Quit Smoking Information
Tobacco use remains the leading preventable cause of death in the United States, causing nearly 440,000 deaths each year and resulting in an annual cost of more than $75 billion in direct medical costs. Nationally, smoking results in more than 5.5 million years of potential life lost each year. The majority of adult smokers started smoking by the age of 18. Every day, an estimated 3,900 young people under the age of 18 try their first cigarette. More than 6.4 million children living today will die prematurely because of a decision they will make as adolescents — the decision to smoke cigarettes.
Source: The Office on Smoking and Health (OSH) is a division within the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion (NCCDPHP), which is one of the centers within the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Children and Second Hand Smoke
Secondhand Smoke Can Make Children Suffer Serious Health Risks
Breathing secondhand smoke can be harmful to children's health including asthma, Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS), bronchitis and pneumonia and ear infections. Children's exposure to secondhand smoke is responsible for:
increases in the number of asthma attacks and severity of symptoms in 200,000 to 1 million children with asthma;
between 150,000 and 300,000 lower respiratory tract infections (for children under 18 months of age);
respiratory tract infections resulting in 7,500 to 15,000 hospitalizations each year.
The developing lungs of young children are severely affected by exposure to secondhand smoke for several reasons including that children are still developing physically, have higher breathing rates than adults, and have little control over their indoor environments. Children receiving high doses of secondhand smoke, such as those with smoking mothers, run the greatest risk of damaging health effects.
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