How Smoking Led to Akira Toriyama’s Death

Posted bydrillimationsystemsPosted inUncategorized

Over eight months have passed since the death of famed manga artist and illustrator Akira Toriyama, who was the man that brought classics such as Dr. Slump and Dragon Ball, and designing the characters for Dragon Quest and Chrono Trigger. We used resources from the U.S.-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), specifically their Tips From Former Smokers campaign, a series of public service announcements intended to educate the public about the dangers of cigarette smoking. Their primary objective is to encourage existing smokers to quit, or to those who haven’t taken a puff, to not start.

Akira Toriyama’s Story

Akira Toriyama developed a brain tumor from smoking cigarettes for decades. Earlier this year in February, Toriyama had to have surgery to remove the tumor before his inevitable death the following month. His habit of smoking goes back to the start of his career. Because of his private personal life, it is not known when he started smoking, but throughout his career, he was smoking three packs a day.

Regardless of how many packs one smokes, the effects on his health had taken a toll, and was a likely cause of his brain tumor. Nicotine damages every organ in the human body, including the brain, with strokes being one of the most common complications from smoking. Strokes, heart attacks, and cancer make up three of the four leading causes of death from non-accident injuries in developed countries.

The link between smoking and brain tumors is not well understood, but scientists believe that nicotine and other carcinogens, which does in fact spread to the brain, can alter the DNA of brain cells, potentially making them turn cancerous. Cancers relating to smoking most often occur in the lungs, throat, jaw, intestinal areas, but cancers that start in the brain are rare. Just when they thought the tumor was removed, the damage had already been done. The following month after his surgery, Toriyama was pronounced dead at the age of 68. The cause – a subdural hematoma that may have been the result of complications from his surgery, which is rare.

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11 thoughts on “How Smoking Led to Akira Toriyama’s Death”

  4. What an eye-opening story! I smoked from the age of 14 until my early 20s. I quit so I wouldn’t smell like smoke when I started my teaching career. Who knows if there’s any lasting damage. It is truly terrifying what it does to people. My mother in law smoked for the majority of her life and ultimately it was small cell carcinoma that ended her life. She smoked until almost the end. She had to quit after her diagnosis because she was put on oxygen. She didn’t last long after that.

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  7. I love his work! He inspired me to become the anime lover and fantasy writer that I am today. It’s sad to know that he passed due to smoking. A lesson for us all ♥️

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