Smoking

Secondhand Smoke: The Risk and the Controversy

We all know that smoking poses a significant risk to our health. We can make an educated decision about whether or not to smoke, and if we do decide to smoke, we should be willing to accept any negative effects such as lung cancer and heart disease later in our lives. But what about exposure to secondhand smoke? At this point, we don’t always have a choice in exposure to the smoke of others. The Office of the Surgeon General (OGS) has documented a high level of exposure to secondhand smoke among nonsmoking adults and children in the United States. Blood tests of nonsmokers for the presence of cotinine, a chemical produced by nicotine, indicate that 88% of nonsmoking Americans are exposed to secondhand smoke (US, OGS, Clean).

In 1972, the Surgeon General released a landmark report, The Health Consequences of Smoking, warning of the dangers of smoking. The report also warned of the risks of breathing secondhand smoke, also called “passive smoking” or “environmental tobacco smoke.” Throughout the 1970s, numerous studies were conducted that pointed to the risks of breathing secondhand smoke and the risks to unborn children of smoking mothers (summarized by Shephard). In 1986, both the National Research Council and the United States Surgeon General (Health Consequences of Involuntary Smoking) published independent reports that secondhand smoke causes respiratory infections in children and reduces their lung capacity. Nonetheless, at the International Symposium on Environmental Tobacco Smoke held at McGill University in 1989, critics of the research argued that studies of the effects of secondhand smoke could not rule out the influences of other pollutants. In the summary of the proceedings volume from the conference, Joseph Wu concluded that research had yet to prove that secondhand smoke is a health hazard (375).

Only in 1992 did the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issue a report,...