Third hand smoking

Here's some more info to put out there for those who tell me "But I don't smoke in the house, or in the car...if my kid isn't in it."

One day I asked a patient mother if she smokes in the home.  She said "oh no, I smoke up in my room ..."  She looked like a deer in the headlights when I told her that her room was actually part of the house.  Sometimes you have to think outside the bun.

A New Cigarette Hazard: 'Third-Hand Smoke' from The New York Times Third-hand smoke is a new term being used to describe the invisible yet toxic brew of gasses and particles clinging to smokers’ hair and clothing, not to mention cushions and carpeting, that lingers long after second-hand smoke has cleared from a room. The residue includes heavy metals, carcinogens, and even radioactive materials that young children can get on their hands and ingest, especially if they’re crawling or playing on the floor

Here's the link to the full article

It goes on to say...

“The central message here is that simply closing the kitchen door to take a smoke is not protecting the kids from the effects of that smoke,” he said. “There are carcinogens in this third-hand smoke, and they are a cancer risk for anybody of any age who comes into contact with them.”

Among the substances in third-hand smoke are hydrogen cyanide, used in chemical weapons; butane, which is used in lighter fluid; toluene, found in paint thinners; arsenic; lead; carbon monoxide; and even polonium-210, the highly radioactive carcinogen that was used to murder former Russian spy Alexander V. Litvinenko in 2006. Eleven of the compounds are highly carcinogenic.

To conclude... I had a pregnant lady in the office some months ago.  I told her that she needed to quit smoking for the health of the child.  She told me to stop and not talk to her about it.  She didn't care, she wasn't going to quit and was getting rather upset at me for even talking to her about it.  Yeah, I'm the enemy.  Poor helpless baby.