The Dangers of Second Hand Smoke #brakesonsmoking

I was brought up in a smoking household which was something I detested.

I have an overriding memory of constantly nagging my parents to stop smoking and once they jokingly tried forced me to take a drag of a cigarette – horrid!

Looking back at my childhood I regularly suffered from ear infections and mild asthma and used to spend most winters with a barking cough that no amount of disgusting cough mixtures would get rid of.  My parents would think nothing of lighting up in the house or car, sometimes only opening a window to throw a butt out.

I have to admit that I succumbed to peer pressure at the age of 17 and started smoking myself but I never really enjoyed it and was only ever a social smoker.  I found it easy to give up when I got pregnant with Abbey and successfully stayed off until she was 13 months old.  I am not sure whatever possessed me to start again but I did the same thing again with both Callan and Kian, finally kicking the habit for good in 2003.

When my eldest were small I worked in a pub, long before the smoking ban came in and I hated the way my hair, my clothes and even my car smelled after a shift.  I have to admit that I breathed a sigh of relief when the ban came in and could go out and not come away stinking of stale tobacco.  They say being an ex-smoker makes you notice it more and I have to say that I am terrible.  I cannot abide walking through a cloud of smoke at the school gates or local shopping centre however I would much rather people smoked outside than in their cars or homes!

Why?

It is now widely known that secondhand smoke is harmful to anyone exposed to it and 80% of secondhand smoke is invisible and odourless.  Children are especially vulnerable due to having less developed airways, lungs and immune systems, combined with the fact that they breathe more rapidly than adults. Shockingly exposure of children to secondhand smoke is responsible for over 300,000 general practice consultations and 9,500 hospital admissions in the UK each year.

Public Health England has just launched their campaign in support of its NHS Smokefree Homes and Cars campaign which can be found online, on television and on radio

Secondhand smoke is a real and substantial threat to a child’s health. Every time a child breathes in secondhand smoke, they breathe in thousands of chemicals that can cause cancer and increase the risk of:

• Lower respiratory infections (such as bronchitis and pneumonia) (up to 60% more likely)
• Middle ear infection (up to 45% more likely)
• Meningitis (more than twice as likely)
• Decreased lung function (modestly more likely)
• Sudden infant death syndrome (cot death more than three times as likely)

Tobacco smoke contains more than 4,000 chemicals, more than 50 of which cause cancer, including:

• Tar – a mixture of dangerous chemicals
• Arsenic – used in wood preservatives
• Benzene – an industrial solvent, refined from crude oil
• Cadmium – used in batteries
• Formaldehyde – used in mortuaries and paint manufacturing
• Polonium-210 – a highly radioactive element
• Chromium – used to manufacture dye, paints and alloys
• 1,3-Butadiene – used in rubber manufacturing
• Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons – a group of dangerous DNA-damaging chemicals
• Nitrosamines – another group of DNA-damaging chemicals
• Acrolein – formerly used as a chemical weapon

Other poisons in cigarette smoke include:

• Hydrogen cyanide – used as an industrial pesticide
• Carbon monoxide – found in car exhausts and used in chemicals manufacturing
• Nitrogen oxides – a major component of smog
• Ammonia – used to make fertilisers and explosives

If you are trying to give up smoking there is plenty of help on offer these days with free support tools and resources on www.nhs.co.uk/smokefree or by searching ‘Smokefree’:

• Quit Kit – Posted to you, this kit comes with a handy calendar packed with tips and a Health and Wealth wheel which explains how well your body is doing and how much money you’re saving
• Smokefree App – a free app that people can download to support them in the quit attempt wherever they are. It works on Android and Apple smartphones
• Local Stop Smoking Service – people wishing for local face to face support from an expert throughout their quitting journey can find out where their local stop smoking service is
• Text message support – quitters can receive daily messages proven to help keep them motivated and smokefree
• Email support – provides daily emails with motivational support to help people keep on track

If you are planning on giving up smoking I wish you the best of luck – it is the best thing I ever did!

I’m working with BritMums and Public Health English alongside the #brakesonsmoking campaign. I have been compensated for my time. All editorial and opinions are my own. Visit www.nhs.uk/smokefree for free support and advice.