Query on second hand smoke

[High Plains]

Okay, I've been observing the latest iteration of the perennial smoking ban threads, and I have a serious question: How do we know how many people die each year from second hand smoke?

It's not like this scenario: Ambulance screams up to emergency room, paramedics wheel in woman on a stretcher in severe respiratory distress, doc asks what happened and paramedic responds: "It was terrible, doc. She was just walking down the street and passed an office building doorway and was struck down by a cloud of second hand smoke."

I am assuming it is more like this: XXX number of people die of lung cancer or emphysema beyond what is statistically expected and a certain percentage is attributed to second hand smoke.

How do we know these deaths attributed to second hand smoke are not actually caused by decades of sucking in bus exhaust or power plant emissions?

How de we separate out second hand smoke from other environmental contaminants?

How much second hand smoke kills you? One exposure? One hundred exposures? One hundred thousand?

Answers please. I'll check back in awhile; I'm going out for a smoke.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

1. Don't have the answer on that one, but if you are going to smoke

do consider taking Pycnogenol daily for reasons that have yet to be explained.

[pitohui]

5. smokers maybe should avoid supplements

there is evidence that some anti-oxidants, actually elevates the risk of cancer to smokers, the great trial showing this was beta-carotene


there don't seem to be good studies showing that smokers benefit from supplements while there are several studies showing they may be harmed

smokers are already ingesting a chemical cocktail -- and then you are suggesting that they add more in the concentrated form of a daily pill -- apparently there's bad synergy there

if you don't smoke, it's prob. safe enough to play around with that stuff but i sure wouldn't tell a smoker to mess with it

[valerief]

2. Probably non-smokers who live with smokers and

the type of cancers that develops from smoking as opposed to bus fume cancers

[DS1]

3. Bartenders, I believe, typically have more lung problems

if they work in bars which have allowed smoking in the past

[TransitJohn]

4. Definitely statistics

lung cancer...gets looked in to. Family/coworkers more than likely extensively questioned, that sort of thing.

Think I'll join you outside for a smoke.

Edited: by the way...love your moniker. I live in Laramie on the High Plains; where are you in SD?

[High Plains]

8. Howdy, Laramie.

My home in South Dakota is in Huron, in the eastern part of the state. But I spend most of my time in British Columbia, just north of the Idaho panhandle and Spokane, Washington.

I used to live in Dutch John, Utah. The closest towns of any size were Green River and Rock Springs.

[High Plains]

6. Sorry, folks, the replies so far aren't cutting it.

I appreciate the responses, but I can speculate as well as the next guy.

What's the science on this? I suppose I could go do the research, but I'm hoping some person conversant with these issues will jump in.

[PollyH]

7. Smoke

I have always been skeptical of the second hand smoke will kill you routine. How long would you have to be in a closed room with someone who smokes? How many cigarettes would that person have to smoke before you were stricken with a dread disease? What and/or where are the statistics and evidence that this actually occurs? Is this theory just another hype to scare people? I don't recall reading anything such as: "Sadly Joe Blow died an early death from others second hand smoke."

Color me not convinced.

[seabeyond]

9. why arent generation after generation of children dead, and dying

off for years now from second hand smoke, from decades of parents smoking, if a whiff of smoke outside side, twenty paces away will take down a body?

or a whiff of smoke from the driver in front of them at a red light

where are the mass deaths that institutions like american cancer association has fed the american people for decades the manipulated statistics of fear based data to attack smokers and the cig industry.

it is all pretty abovious

[valerief]

13. Some people get sickle cell anemia and some don't.

Genes play a role in disease.

[Tammie]

10. I'm not convinced either

My mother will be 81 years old this coming Saturday. She herself is not a smoker. However, she has not lived one day in her life without inhaling second hand smoke. Her father smoked, my father smoked, my brother smokes. She is the healthiest one in our family. The only pill she takes is one Silver Centrum daily. Second hand smoke should have gotten her by now, but she's alive and kicking (all our butts because we're still smoking).

[Nikia]

14. Some people are still living somewhat close to Chernobyl

They won't leave. Many have died of cancer but several of them are still alive and healthy. Everyone has different suspetibility to carcinogens, several different genes are involved. My grandfather said that he had nothing to worry about from smoking since none of his genetic relatives had ever gotten cancer and that therefore he was genetically strong against it. He ended up dying of an aortic aneurysm after being hospitalized for heart damage caused by heart attacks. He couldn't escape the fact that smoking cause damage to the circulatory system as well.

[TahitiNut]

12. The statistical 'proof' is specious ... there's no conclusive evidence

... to validly support any definable mortality rate due to ETS. It's apparently impossible to argue, however, since the fallacious 'burden of proof' is now politically placed on 'proving the negative.' The habitual retort of antitobacco-fascists is "Well, you can't prove it's healthy!" (D'oh!)

[Nikia]

11. Of course cancer occurs from chronic exposure of the suseptible

Just like other cancer risks such as unprotected sun exposure, various chemicals, radiation, and foods. Some people can have a high level exposure and never get cancer. Some will get cancer in the perfect environment through genetics. Most of us are in between and might be more suseptible to some triggers than others. I'll look for reasearch on secondhand smoke. I do know though that most chemicals are tested for carcinogen potential and that several of the chemicals in secondhand smoke are classified as carcinogens. A smokey bar could exceed the OSHAA limit for some chemicals.
A few people, especially small children, can have medical emergencies from breathing in second hand smoke. I worked with a woman whose child had that problem. The smoking father had to smoke outside, far enough away from the door.

[SheilaT]

15. they figure it out by looking

at non-smokers who live with smokers. And yes, not every such non-smoker will develop lung disease or cancer or whatever, just as not all smokers get those things. It's just that statistically non-smokers who live with smokers get those diseases at a noticeably greater than non-smokers who don't live with smokers.

And it is dose related, meaning the more second hand smoke you're exposed to, the more likely you are to get one of the related diseases. Just as smokers who smoke more cigarettes are more likely to get cancer, emphysema, and all the other nasties that go along with smoking.

But no one can say exactly how much exposure or how many cigarettes will trigger what specific disease in any particular one individual. Statistics like that tell you nothing at all about what will happen to any given individual. It simply tells you that out of a group of a hundred or thousand or more, how many will get what diseases.

Almost everyone has anecdotal stories of one kind or another. I have noticed all my life (and I grew up in the 50's with two smoking parents) that smokers tend to get more colds and keep them longer.

All that aside, smokers stink, to put it bluntly. Most of them simply have no idea that even if they go outside to smoke (which we all do appreciate, by the way) they still smell of the cigarette when they come back inside. Their clothes, their houses, and their cars will reek if they smoke inside any of them.

My sister was married to a smoker, and when I was pregnant and she thoughtfully sent me a bunch of baby clothes, the first thing I had to do was wash them because they reeked. They were clean, but smelled of cigarettes. Yuck.

I've noticed when working as a classroom volunteer in elementary school that you can usually tell the kids who come from a home where at least one parent smokes, because they smell of cigarettes on their clothes.

I realize that my finding the odor offensive is not at all on a level with whether or not it causes disease and death, which it does. But do disabuse yourself of the notion that no one can tell you smoke because you do it outside.

[pinto]

16. Please don't reopen a previous thread,

that's been locked, with a new thread.

For future reference, DU has an active Health forum here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=222

Thanks for your consideration.