The Darker Side Of Second Hand Smoke

A lot many people would have been in this situation more than once in their lives. You might be enjoying a nice meal or watching a ball game when you are suddenly overcome with the unpleasant odour of tobacco smoke. This may not affect some people, but some of them may simply be annoyed, while some others who have a keen aversion to the effects may become irritated and enraged. Whichever category you fall into, it has one thing in common, and that is health risks. Whether sensitive to tobacco cigarette smoke or not, you cannot escape the harmful and potentially fatal side effects of second hand tobacco cigarette smoke.

The harmful effects of second hand smoke are many and varied. The American Lung Association states that second hand smoke, also called as environmental tobacco smoke, is a poisonous mixture of the smoke emitted by a burning cigarette, pipe or cigar, and the smoke coming from the lungs of smokers. Even as smokers take short breaks in between smoking sessions, or once the cigarette is crushed, they continue to breathe out these toxic fumes containing chemicals. Though smoking is carried out in a designated area, these smokers will have the potential to intoxicate anyone coming into contact with them after their smoking sessions get over.

Many unfortunate and dangerous results arise from this habit of smoking tobacco cigarettes. The toxins do exist during the actual smoking time of tobacco products and remains in the atmospheric air even long hours after the last puff of a cigarette. On an everyday basis, victims inhale these "leftover gas" involuntarily and most of the times unknowingly. It is widely known that cancer will be contracted through tobacco cigarette smoke thanks to the cancer causing agent Carcinogen A. It is also a true fact that diseases such as asthma, respiratory infections, and other mild illnesses such as cold can arise from this dangerous activity of inhaling second hand smoke.

Any level of exposure to second hand smoke, despite the duration, can be harmful to the human body. There is no safe level of exposure. The American Lung Association states that short or infrequent exposures to second hand smoke can cause blood platelets to become stickier than usual. It will also damage the lining of one's blood vessels, decrease the speed of coronary flow reserves, and reduce the human heart rate variability, potentially increasing the chances of a possible heart attack or stroke. Researches are being conducted to ascertain a possible link between second hand smoke and a hardening of the arteries leading to stroke. Second hand smoke is very much harmful to young children. It is responsible for lower respiratory tract infections in infants and children that are under 18 months of age. This results in thousands of hospitalization cases each year, and is the primary cause of sudden infant death syndrome deaths which constitutes a good percentage in the Unit ed States annually. The National Cancer Institute is of the view that exposure to second hand smoke slows down the growth of children's lungs as well.