SecondHand SmOke - How DanGerOus cOuld yOu be

Some people says that second hand smoke is double dangerous for than the smoke inhaled by the smoker himself. So why and how that can be?


Here are some facts about Second Hand smoke:

1 Secondhand smoke is composed of sidestream smoke (the smoke released from the burning end of a cigarette) and exhaled mainstream smoke (the smoke exhaled by the smoker).

2 While secondhand smoke has been referred to as environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) in the past, the term “secondhand” smoke better captures the involuntary nature of the exposure.

3 The 2006 Surgeon General’s report uses the term “involuntary” in the title because most non-smokers do not want to breathe tobacco smoke. The term “involuntary” was also used in the title of the 1986 Surgeon General’s report on secondhand smoke.

4 Secondhand smoke contains many of the same chemicals that are present in the smoke inhaled by smokers. [Cigarette smoke contains more than 4,000 chemical compounds.]

5 Because sidestream smoke is generated at lower temperatures and under different conditions than mainstream smoke, it contains higher concentrations of many of the toxins found in cigarette smoke.

6 The National Toxicology Program [NTP] estimates that at least 250 chemicals in secondhand smoke are known to be toxic or carcinogenic.

7 Secondhand smoke has been designated as a known human carcinogen (cancer-causing agent) by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the NTP, and the International Agency for Research on Cancer, and an occupational carcinogen by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.

8 Secondhand smoke contains more than 50 cancer-causing chemicals.

9 When nonsmokers are exposed to secondhand smoke, they inhale many of the same cancer-causing chemicals that smokers inhale.

10 There is no risk-free level of exposure to secondhand smoke: even small amounts of secondhand smoke exposure can be harmful to people’s health.

11 Many millions of Americans continue to be exposed to secondhand smoke.

     A smoke-free environment is the only way to fully protect nonsmokers from the dangers of secondhand smoke. Separating smokers from nonsmokers, cleaning the air, and ventilating buildings cannot eliminate exposure of nonsmokers to secondhand smoke.


     So the question that first came to my mind after reading this is: “So, smokers are safer than non-smokers who became involuntarily a secondhand smoke recipient?”


     I ponder on it for a little while, then I realized, maybe not really. In a chance that you smoke, let’s say 25% of it you inhaled and 75% goes to a secondhand smoke recipient. Then you are beside your buddy also smoking, so he takes 25% of his own, and 75% goes to you, that results for you to have a 100% and the secondhand recipient still 75%, the smoker is still in much danger than the non-smoker, though non-smoker is still not safe.


     So now I think, I maybe smoke very rarely, but I still add to the danger of people around me, polluting the air that we inhaled. My bad. :)