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Today, the cloud of smoke is clearing and more people are beginning to see the dangers of smoking and secondhand smoke, including here in Tennessee, where the General Assembly just passed a historic ban on smoking in most – but not all – public places and voted to raise the cigarette tax by 42 cents. Efforts by groups like SmokeFree Nashville and the Campaign for a Healthy and Responsible Tennessee (CHART) are making headway in the historically tobacco-driven state and legislature.
The movement in Tennessee and other states has gained ground, in part, due to a recent scientific report from the U.S. Surgeon General Richard Carmona. The report found that even brief secondhand smoke exposure can cause immediate harm. "The scientific
evidence is now indisputable: secondhand smoke is not a mere annoyance. It is a serious health hazard that can lead to disease and premature death in children and nonsmoking adults," said Carmona when the 2006 report was released. William Blot, Ph.D., professor and cancer epidemiologist with Vanderbilt-Ingram and the International Epidemiology Institute, contributed to the report.
Secondhand smoke is the combination of smoke from the burning end of the cigarette and the smoke exhaled by smokers. There is no safe amount of secondhand smoke, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Breathing even a little secondhand smoke can be dangerous. "Tobacco smoke dramatically affects virtually every part of the body," said Terry Pechacek, Ph.D., associate director for Science for the CDC's Office on Smoking and Health. "It has a powerful ability to impact the whole structure of DNA."
You are what you inhale
Why is smoking and exposure to secondhand smoke so dangerous? Secondhand smoke contains more than 4,000 chemicals, many of them toxic. "There are over 60 carcinogens in tobacco smoke," said Pechacek. They include things like arsenic, commonly used in pesticides; hydrogen cyanide, used in chemical weapons; polomium-210, a radioactive and highly toxic chemical; and formaldehyde, used to embalm dead bodies.
Exposure to these chemicals through secondhand smoke makes the platelets in your blood behave as if you were a regular smoker. Even after a short time in a smoky room, the chemicals seep into your bloodstream and cause the platelets in your blood to stick together. Tobacco smoke also damages the inner lining of your blood vessels. The carbon monoxide found in cigarettes binds to hemoglobin in red blood cells and prevents affected cells from carrying a full load of oxygen. Adults who breathe five hours of secondhand smoke a day have higher, artery-clogging bad cholesterol. Nonsmokers who breathe secondhand smoke are more likely to develop lung cancer, heart disease and other serious diseases. If you inhale secondhand smoke at home or work, your chances of getting lung cancer are increased by 20 percent to 30 percent.
Children are even more vulnerable. They are more likely to have lung problems, asthma, ear infections, sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), and other serious health problems from secondhand smoke exposure. The city of Bangor, Maine, has made it illegal to smoke in vehicles when children are present. Similar measures have been adopted in Arkansas and Louisiana and are being considered in several other states.
Tobacco states lag behind
Much of the United States is getting this message, with 22 other states passing laws to ban smoking in public places. Tennessee lagged behind. Smoking was only recently banned in Tennessee's government buildings, where this kind of legislation would be determined.
The tobacco-growing state faces an uphill battle against the cash and the culture that came with the crop for so many years. "Traditionally we have been a tobacco growing state with a very big tobacco lobby. For many years they have had a lot of power and say- so in the government," said Jason Stamm, Tobacco Control Coordinator with the Metro Public Health Department in Nashville. "We are definitely behind the curve."
Tennessee has one of the lowest tobacco taxes in the nation, at just 20 cents per pack, and there are no smoke-free workplace laws on the books. Stamm said 22 states have some kind of protection in place. In Tennessee, local communities don't have the authority to ban smoking in public places, as has occurred in New York City, for instance. A growing number of restaurants in Tennessee have voluntarily eliminated smoking, but a city government can't decide to ban smoking in all restaurants and similar businesses. That, too, is something advocates like Stamm are trying to change.
Donna Henry, M.P.H., R.D., director of the Health Promotion Division in the Tennessee Department of Health's Community Services Section, said 1 million Tennesseans, or about 26 percent of adults in the state, smoke cigarettes and another 4 percent use snuff or chewing tobacco. These people are at greatest risk for oral, head and neck cancers. In addition, 14 percent of public high school students in Tennessee reported using smokeless tobacco products and about 27 percent reported they smoke cigarettes. All that smoking, chewing and dipping takes a toll; Tennessee ranks fourth in the nation for lung and bronchus cancer deaths.
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