Dangers of Second-hand Smoke (SHS)

*Take a deep breath*

Have you thought that not being a smoker is good enough to maintain our healthiness from the chronic disease that might be suffered from those smokers? Yes, most of us do not realize that they are breathing the second-hand smoke. Instead of going away from the smoky places, we tend to just stand still and smell it. Don't feel you terrible because of the scent of the cigarette? We know that smoking brings a lot of bad consequences yet we do not know how terrifying are the effects of smoking which not only towards our body but also affecting the animals and our environment. Scary, is it? So today, I want to persuade all of you to become more concern about every single particle that you inhale especially when you are hanging out at public places or maybe you are living with a smoker. Before that, let me review my main points. First of all, second-hand smoke (SHS) are harming humans’ health, affecting animals especially pets that live indoor and the third one is second-hand smoke also give catastrophe consequences to our earth.

Okay let's start with the first main point, second-hand smoke is a serious threat to human health. It begins with the babies. Breathing second-hand smoke (SHS) is known as the cause of Sudden Infants Death Syndrome (SIDS). Thus, babies that have been surrounded by second-hand smoke are more likely to die of Sudden Infants Death Syndrome than babies who are not around the second-hand smoke. (Richard & Kenneth, 2005) This is the main reason why pregnant women need to ask their husband and anyone to smoke away from them because it could give bad consequences to the baby. Besides, babies that being surrounded by second-hand smoke also tend to have lower birth weights. The tendency for them to have breathe problems until they become adults is high. Hence, a good parent it is better for you to eradicate the smoking habits because it not only saves your life but

also your beloved one.

Other than babies, older children also get the impacts from the second-hand smoke. Those parents whose smoke are responsible for their children’s health. According to Richard and Kenneth, children can get more bronchitis and pneumonia. Besides, they have to deal with difficulty in breathing and coughing often. It does not only stop there, but second-hand smoke could trigger asthma. Around 40% go to the operation room as a result of living with the smokers. Plus, a severe asthma attack can put life at risk. There is no amount of smoke that is safe to our body, including adults. According to Japanese researchers at American Heart Association (ASA) meeting, even as little as 30 minutes of second-hand smoke (SHS) can result in hardening of arteries in non-smokers. Now, imagine. How many minutes you had spent with the smoke in the public areas or did you breathe the smoke almost every day because you live with a smoker? We should not take this as a light problem because the SHS make platelet in the body act like those regular smokers. Even a short period in a smoky environment, it causes the platelet to stick together that would lead to many complications.

The second fact that you know is that second-hand smoking not only harms the health of human being but it also harms the health of animals especially pets that live indoor. According to Dr. Jan Bellows, a veterinarian at All Pets Denta Clinic in Weston, he said that since pets spend much more time in the house compared to us, this increases their exposure to carcinogenic substances which are harmful to their health. Moreover, a late research on LiveScience.com indicated that pooches with long muzzles will probably create more sinus since their noses and sinuses have more surface zone on which cancer-causing agents can gather. Besides, while grooming themselves, cats are more likely to get mouth and lymph nodes cancers because they will lick up their furs that have cumulated by the toxic substances. Likewise, birds are sensitive to the second-hand smoke because they spend most of the time flying in the air and might put their life at risks. Albeit animals are small in size, there is no exception for them for them to breathe the clean air. For the sake of animals' health, we need to be more observant about the surrounding that our pets breathing. In short, second-hand smoke from the cigarette affecting animals' health.

The third fact that you should consider is that environment is the other victim of the second-hand smoke. Smoking can be the major factor that threatening our air pollution. Smoking cigarettes can generate severe environmental pollution. In all kinds of pollution, air pollution is considered as the most dangerous one because it will attack your cardiovascular system that can lead you to death. Basically, there are two main atmosphere-polluting chemicals in air pollution which are carbon dioxide and methane. About 2.6 billion kg of CO2 and 5.2 billion kg of methane being released into the atmosphere annually. In addition, SHS contain the carcinogen, toxic metals and poisonous gasses which are very dangerous and degrading our air quality. In this case, Centre of Disease Control carried out and experiment regarding respirable suspended particles (RSP) and the result showed that RSP level in places that banned public smoking is decreasing up to 96% compared to places that allow public smoking. This shows how crucial it is to choose a good place to live in because there is a huge difference regarding the level of toxic substances in the clean air and the dirty air. This can be proven by the outdoor tobacco smoke (OTS) experiment that had been carried out in Helsinki, Finland. The results showed that places that being surrounded by smokers polluted 5 to 20 times higher than the sidewalks of busy streets that packed with vehicles.

In a conclusion, second-hand smoke (SHS) is a serious hazard health that gives big consequences to the human being, animals, and our environment. The government should take actions to limit the smoking areas and develop places that designated exclusively for smoking to minimize the rate of second-hand smoke so that we can create a healthier environment. For public safety, smokers should not be allowed to smoke in the same place where the non-smokers breathe. The smokers might claim that it is their human right to smoke whatever they want. However, the non-smokers also have their rights to breathe the clean air that free from chemicals substances. Thus, think wisely before you surround yourself with the smokers or if you are a smoker, think about your beloved one.