Among participants who had never smoked, the combined rates of death from ischemic heart disease, other types of heart disease, and any type of stroke decreased from the 1959–1965 period to the contemporary period by 79% among women (Table 2) and by 74% among men (Table 3). These decreases were proportionately larger than those seen in the current smokers; consequently, the relative-risk estimates associated with current smoking increased for all three cardiovascular end points. In the contemporary cohorts, the relative risk for death from ischemic heart disease for current smokers, as compared with those who never smoked, was 2.86 (95% CI, 2.65 to 3.08) for women (Table 2) and 2.50 (95% CI, 2.34 to 2.66) for men (Table 3). The relative risk of death from ischemic heart disease exceeded 3.00 among male and female current smokers who were 55 to 74 years of age (Table S2 in the Supplementary Appendix). Hence, two thirds of the deaths due to ischemic heart disease among smokers in the contemporary cohorts were attributable to their smoking.
