Can a person become addictecd to smoke from the OTHER end of a cigarette or cigar?
Several places (bars) I frequent allow smoking and I seem to enjoy smelling the tobacco smoke. (I don’t smoke myself). Getting a little concerned…
Jack
Enjoying the smell might just be because you associate the odor with pleasant social surroundings. (Sorta like how, the morning after you’ve performed cunnilingus on your honey, the scent brings up pleasant memories of the previous evening without being particularly nice-smelling in and of itself. But I digress.)
Unless I’m mistaken, the addictive component is going to be very diluted in second hand smoke, if only because it’s in the smoker’s bloodstream. You might be able to get addicted, but it’ll be harder than if you smoked yourself.
I sold my soul to Satan for a dollar. I got it in the mail.
Absolutely, positively NOT! Think about the difference between occasionally inhaling a tiny percentage of tobacco smoke mixed with air, compared to regularly inhaling directly from the butt of a cigarette. If second hand smoke were that deadly, smokers would drop dead after two packs.
I do not smoke, and I don’t like smelling it, but I hate anti-smoking nazis who say you’re going to get cancer from second hand smoke. You’re not. Ever.
I for one welcome our new insect overlords… - K. Brockman
I’m a smoker - and I say no, you can’t get addicted to cigs just from second-hand smoke.
I was around cigarette smoke from infancy thru childhood (father smoked, brother, an uncle and aunt I saw frequently and another uncle who visited frequently smoked cigars (yuk.) my mother never had a desire to smoke. I didn’t get addicted until I was 16 and started smoking because of (here it comes) PEER PRESSURE. As for getting cancer from second-hand smoke, I’m not going to say it isn’t harmful to some extent especially for those with respiratory problems, but in general, I’m doubtful that you can get cancer from it. How do all the so-called scientific studies eliminate causation from other environmental pollutants?
Well, let’s not dismiss this out of hand. You respondents are obviously hanging around in a better class of bar than Jake and your humble moderator. 
I’m a two pack of Camel non-filter guy and I’ve been in bars where I don’t smoke because I feel like I already am smoking. I of course can’t identify whether this was simply because of the volume of smoke or because that smoke was delivering a serviceable quantity of nicotine to me. I will say that my bartender friends claim that it is more difficult for them to quit in part because they get “dosed” at work.
Would one of our resident smoking/medical/general search experts try to find info backing or refuting the question?
Livin’ on Tums, vitamin E and Rogaine
Hail Ants, are you dimissing the lawsuits filed by flight attendants who claimed that being in a confined area with smokers over the years contributed to their health problems? To say you can’t get cancer, ever, from second hand smoke seems a bit dismissive. Certainly, going to a bar every once in a while wont give you cancer, but lets not ignore the possibility of long term exposure having an effect on someones health.
There was a study conducted by the World Health Organization on second-hand smoke. According to this study, second-hand smoke has absolutly no effect in causing any smoke related illnesses. This study was swept under the table after it was released, but every now and then Sydney Zion, a columnist in the NY Daily News writes about it.
P.S. I was a smoker for 25 years, I stopped last month by using Zyban. It’s been 44 days, and I think I’m gonna make it. Screw the patch, the gum, the needles. It works. I never thought I would stop, but I have.
Then we’ll turn our tommy guns
on the screaming ravaged nuns
and the peoples voice will be the only sound.
-P. Sky
Good point, Manhattan. I’m a pack and half marvel myself and have noticed that in some very smoky places I don’t get the same “nicotine hunger” because of the high level floating around the air.
But I do wonder about the level/frequency that would be needed to start a nicotine habit in a nonsmoker. I don’t doubt the headache/head spin that a smoky environment causes in smokers and nonsmokers alike. And I do believe that some people are more nicotine prone than others. E.g. I can take or leave alcohol but one puff and I’m back over a pack a day. But some folks can only smoke a cigarette once in a while and be fine. So it may be variable by individual, too.
Just an anecdotal interjection; will do some looking for factual info.
Veb
seriuosart:
Well, in a word, yes. Tobacco is not plutonium. Smoking 3 or 4 packs of Luckys for 40 years, while it certainly increases the risk, it does not guarantee that you’ll get cancer. So even when inhaled over a long period of time second hand smoke is still too miniscule for me to consider it a real health risk. That is, more significant to flight attendants’ health than say being around thousands of potentially infectious people every week. Or changing altitudes and climates several times a day. Or constantly breathing air made from canned liquid oxygen.
I for one welcome our new insect overlords… - K. Brockman
I think it depends on the level of secondhand smoke you’re exposed to. If we’re talking living with a smoker and there’s maybe one or two cigarettes going in the room at any given time, coupled with the fact that you have the option of leaving the room, it’s probably not that big a risk. But if you’re talking about working in an environment such as a bar or the smoking section of an airplane or a casino, where there are dozens of people sucking coffin nails and you have to breathe that eight hours a day, we’re probably talking major health risks. I’ve been informed that I’m doing the equivalent of smoking three packs a day by breathing secondhand smoke. I come home from work smelling like a dirty ashtray. I wash my hair daily, and the water I wash it with comes out looking dirty from all the cigarette smoke I’ve been steeped in all day.
The trouble with Sir Launcelot is by the time he comes riding up, you’ve already married King Arthur.
Hail ant said:
>>seriuosart:
quote:
are you dimissing the lawsuits filed by flight attendants who claimed that being in a confined area with smokers over the years contributed to their health problems?
Well, in a word, yes. Tobacco is not plutonium. Smoking 3 or 4 packs of Luckys for 40 years, while it certainly increases the risk, it does not guarantee that you’ll get cancer. So even when inhaled over a long period of time second hand smoke is still too miniscule for me to consider it a real health risk. That is, more significant to flight attendants’ health than say being around thousands of potentially infectious people every week. Or changing altitudes and climates several times a day. Or constantly breathing air made from canned liquid oxygen.
<<
actually, i believe that pilots and flight attendants have non-trivially elevated rates of some cancers due to cosmic rays.
30,000ft of air provides pretty good shielding.
-Luckie
My ongoing attempts to quit smoking keep getting stymied by my tendancy to frequent smoky bars. I do not believe getting “dosed” has anything to do with it. I think your bartender friends are having trouble quitting because they spend eight hours a day watching people enjoy cigarettes.
Agisofia:
This would mean that breathing in secondhand smoke for 40(ish) hours a week is more dangerous than being a two-pack-a-day smoker. I think you might want to check that statistic.
“Shut up! I’m having a rhetorical conversation!”
Why do they call it secondhand smoke? Wouldn’t pre-smoked smoke, be better?
It seems that the knee-jerk reaction of the smokers amongst us are dismissing the effects of passive smoking. One study by the World Health Organisation does not constitute conclusive proof that passive smoking is harmless, although I welcome any informed research into the subject. I don’t particularly appreciate the dismissive attitude and lack of concern for those exposed to second hand smoke shown here. Indeed we aren’t talking about Plutonium as one patron puts it, but then you know Plutonium is harmful and you wouldn’t knowingly stick it in your mouth would you?
I just did a web search on yahoo using the words “second hand cigarettte smoke cancer” and requesting a match on all words. The search found 3,978 matches. No, I didn’t look at them all. 
However, I did scan the first 40 or so titles, and found that every hit that was really referring to the topic at hand stated flat out that second hand cigarette smoke causes cancer and heart disease.
I’d have referenced more sites, but that would have just been piling on.
Here’s a couple with statistics on them. This one, from a State of California web site http://ntap.k12.ca.us/NTAP_hosted/tobacco/tob2nd.html . This one, from the Univerity of Pennsylvania Cancer center http://cancer.med.upenn.edu/cancer_news/1994/smoke_child.html . This one, admittedly from an anti-smoking site, but quoting statistics from the American Lung Association http://www.smokehelp.org/html/second_hand_smoke.html .