What's your risk of Second Hand Smoke?

Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Lorraine Mooney said, "...the definitive study on passive smoking, sponsored by the World Health Organization, reported no cancer risk at all."

It takes 20 years or more for damage to manifest itself in a smoker. Environmental Tobacco Smoke (ETS) is hundreds of times more dilute than mainstream smoke. Non smokers would have to live with ETS for upwards of 2,000 years to incur the same damage.

From the US Dept. of Transportation's Dec. 1989 report entitled "Airliner Cabin Environment: Contaminant Measurements, Health Risks and Mitigation Options," we learned:

For business passengers, flying 480 hours per year for 30 years starting at age 35, the lifetime risk of premature cancer death expressed as number of expected premature deaths per 100,000 flying cabin occupants - Ascribable to ETS : .27 (point.27) Ascribable to in-flight Cosmic Radiation: 504. Here we see that the risk from in-flight cosmic radiation is some 1867 times higher than the risk from ETS. Yet the risk from cosmic radiation is routinely ignored while we fanatically ban smoking on airplanes.

In the Florida airline flight attendants case, the judge would not allow the defense to present evidence from the Federal Aviation Administration, who on March 5th, 1990, issued an advisory to all carriers #AS120-52. Subject: Radiation Exposure of Air Carrier Crew Member signed by Robert McMeeken, MD. Federal Air Surgeon. This advisory provided information on cosmic radiation and air shipments of radioactive material. It spoke to airline attendants who flew above 25,000 feet. The higher the altitude the higher the doses of radiation. Regarding risk to the unborn child, the advisory estimated that 11 in 10,000 would suffer serious health effects such as genetic defects or embryonic death from radiation. The flying public was never warned of the danger of radiation.

Air traffic now flies at 30,000-35,000 feet instead of the 39,000-41,000 feet as in the past. To compensate for the higher fuel cost fresh air systems have been shut off to the point of causing discomfort for passengers i.e. a 50% decrease in fresh air means that every other breath taken is "second hand" air, as passengers breath in each others biological "bath water" and airborne pathogens.

What's your risk of Death?

Chemical dependency counselor, Debora J. Orrick, makes the claim on the drkoop web site, "The consistency of results seen in numerous American and international research studies of ETS lead to a certainty of more than 99.9 percent that second hand smoke increases the risk of lung cancers in nonsmokers."

From an August, 1994 Good Housekeeping article entitled "Risks": If you are a nonsmoker married to a smoker, you will die of lung cancer from your spouse's smoking - Risk Factor: 1 in 60,000

You will have a heart attack 1 in 77
You will be attacked with a deadly weapon 1 in 260
You will die of heart disease 1 in 340
You will die in an auto accident 1 in 5,000
You will have AIDS 1 in 5,700
You will be murdered 1 in 11,000
You will die in a fire 1 in 50,000
You will die in an airplane crash 1 in 250,000
You will die in your bathtub 1 in 1 million
You will die from falling out of bed 1 in 2 million
You will freeze to death 1 in 3 million

Smoke from charcoal contains many of the same components as those most feared in tobacco smoke (carbon monoxide, formaldehyde, carcinogens and so forth). A ten pound bag of charcoal produces as much smoke (and harmful chemicals) as 160 packs of cigarettes.

So, are you going to quit barbecuing?

So, why does the government, health care agencies, and the insurance industry make such a big deal about ETS when the research doesn't even support their claims?

At the risk of repeating myself...
          It's because of money, control, and jurisdiction.