Posted on 08/07/2006 9:30:09 PM PDT by Extremely Extreme Extremist
As any parent knows, crawling babies explore the world by touching - and tasting - anything they can get their wet little hands on.
If their parents use tobacco, that curiosity may expose babies to what some doctors are calling "thirdhand" smoke - particles and gases given off by cigarettes that cling to walls, clothes and even hair and skin. Up to 90% of the nicotine in cigarette smoke sticks to nearby surfaces, says Georg Matt, a professor at San Diego State University.
Preliminary research by Matt and others suggests the same chemicals that leave a stale cigarette odor on clothes and upholstery also can be swallowed, inhaled or absorbed through the skin of non-smokers. Smoke residue may linger for hours, days or months, depending on the ventilation and the level of contamination. In some cases, contaminants may need to be removed by rigorously cleaning or replacing wallpaper, rugs and drapes, Matt says.
Matt cautions that his research needs to be confirmed by other studies. But his work suggests that babies may take in nicotine and other chemicals just by hugging their mothers - even if their mothers never light up next to them.
About 43% of children ages 2 months to 11 years live with a smoker, according to research described in Matt's 2004 study in the journal Tobacco Control.
In his small study of 49 infants under 13 months old, Matt found nicotine in the air and dust throughout smokers' homes, even when parents smoked only outside. Tests also found a nicotine byproduct, cotinine, in babies' urine and inside shafts of their hair.
As expected, babies whose parents smoked around them had the highest cotinine levels - nearly 50 times higher than the babies of non-smokers, according to the study.
Smokers who tried to shield their infants had only partial success, Matt says. The babies of parents who smoked only outside had cotinine levels seven times higher than in the infants of non-smokers, the study showed.
Adults also may be exposed to significant smoke residue if they rent cars, hotel rooms or apartments that have soaked up years of smoke, Matt says. He worries more about youngsters, however, because they may be exposed day and night for years.
Children also may be at greater risk because they breathe faster than adults and inhale more chemicals, says Jonathan Winickoff, an assistant professor of pediatrics at Harvard Medical School. Crawling babies may take in chemicals through their skin.
Though scientists have extensive evidence about the damage caused by secondhand smoke, they know relatively little about the potential risks of thirdhand exposure, says Brett Singer, a scientist at California's Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory. "The million-dollar question is: How dangerous is this?" Singer says. "We can't say for sure this is a health hazard."
Matt agrees that doctors should study children - ideally for 10 or 15 years or more - to see whether low levels of smoke residue worsen asthma or harm the development of a child's lungs.
Let me begin by saying that I am anti-carb. I have a real thing against refined sugar. (But I do think artificial sugars can be much worse.) But I'd like to refine what you've quoted with a little bit pf personal experience.
My son is a Type 1 diabetic. His life depends on us calculating his carbs, calculating his insulin bolus to counter those carbs, and timing his insulin with his carb digestion as much as possible. From what we've seen, the glycemic index is a load of crap.
If my son drinks 45 grams of carbohydrates in the form of a soda is blood sugar will go up within 10-15 minutes. He will need 3 units of insulin to counter that rise. If he eats 45 grams of carbs in the form of a 50% white rice/25% brown rice/25% wild rice mix, his blood sugar will not go up for about 20-30 minutes. But when it does, it spikes up just as fast as the soda did, it only took longer to get the spike. He will still need 3 units of insulin. The only difference *that his body sees* between a Coke and the rice mix is the timing. From what I've seen, the rise isn't *gradual* in either case.
Let me put it this way: He has NEVER eaten anything and had his insulin requirements remain higher than his baseline (with no food) for more than 3 hours with ANY food.
What does slow down food sugars entering the body? FAT. Eating fat *with* carbs will slow down the carbs, sometimes dramatically.
But here's the real head-tilter: If he eats carbs with no fat, he gets 1 unit of insulin with 15g of carbs. Pretty straight-forward. If he eats fat with carbs, he'll need *more* insulin over a longer period of time. (It actually looks like we're giving insulin for the fat.) But if he eats nothing *but* fat, he won't need any insulin. It's like the fat doesn't just slow down the carbs, it actually magnifies it.
So my suggestion is this: Forget the glycemic index thing. Eat *natural* carbs (that your body actually recognizes) and eat a small amount at each sitting. I don't see anything wrong with eating 25g five times a day.
Don't stay away from sugar because it packs too much of a sugar punch. Stay away from it because it's been pulverized to the point where it's not even really *food* any more, it does you absolutely no good, and because we were not designed to eat a ton of it anyway.
This is not coming from a scientist or a doctor. This is coming from a woman who has administered or supervised almost 10,000 blood glucose readings, made a decision as to insulin dosage, and still has a living kid. (I must be calculating something right!)
I mean the bull hockey about sucrose not being metabolized.
Glycemic index as we know it (South Beach Diet etc.) attempts to summarize a curve shape in a single number. As such it cannot meet everybody's needs. In time, better measures will appear.
I know how you feel. When someone is cooking fish the smell is nauseating. It gets in my hair and on my clothes. It takes days to get the smell out of the house. Once my husband cooked trout and I actually had to wash the curtains to clear the air. It took a week before my house didn't smell like a cannery.
And, like you, I don't think it should be outlawed! ;-)
Honey, you have no idea how much you really do want some people to smoke. If you can't stand us with cigarettes then I promise, you really can't stand us without!
Perhaps I got a little carried away. But smoking is something that I believe has been destructive to me - directly to my health and by making me watch people I love suffer before their premature death.
If you choose to smoke in your own home, or any place that allows you to...that is your right. If you choose to believe the health warnings are nothing but propaganda...that's your business.
But please don't expect me to quit trying to encourage people to quit. If caring about the health of others, of trying to help them avoid my grief, makes me a "nasty little person", so be it. At least I'm a "nasty little person" -trying- to obey the commandments and teachings of our Lord and Savior.
BTW...sign of the changing tmes...when I was growing up, conservative, church-going people were the ones opposed to drinking and smoking (the body is a temple of G-d), while the hippies and other liberals were the "do your own thing" crowd
I most certainly see your point, but you must understand some things about smokers.
This is something that we do which is under constant bombardment. Every single day most of us encounter an anti-smoking message. We're sneered at, glared at, or outright attacked by perfect strangers. We can't even watch TV without having to deal with the tension of being told that we're *wrong*. Our doctors blame every hang-nail on cigarettes. It's to the point where we can't take *any* of it seriously.
We are, as you pointed out, just like everyone else. How do *you* feel when a well-meaning person tells you what to do? Most people have a knee-jerk "screw you" reaction unless the messenger phrases his/her opinion *very* carefully.
For example: If my husband reminds me to do the dishes, they will pile up for three days. I *know* what I have to do. Now leave me alone and let me handle it. If you *tell* me to do them, then I'm screwed.
The normal response to pressure is to do the opposite.
Do you know what happens when an anti-smoking ad appears on TV? Every single smoker who sees that ad lights up!! Heck, if I didn't know better I'd think the tobacco companies are behind the anti-smoking campaign. Most of us want to quit, but all the pressure *to* quit makes it nearly impossible. The decision to quit smoking has to come from within. When we decide to quit, we need encouragement and support, not nagging and reminders.
If you really want to help smokers kick the habit, I'd suggest you take a few weeks and do a serious study of opposition. Figure out how to overcome *that* and you'll be effective. It takes a lot of thought to make someone seriously listen to you, look down at the cigarette they’re holding, and say, “You really do have a good point. I do need to quit.” It takes a lot of patience, compassion, and understanding to leave them alone at that point and allow them to battle that monkey on their own terms.
Understand that statements like, “And regardless of whether or not it is harmful, smoking STINKS! The smell of the homes and cars of smokers is repulsive. It gives me headaches and sore throats, so I tend to avoid them. I like the people, I just get ill around them,” REALLY say, “*YOU* STINK! You are repulsive. Even if you’re a nice person you make me sick.” *That* was what many people heard and *that* is why you got such a hostile reaction.
I seriously understand your passion on this topic and it really is valid. But you need to understand the other side or you’re never going to reach us.
"It is usual practice, here on FR, to add :/sarcasm at the end of such a post, n00b."
It's also proper etiquette *not* to talk like a 20 year old snot nosed Democratic Underground punk.
Learn real english, "n00b."
"Don't cherry-pick posts."
You sure do spend a lot of your time ordering other people here how to think and behave, don't you?
How did anyone born between 1920 and 1960 ever survive?
Older than the PC police want them to be.
LOL is right! It's a wonder that we, in our fifties, ever made it past toddlers. No seatbelt police, bike helmet police, smoking police, hamburger police, etc., etc., ad nauseum.
Thanks for this thread. I needed a good laugh this morning.
ROTFLMAO!! Oh, you are bad!
See!! What more evidence do you need!
My mother's older sister smoked two packs a day for 60+ years and died at 88. My mother never smoked or drank and died at .... you guessed it, 88.
Their parents were heavy smokers, too. Each died in their late 80s. Maybe it had something to do with genes, ya think?
I had a pair of smoker friends like that. They lit cigarettes before their feet hit the ground in the morning. Their bathroom curtain had turned yellow, and there were streaks on the walls.
Good grief! How did babies survive that had to grow up in houses with wood heat before CHA?
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