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This information is directly from the www.quitnow.info.au website for the benefit of the health of employees. |
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| More than half of the smoke from a cigarette is not inhaled by the smoker, but enters the surrounding air. This releases 4000 different chemicals from tobacco smoke into the air, 43 of which are known carcinogens. |
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| Passive smoking causes cancer, heart disease, and respiratory disease, as well as acute sensory irritation. It causes the premature death of hundreds of thousands of non-smokers worldwide. |
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| Australian research on passive smoking and environmental tobacco smoke has shown that: |
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| If you are a non-smoker who lives with a smoker, you are 30% more likely to be at risk of lung cancer. It is estimated that exposure to a partner who smokes at home causes about 12 new cases of lung cancer and 11 deaths from lung cancer each year in people who have never smoked.* |
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| If you are a non-smoker who lives with a smoker, you are 24% more likely to be at risk of heart attack or death from coronary disease. |
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| It is estimated passive smoking causes 77 deaths and 132 hospital admissions for in Australia each year.* |
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| Children exposed to environmental tobacco smoke are 1.4 times as likely to experience asthma as children who do not come into contact with tobacco smoke.* |
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| Children exposed to environmental tobacco smoke during the first eighteen months of life are 60% more likely to experience respiratory illnesses (such as croup, bronchitis, bronchiolitis and pneumonia) than children who do not come into contact with tobacco smoke.* |
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| There is evidence of a causal association between post-natal exposure to environmental tobacco smoke and sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS).* |
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| Nearly two fifths of Australians who do not smoke or are former smokers avoid places where they might be exposed to other people's cigarette smoke. |
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* National Health and Medical Research Council, The Health Effects of
Passive Smoking. 1997
# Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, National Drug Strategy
Household Survey, 1998
Last updated on 17 December 2001 by the Population Health Division, Commonwealth
Department of Health and Ageing
URL: http://www.quitnow.info.au/passive.html
For further information contact: Population Health Division,
Phone 02 6289 1555
Email quitnow@health.gov.au
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