Pregnancy and Newborns
When women smoke during pregnancy, the unborn baby receives a lower amount of oxygen and
a higher amount of carbon monoxide. This increases the risk of miscarriage, premature birth, stillbirth or death in early infancy. Pregnant women who stop
smoking during their pregnancy decrease the risk of these potential health problems in their babies. Nicotine makes blood vessels smaller and interferes with the baby getting proper nutrition. It also speeds up its heart rate and slows down breathing movements.
Children and Teens
Countless studies have proven that secondhand smoke affects the health of children. Both the Surgeon General and the EPA strongly urge that no one smoke in the presence of children. Children in households where one or both parents smoke have twice the amount of bronchitis, pneumonia and are hospitalized more frequently before their first birthday than children of non-smoking parents. If both parents smoke, teens are more likely to become smokers themselves. Teenage smoking is a major health problem. Teenagers tend to underestimate how addictive smoking can be. There is concern that some teenagers may become addicted with smoking only one pack of cigarettes.
Little lungs, big impact: How secondhand smoke affect children
Secondhand smoke also may have a marked effect on the health of infants, children, teens and non-smokers. Some conditions of concern are:
Asthma
Secondhand smoke may make asthma attacks more frequent and severe in children who already have asthma — up to 1 million each year. Children with asthma who live with one smoker may be more than twice as likely to miss school because of a respiratory illness than are unexposed children without asthma. And if children with asthma live with two or more smokers, they may be more than four times as likely to be absent with respiratory illness. Even children without asthma are 40 percent more likely to miss school with a respiratory ailment if they live with at least two smokers. Secondhand smoke is also associated with up to 300,000 cases of bronchitis and pneumonia in infants and toddlers each year.
Middle ear conditions
Children living in households with smokers are more likely to have ear infections or fluid in their ears. Secondhand smoke may be a factor in more than 1 million children's visits to the doctor for middle ear infections every year.
Low birth weight and SIDS
Secondhand smoke is also associated with low birth weight. Low birth weight, in turn, has been linked to increased risk in adults of stroke, high blood pressure, coronary heart disease and type 2 diabetes (formerly called adult-onset or non-insulin-dependent diabetes). In addition, research indicates that if a mother smokes, her infant may have twice the risk of SIDS. The increased risk may be due to an infant's improper lung and brain development and an increased number of respiratory infections caused by smoking.
Secondhand smoke is a serious health risk to children
The developing lungs of young children are also affected by exposure to secondhand smoke. Infants and young children whose parents smoke are among the most seriously affected by exposure to secondhand smoke, being at increased risk of lower respiratory tract infections such as pneumonia and bronchitis. EPA estimates that passive smoking is responsible for between 150,000 and 300,000 lower respiratory tract infections in infants and children under 18 months of age annually, resulting in between 7,500 and 15,000 hospitalizations each year. Children exposed to secondhand smoke are also more likely to have reduced lung function. Passive smoking can lead to buildup of fluid in the middle ear, the most common cause of hospitalization of children for an operation. Asthmatic children are especially at risk. EPA estimates that exposure to secondhand smoke increases the number of episodes and severity of symptoms in hundreds of thousands of asthmatic children. EPA estimates that between 200,000 and 1,000,000 asthmatic children have their condition made worse by exposure to secondhand smoke. Passive smoking may also cause thousands of non-asthmatic children to develop the condition each year. Children exposed to tobacco smoke have a greater risk of getting asthma, pneumonia and ear infections, and are more likely to need hospital care. Children with asthma who are exposed to second hand smoke have more asthma attacks. Second hand smoke is dangerous to an unborn baby. Infants exposed to second hand smoke are more likely to die from crib death. Children’s lungs are smaller. Their immune systems-which protect them from getting sick – are less developed. For both these reasons they are more likely to get respiratory (lung) and ear infections triggered by second-hand smoke. Children are smaller, and breathe faster than adults. They take in more harmful chemicals per pound of their weight than an adult would in the same amount of time.
As soon as you reduce your child's exposure to secondhand smoke, the danger of it harming your child begins to go down. It is never to late!