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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
For further information contact: Population Health Division,
Phone 02 6289 1555
Email quitnow@health.gov.au
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