- Secondhand Smoking -
Facts About Side Stream Smoke
Secondhand smoking is the term used to describe the inhalation of the
toxic ingredients in cigarettes by non smokers who are exposed to side stream smoke
from someone else's cigarette.
Cigarette smoking effects are just as real for secondhand
smoking as they are for mainstream smoking, and they are especially dangerous for children.
"Knowledge of the nature
of sidestream and mainstream smoke, of the materials absorbed during "passive" smoking, and of the
quantitative relationships between dose and effect that are commonly observed from exposure to carcinogens,
however, leads to the conclusion that passive smoking gives rise to some risk of cancer."
WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION
INTERNATIONAL AGENCY FOR RESEARCH ON CANCER
IARC Monographs on the Evaluation of Carcinogenic Risks to Humans
Vol 38 Tobacco Smoking
p6
Smoking Facts About Cigarette Smoking Effects in Children
A large body of evidence exists that leads researchers to the same conclusions over and over again and that is that parental smoking is a significant factor in harming
children's health and has a significant impact on their upper airways and middle ear health.
Parental smoking is the greatest cause of secondhand smoking in children.
Environmental Cigarette Smoking Effects
Side Stream Smoke contains:
than mainstream cigarette smoke.
- the smoke from the burning end of the cigarette as it idles is called side stream smoke
- Side stream smoke has been classified as a Class A carcinogen by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
- in Canada nearly one million children are engaged in secondhand smoking on a regular basis.
- in Australia it has been reported that nearly 43% of school age children smoke regularly from exposures to
environmental tobacco smoke in
homes, cars and public places.
- In the USA, estimates for the year 2000 are that 126 million people over the age of 3 are exposed to
environmental tobacco smoke and 60% of non-smokers show evidence of exposure to the ingredients in cigarette smoke.
- environmental cigarette smoking effects on children are significant. It can cause a
clogged eustachian tube
leading to middle ear infections in infants and small children and is now
recognized to be one of the prominent causes of asthma in children.
Smoking Facts about Side Stream Smoke
The constituents of side stream smoke are different from that of the mainstream smoke inhaled by the
smoker.
A person who is engaged in secondhand smoking is inhaling three different types of smoke.
Second hand smoke is actually a combination of main stream smoke that was not
inhaled, exhaled smoke from the smokers own lungs, and smoke produced by the burning end of the cigarette. Side stream smoke has been shown to be
significantly more toxic than inhaled smoke.
One of the reasons that side stream smoke is dirtier and more toxic than main stream smoke is because
the lower burning temperature at the end of the cigarette as it idles, results in incomplete combustion of many of the ingredients in cigarettes
and these byproducts are more toxic than the smoke from the tobacco that is burned at higher temperatures.
Here is what one study had to say about the toxicity of side stream smoke.
"The toxicity of whole sidestream smoke is higher than the sum of the toxicities of
its major constituents."
Schick S and Glantz S.(2005)Philip Morris toxicological experiments with fresh sidestream smoke: more toxic than mainstream smoke
Tob Control 2005;14:396-404
So if there are over 4000 known
chemicals contained in a cigarette, how toxic does that make secondhand smoking?
Here is what the US Surgeon General has to say about secondhand smoking:
"Currently, levels of exposure to this known human carcinogen are more than twice as high among nonsmoking children than
among nonsmoking adults."
2004 report of the US Surgeon General
Executive Summary p14
The phrase "this known human carcinogen" is a reference to tobacco smoke.
A burning cigarette produces thousands of chemicals many of which have been shown to be lethal, radioactive, and carcinogenic.
Some of those chemicals are drawn through the cigarette and inhaled by you when you smoke.
However, up to 90% of those ingredients are released
into the environment from the burning end of the cigarette in the side stream smoke. Not only are all the
people around you engaged in secondhand smoking but so are you.
The side stream smoke coming off the
end of your cigarette releases all the toxins into the air and you are breathing them in as well.
Just because you are an active smoker does not mean you are immune from the cigarette
smoking effects of side stream smoke.
And if you are a non-smoker but you have regular and prolonged exposure to environmental tobacco
smoke you have a 20-30% increased risk of developing lung cancer and cardiovascular diseases associated with smoking.
Of all the smoking facts about environmental tobacco smoke perhaps the most important one is this:
Secondhand smoking is involuntary smoking.
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Cigarette Smoking Secondhand
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