Popular Questions

1. What are the toxins present in secondhand smoke?
Secondhand smoke contains many harmful chemicals. Specifically which chemicals are present depend on the type of tobacco product, how it’s smoked and the paper in which the tobacco is wrapped. More than 4,000 chemicals make up the haze of secondhand smoke. And more than 60 of the chemicals in cigarette smoke are known to be carcinogenic, which means they may cause cancer.

Some of the substances found in secondhand smoke that are known or suspected to cause cancer include:

  • Formaldehyde
  • Arsenic
  • Cadmium
  • Benzene
  • Ethylene oxide
  • Ammonia
  • Carbon monoxide
  • Methanol
  • Hydrogen cyanide

2. Does secondhand smoke put non-smokers, who inhale it, at risk?
Yes. Secondhand smoke is responsible for an estimated 38,00 deaths among non-smokers each year in the United States, which includes 3,000 lung cancer deaths and 35,000 deaths due to heart disease.


3. Are children susceptible to the toxins present in secondhand smoke?
Yes. Secondhand smoke has a marked effect on the health of infants and children. They are more vulnerable than adults because they are still developing physically and generally have higher breathing rates, which means they may inhale greater quantities of secondhand smoke than do adults. Secondhand smoke exposure causes as many as 300,000 children in the United States, under the age of 18 months, to suffer lower respiratory tract infections, such as pneumonia and bronchitis; exacerbates childhood asthma; and increase the risk of acute, chronic, middle-ear infections in children.


4. Does secondhand smoke harm pets?
Yes. There’s ample scientific evidence to suggest that secondhand cigarette smoke can cause cancer in companion animals. And pets don't just inhale smoke; the smoke particles are also trapped in their fur and ingested when they groom themselves with their tongues. A study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology found that dogs in smoking households had a 60 percent greater risk of lung cancer; a different study published in the same journal showed that long-nosed dogs, such as collies or greyhounds, were twice as likely to develop nasal cancer if they lived with smokers. In yet another study, vets from Tufts University found that cats whose owners smoked were three times as likely to develop lymphoma, the most common feline cancer.


5. What are the medical and economic costs to nonsmokers suffering from passive smoking-related chronic diseases?
The medical and economic costs to nonsmokers suffering from lung cancer or heart disease caused by secondhand smoke are near $6 billion per year in the United States.


6. What is the total annual cost of smoking in California?
According to a 2003 report by the Institute for Health and Aging, the cost of smoking in California is nearly $16 billion annually or $3,331 per smoker every year. Direct health care costs attributed to smoking, including hospital care, ambulatory care, nursing home expenses, prescription drug costs and home health care, account for more than half of the burden at $8.6 billion.  Lost productivity due to premature death amounts to a staggering $5.7 billion, with another $1.5 billion in lost productivity due to illness.


7. Is there a Constitutional Right to smoke?
No. According to the Technical Assistance Legal Center, “the privacy interest protected by the U.S. Constitution includes only marriage, contraception, family relationships, and the rearing and educating of children. Very few private acts by individuals qualify as fundamental privacy interests, and smoking is not one of them.”


8. What is the percentage of non-smokers in the State of California?
As of 2006, 86 percent of Californians are non-smokers, and 14 percent of Californians smoke.


9. Is tobacco a product that is regulated by the government?
No. Tobacco products are among the least regulated. They’re exempt from basic health protections that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) applies to other consumer products, such as food, drugs, cosmetics and even dog food. The FDA can regulate a box of macaroni and cheese, but not a pack of cigarettes.


10. How much money does the tobacco industry spend to market its products?
In 2005, the tobacco industry’s marketing expenditures in the United States stood at $ 13.1 billion.


11. What is the most littered item in the United States and the World?
Cigarette butts are the most littered item in the world.


12. How many cigarette butts do Americans discard every year?
Americans discard more than 175 pounds of cigarette butts every year.


13. How many cigarette butts are discarded, each year, in San Diego County?
In 2005, 15 percent of San Diego County residents smoked, generating an estimated 5 million cigarette butts every day, and 1.8 billion cigarette butts every year. That’s enough to fill Sea World’s Shamu Stadium and Lagoon, to the brim, each and every year.


14. How long does it take for a cigarette butt to biodegrade?
Cigarette butts, made of plastic cellulose acetate, take approximately 15 years to decompose. In the meantime, the toxins trapped in the filters leach into water sources.


15. Are cigarette butts hazardous to marine animals and seabirds?
Yes. Cigarette butts pose a dangerous health risk to marine animals and seabirds. They commonly swallow cigarette butts, which can cause death from choking or starvation.


16. Are cigarettes a source of the death, injury, environmental, and property damage caused by fires?
Yes. Cigarettes are the leading cause of fire death, injury and property damage in the United States.