Air Purifier News

Secondhand Smoke Is a Killer for Kids

Secondhand smoke is more deadly than previously believed — and it's especially harmful to children.

A new report from the U.S. surgeon general states there is no such thing as a safe level of exposure to cigarette smoke.

The only real protection is to eliminate all indoor exposure, and ventilation systems and popular air purifiers don't do the trick.

The report — the "Health Consequences of Involuntary Exposure to Tobacco Smoke" — comes at a time when an estimated 15 million American children are exposed regularly to secondhand smoke, according to the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology.

Devastating Effects on Kids

"The news is bad," said Dr. Michael Cummings, chairman of the Department of Health Behavior at the Roswell Park Cancer Center in Buffalo, N.Y. "Young children take in a bigger dose of smoke with every breath and, as a result, suffer more health problems."

Because young bodies are still developing, especially the lungs, the effects of the many poisons contained in cigarette smoke can be devastating to a child's growth and development, experts said.

This regular exposure leads to higher rates of asthma, bronchitis, pneumonia and ear infections. And it takes longer to recover from these illnesses.

"Studies have shown a child sent home after being treated for asthma will generally recover within about a week," said Dr. Christopher Randolph, a pediatric allergist and immunologist at Yale University. "But a child exposed to secondhand smoke at home can take up to a month or longer to recover."

The challenge is knowing which kids are getting ill as a result of secondhand smoke.

"We can't be entirely sure that a child's respiratory problems are the result of secondhand smoke," said Randolph. "It's really just a hunch. It's based on clinical suspicion.

If a child isn't getting better even while receiving treatment, then secondhand smoke is a likely culprit, Randolph said.

Babies, Toddlers Most at Risk

The very young are at greatest risk of suffering the effects of secondhand smoke because they simply can't walk away from the smoke .

"Young children are trapped," he said. "Unlike older children, who spend more time outside the home away from caretakers who might be smoking."

According to the AAAI, an estimated 1 million American children experience a worsening of their asthma as a direct result of secondhand smoke.

This new report also confirms that exposure to cigarette smoke can cause sudden infant death syndrome, also known as SIDS or crib death. It states some 430 infants died of SIDS in 2005 as a result of exposure to secondhand smoke in the home. This relationship was originally addressed in the previous report in 1986, but fell short of labeling it as a cause.

Is It Child Abuse?

With such damaging health effects, is secondhand smoke tantamount to child abuse? Some think so.

"It is not rationalized or deliberate abuse, but it negatively affects a child's health and it is easily prevented," Randolph said.While it may be easy to prevent unwanted exposure to tobacco smoke, anyone who has quit smoking will attest to just how difficult an undertaking that can be."It's extremely difficult to get parents or caretakers who smoke to quit," said Randolph. "Nicotine is extremely addictive, second only to heroin."

Fighting Back

John Seffrin, CEO of the American Cancer Society, said that in 1964, when the surgeon general's landmark report connecting cigarette smoking to lung cancer was issued, there were no laws restricting public smoking.

Now, 16 states, Washington, D.C., and more than 2,200 communities across the country have passed such laws, covering 43 percent of the American population, Seffrin said.

And some states are doing more than just that. Arkansas and Louisiana recently passed laws making it illegal for a person to smoke in a vehicle in which a child is sitting in a child-safety seat. And there is talk of making it illegal to smoke during pregnancy.