The Effects of Second Hand Smoke in Adults

The effects of second hand smoke in adults can be devastating. Second hand smoke is the combination of the smoke from the cigarette and the inhaled and exhaled smoke from the smoker. This is called sidestream and main stream smoke. The harmful exposure of this smoke contains four thousand chemicals. Of these four thousand chemicals, a minimum of fifty of them are known be cancer causing, two hundred are known poisons, and forty of them are carcinogens. Carcinogens in the smoke cause cancer. This is due to the fact that it breaks down important genes in the body that manage the growth of cells. The damage causes abnormal growth of the cells in the body that reproduce too quickly.

There are many cancers that are linked to cigarette smoking and second hand smoke in adults. These include lung cancer, pharynx cancer, breast cancer, pancreas cancer, larynx cancer, kidney cancer, stomach cancer, cervical cancer, bladder cancer, esophageal cancer, and laryngeal cancer.

The effects of second hand smoke in adults can also lead to complications in asthma. These complications include triggering asthma attacks and worsening the severity of them. This is because their bronchial passages are chronically inflamed. Other complications of sidestream smoke include ear infections, cardiac arrest, aortic aneurysm, acute myeloid leukemia, bronchitis, strokes, and pneumonia.

Some of the toxic chemicals that are in sidestream and mainstream cigarette smoke are carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxide, formaldehyde, acrolein, acetaldehyde, ammonia, hydrazine, vinyl chloride, urethane, nitropropane, quinoline, methylchrysene, dichlorostilbene, aromatic nitrohydrocarbons, aromatic amines, nitrosoanatabine, arsenic, and cadmium.

While it is important to be a non smoker it is also important to avoid secondhand smoke as much as possible. This is because sidestream and mainstream smoke lingers to a fog in an area or room or space. If you are a non smoker, in a room with a smoking- smoker for two hours, it is the equivalent of having smoked four cigarettes. Avoidance factors of second hand smoke are important because it is estimated that between seventy and ninety percent of nonsmokers, are exposed to second hand smoke on a regular basis. Avoidance factors are important because the effects of second hand smoke in adults can be deadly.