that many smokers die before they can fully descend into a cognitive decline and therefore the evidence is just not there. Other experts suggest that the cognitive decline could be related to cardiovascular damage or damage to the lungs which is caused by smoking in many cases.
It is now important to research the factors influencing such a decline that start early on in life, sometimes three decades before any diagnosis is made.