Secondhand Smoke

You don't have to be a smoker for smoking to harm you. You can also have health problems from breathing in other people's smoke. Secondhand smoke is the combination of smoke that comes from the burning end of a cigarette, cigar or pipe and the smoke exhaled by the smoker. Secondhand smoke contains more than 50 substances that can cause cancer. Health effects of exposure to secondhand smoke include lung cancer, nasal sinus cancer, respiratory tract infections and heart disease.

There is no safe amount of secondhand smoke. Children, pregnant women, older people and people with heart or breathing problems should be especially careful.

National Cancer Institute

External Resources

Smoking and Ventilation Standards - Do ventilation systems remove secondhand smoke from indoor air, or just the odor? Information from Americans for Nonsmokers' Rights.

The Options Initiative - A program developed by Philip Morris U.S.A. to help business owners find effective, practical ways to minimize secondhand smoke.

Smoking Mom; A Possible Cause of Asthma in Children - Recent research indicates secondhand smoke not only worsens asthma symptoms, it causes asthma by constricting airway muscles and increasing mucous production.

Print Media Coverage of Research on Passive Smoking - Research evaluates tobacco industry influence on coverage in newspapers and magazines of the health effects of secondhand smoke.

Cancer Facts and Figures - Concise summary from the American Cancer Society of tobacco use, cigarettes, trends in smoking, profiling smokers, costs of tobacco, nicotine addiction, secondhand smoke, spit tobacco, and industrial hazards.

Smoking And Tobacco Factsheets - From the Missouri Health Department, a large set of factsheets on cigarettes, tobacco advertising, health effects, and secondhand smoke.

The Tobacco Reference Guide - Complete online book provides quotes, summaries, and factsheets on: scope of the problem and overall death and disability; demographics; mortality and longevity data; history; secondhand smoke; asthma and allergy; lung cancer; other cancers; heart disease; COPD; other healthproblems; impotence; pregnancy; children and teen smoking; spit tobacco; pipes and cigars; tobacco ingredients and additives; nicotine and addiction; low tar and nicotine cigarettes; quitting; women and smoking; and advertising.

Tobacco Web - From Australia: cigarettes, tobacco history; current trends; smoking and health, the tobacco industry -- recent revelations; secondhand smoke; young people and smoking; smoking in the workplace; tqitting smoking.

WHO: The Tobacco Atlas - History of tobacco, types of use, male and female smoking, youth, cigarette consumption, health effects, secondhand smoke, deaths, costs; the trade, the industry, smuggling, tobacco promotion and marketing, Internet sales, politics; activism, research, tobacco control, policy initiatives; quitting, litigation, pricing, and futures.

Help for Tobacco Addiction - Effects, quitting information, QandA, secondhand smoke. "If Tobacco does not kill you it makes your life a living hell."

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