I’m participating in a debate on this subject on a different message board, and I’m running into the usual impasse; we’re posting back and forth on whether or not second-hand smoke has definitively been identified as toxic or not. Did we ever come to a consensus on this topic here (I couldn’t find anything on searching.), or is it still a matter of you believe it isn’t if you believe X websites, and you believe it is if you believe Y websites?
I know Cecil Adams did a column on this six years ago saying that the EPA report was flawed, but I have also seen that the big impetus behind the discrediting of the EPA report was the tobacco industry.
Please don’t turn this into a debate on the merits of smoking or not smoking, or banning smoking, or anything beyond a definitive answer on the toxicity of second-hand smoke. Thanks, guys.
Although I don’t know how much of a proof this really is, since it doesn’t directly cite any specific scientific studies. And even if true, without knowing the details of the studies (controls, double-blind, etc.) the mechanism of action could still be questioned as not being toxicity but say placebo effect. I don’t know if you are specifically interested in toxicity.
This is largely a summary of studies, but particualalry in children whose parents smoke, there would appear to be a link.
Problem here is that given the way the tobacco industry has lied on oath to congressional hearing, which is now a matter of public record, this study reported by the BBC link has very dubious credibility, maybe it is true and the fact are not convenient to some folk, but the link between the industry, and the funding means I would be extremely cautious about relying on it for any truth whatsoever.
The damage is probably overstated, but the question is - by how much ? There isnt too much dispute that passive smoking does have an effect
First of all, there’s no question as to the toxicity of second-hand smoke, as any asthma sufferer can relate; cigarette smoke contains an array of toxins than are irritating and, in a contained area, indisputably harmful. The threshold of exposure is unclear, but definitely lower than has been stated in past times.
Does second-hand smoke correlate to higher incidences of chronic illnesses like lung cancer? I have yet to see any definitive evidence (in the strictly experimental use of the term), and given the uncontrolled and essentially unquantifiable amount of exposure, it would be hard to establish this in any rigorous fashion beyond anecdotally. Epidemiological studies have routinely demonstrated strong correlations between passive smoking work or home environments with both higher incidences of respiratory infections and chronic illnesses like asthma, and weaker but still statistically valid incidences of cancer. (The problem isn’t the lack of numbers but the lack of a control population to compare against, i.e. what is a “normal” level of chronic illness compared to that induced by inhaling second-hand smoke.) Epidemiological statistics aren’t the same thing as a controlled study, of course, and plus, each side in the debate bends the numbers to suit their own arguement, but the evidence tends to weigh toward passive smoking being more harmful than Tobacco Institute apologists would care to admit.
Once we have a significant population of long-term tobacco-free people as a baseline to compare against, we can make a stronger epidemiological case for the harm of passive smoking, but it’s pretty clear that at a minimum it’s an irritant that makes respiratory infections more likely and certainly does no good for anyone.