Facts and Statistics

What is Secondhand Smoke?
Is Secondhand Smoke Just a Nuisance or Is It Harmful?
Are People of Color Disproportionately in Danger?
Is Secondhand Smoke Harmful to Children?
Am I Safe In a Non-Smoking Section or Ventilated Area?
What is the Economic Impact of a Smoke-Free Restaurant or Business?
What communities are smoke free?

What is Secondhand Smoke?

Secondhand smoke is also called:

Secondhand smoke is the smoke that comes from a lighted cigarette, pipe, or cigar and the smoke exhaled by a smoker. Nonsmokers exposed to secondhand smoke absorb the same nicotine and other harmful chemicals into the body as smokers do.

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Is Secondhand Smoke Just a Nuisance or Is It Harmful?

Secondhand smoke may not seem like a big deal until you consider there are 4,889,357 people over age 18 throughout Houston. The Texas smoking rate is 22 percent over 18, which means there are at least 1,075,45 smokers in Houston that smoke 27,208,978 cigarettes per today.¹ That is a considerable amount of secondhand smoke even if only one-fourth of all smoking occurred indoors.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has classified secondhand smoke as a Group A carcinogen, which means that there is sufficient evidence that secondhand smoke causes cancer in humans. Secondhand smoke contains over 4,000 chemical compounds. More than 60 of these are known or suspected to cause cancer.² Six of the sixty chemicals are:

Environmental Protection Agency studies of human exposure to air pollutants indicate that indoor levels of pollutants often are significantly higher than outdoor levels, and the Science Advisory Board has consistently ranked indoor air pollution among the top five environmental risks to public health.

Secondhand smoke kills over 53,000 nonsmokers in the United States each year.³ The chemicals in secondhand smoke can cause deaths related to:

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Are People of Color Disproportionately in Danger?

According to the National Cancer Institute data, people of color have high rates of occupational exposure to secondhand smoke. Hispanic, Native Americans, and African-Americans are less likely to be protected under smoke-free workplace policies since they are more likely to work in industries that enjoy the least amount of protection from smoking in the workplace – service, hospitality, and labor industries.⁴

There is a 50 percent increase in lung cancer risk among food service workers due to secondhand smoke exposure in the workplace.

Levels of secondhand smoke are 1.6 to 2.0 times higher in a restaurant than in office workplaces. Levels in bars are 3.9 to 6.1 times higher than in offices. For a nonsmoker working a 10-hour shift in a bar, it is like smoking a pack of cigarettes a day.⁵

In a national public opinion poll conducted in 2002, researchers found that compared to other groups, Hispanics and African-American voters are more likely to believe that:

The same poll found that support for safe indoor air in workplaces, public places and restaurants is significantly stronger among African-American and Hispanic voters than for other voters.⁶

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Is Secondhand Smoke Harmful to Children?

Children of parents who smoke have more frequent respiratory infections, more respiratory symptoms, and slower development of lung function as the lung matures, when compared to children of nonsmoking parents.

Secondhand smoke causes 150,000 to 300,000 lower respiratory tract infections – such as pneumonia and bronchitis – in children younger than 18 months of age, which results in 7,500 to 15,000 hospitalizations annually.⁷

Each year, asthma in up to 1,000,000 children is made more severe by exposure to secondhand smoke.

Secondhand smoke is the single largest remaining risk contributing to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) after allowing infants to sleep on their stomachs. A 2002 study found that the cotine (metabolized nicotine) in lung tissue of infants who died from SIDS “tended to have higher concentrations of nicotine in their lungs than control children, regardless of whether smoking was reported.”⁸

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Am I Safe In a Non-Smoking Section or Ventilated Area?

Separation of smokers from nonsmokers within the same airspace may reduce, but cannot eliminate, the exposure of nonsmokers to secondhand smoke. Sitting in a non-smoking section of a restaurant for an hour is like smoking one and one-half cigarettes.⁹

Ventilation systems can clear cigarette smoke and odor, but the technology cannot eliminate health dangers. Secondhand smoke is made up of thousands of chemicals; many are invisible and odorless carcinogens.

Even an Ionic Breeze® Quadra air purifier ad said: “No air cleaner can protect against the harmful effects of secondhand tobacco smoke. Clean air begins with a smoke-free environment.”

For a listing of smoke-free restaurants or to be added to the list, click here.

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What is the Economic Impact of a Smoke-Free Restaurant or Business?

Studies of sales tax data in 81 localities in six states consistently demonstrate that restricting smoking in restaurants has a positive or neutral effect on revenues.¹⁰

According to one study, hotel revenues increased in Los Angeles, California; New York City, New York; Mesa, Arizona; and the state of Utah where smoke-free laws were passed.¹¹

In the Zagat Survey 2005 America’s Top Restaurant guide that covers 1,383 of the best restaurants in 41 major markets, four out of five surveyors think smoking should be banned in restaurants. Twenty-six percent said they would eat out more often if a ban were put into effect, while three percent said they would eat out less often. In cities such as San Francisco and Los Angeles where smoking has already been banned, the support is stronger with more than 70 percent of diners saying they would eat out.

Since California launched its tobacco control program 15 years ago, 99 percent of Californians approve of the state's smoke-free workplace law and smoking among youth continues to decline. According to the 2004 California Student Tobacco Survey released in January 2005 by the California Department of Health Services (CDHS), 13 percent of high school students in California smoked in 2004, compared with 21 percent in 2000.

The Environmental Protection Agency estimates the cost savings of eliminating secondhand smoke in the workplace to be between $35 to $66 billion per year, by reducing premature deaths and tobacco-related illness.

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What communities are smoke free?

In addition to major Texas cities such as Austin, El Paso, Dallas, Beaumont, Victoria, and Laredo, many other communities have implemented strong clean indoor air policies:

Smoke free states: 1) California, 2) Delaware, 3) New York, 4) Connecticut, 5) Maine, 6) Massachusetts, and 7) Rhode Island

Smoke free states except for bars: 1) Florida, 2) Vermont, 3) Utah, and 4) Idaho

Smoke free nations: 1) New Zealand, 2) Norway, 3) Ireland, 4) Uganda, 5) Sweden, and 6) Bhutan

Canada: 10 out of 13 provinces are smoke free.

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¹Joel Sullivan Dunnington, M.D.
²American Cancer Society.
³U.S. Department of Heath and Human Services
⁴U.S. Census Bureau, Current Population Survey, March 2000, Gerlach, K.K. [et al]
⁵Seigel, M (1983). Journal of the American Medical Association.
⁶Market Strategies. Secondhand Smoke: Nationwide Survey of Registered Voters, June 2002
⁷American Cancer Society
⁸Journal of Pediatrics, February 2002 and Tobacco Control, December 2001
⁹California Environmental Protection Agency
¹⁰Glantz, S.A. and A. Charlesworth (1999). Journal of Public Health Management and Practice, 5(1)
¹¹Glantz, S.A. and A. Charlesworth (1999)