• Commit to make your home smoke-free and protect your children.  Call the EPA’s toll free Smoke-Free Home Pledge Hotline at 1-866-Smoke-Free or 1-866-766-5337.

• A Smoke-Free Home Kit will be mailed out to you, which includes:  tips on keeping your home smoke-free, smoke-free home magnet and a smoke-free home certificate.

Secondhand Smoke and the Worksite

The most important location of secondhand smoke exposure for adults is in the work place. Experts believe that a large number of the estimated 30,000 to 60,000 secondhand smoke related deaths that occur each year in the U.S. are caused by workplace exposures. 

Secondhand smoke is a class A carcinogen, something known to cause cancer in humans. There is no safe level of exposure to a cancer-causing agent.  Simply dividing smokers from nonsmokers within the same airspace may cut down exposure to secondhand smoke, but cannot get rid of it.  

Workers exposed to secondhand smoke on the job are 34 percent more likely to get lung cancer.  Exposure to secondhand smoke can also result in worsened asthma symptoms, poor blood circulation, bronchitis, and pneumonia. 

A recent survey showed that about 60 percent of Michigan’s worksites are smoke-free.  Nationally, about 70 percent of all indoor workers said they were working under a smoke-free policy in 1999, compared to 46 percent in 1993. People who work in hotels, motels, casinos, bars and restaurants are among the most exposed of all workers.  

Smoking in the workplace increases an employer’s potential legal liability. Under the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA), employees can sue for protection against tobacco smoke.  Smoke limits access to the workplace for people with asthma and others legally classified as having disabilities who are sensitive to secondhand smoke. 

The development and implementation of smoke-free policies in worksites and public places protect employees and the general public from the harmful effects of secondhand smoke. Smoke-free policies also prompt more smokers to try and quit, increase the number of successful quit attempts, reduce the number of cigarettes that continuing smokers consume, and discourage kids from ever starting to smoke.

Researchers found that the number of heart attack victims admitted to a regional hospital in Helena, Montana dropped 58% during the first six months that a smoke-free ordinance (all worksites were smoke-free) was in effect in Helena.   The study's authors credited much of the decrease in heart attacks to the near elimination of the harmful effects of secondhand smoke in Helena's worksites.   (Sargent, R.P.; Shepard, R.M.; Glantz, S.A., “Immediate Reduction in Acute Myocardial Infarctions After Implementation of a Comprehensive Smoke-Free Ordinance,” Annual Scientific Sessions of the American College of Cardiology in Chicago, March 30-April 2)

For more information on smoke-free worksite policy, please call 517-335-8376.

Myths and Misconceptions About Smoking

Myth:  If I smoke cigarettes in a separate room in the house, then my family is not being exposed.

Fact:  Smoke will travel throughout the house no matter where the cigarette is being smoked.  It is like putting chlorine in the shallow end of the pool and expecting the chlorine to not circulate to the deep end.  Even ventilation systems in homes cannot filter and circulate air well enough to get rid of secondhand smoke. Going into another room to smoke, opening a window or smoking while children are gone may help reduce children’s exposure but will not protect them from the dangers of secondhand smoke.

The Environmental Protection Agency "recommends that exposure to environmental tobacco smoke be minimized wherever possible. The most effective way to minimize exposure is to restrict smoking to smoking areas that are separately ventilated and directly exhausted to the outside, or by eliminating smoking in the building entirely." ("Environmental Tobacco Smoke," Indoor Air Facts No. 5, June 1989. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency) 

Myth:  A little bit of smoke isn’t going to hurt anybody. 

Fact:  In a July 2001 study in the Journal of American Medical Association, investigators found that brief exposure to small amounts of secondhand smoke can immediately affect the hearts of nonsmokers.  The study showed that in as little as 30 minutes of exposure to secondhand smoke, the nonsmokers’ blood flow dropped to the same level as people who had smoked a pack of cigarettes. After short amounts of exposure, secondhand smoke had caused damage to the cells that line the heart and blood vessels, causing them to narrow or constrict. This narrowing can lead to hardening or thickening of the arteries and heart disease.

Myth: Simply separating non-smokers within the same areas, such as a workplace or restaurant, will keep them from being exposed to secondhand smoke.

Fact:  Ventilation systems are designed to circulate air, not filter or clean it.

Quitting Tobacco Use 

Nicotine addiction is the physical dependence of your body to the powerful chemical nicotine. If you use tobacco and you want to quit for your health and the health of others, help is available. Once you have decided to quit it is important to incorporate these key elements: self help information, cessation treatments to help individuals understand and change their behaviors; and pharmacologic (medication) therapy to help ease the discomfort of withdrawal from nicotine.    

You can order the Michigan Department of Community Health’s Smoker’s Quit Kit.  The Smoker’s Quit Kit will give you straight, useful advice to help you quit and stay cigarette free.  It offers you real tips on how to prepare to quit, what to expect, how to stay on track once you have quit, and how to adjust to life as a non-smoker.  To order a free Smoker’s Quit Kit or an Expectant Mother’s Quit Kit call 1-800-537-5666.   

A cessation (or quit smoking) program is an important part of the quitting process.  The following information can help you choose a tobacco cessation program.

Types of Cessation Programs 

• Group Programs    
• Telephone Cessation
• One-on-one Counseling Programs
• Twelve-step Programs
• Self Help Programs
• Inpatient Programs
• Computer-based/Internet Programs

To find cessation programs located nearest to you, go to Michigan’s Guide to Stop Smoking Programs, which lists cessation programs by county at  www.michigan.gov/mdch/0,1607,7-132-2940_3182_22973-16781--,00.html

Guidelines for choosing a tobacco cessation program

Different programs work best for different people. When choosing a program, consider practical matters like time, cost, location and instructor methods. 

• Choose a research-based program.
  
• Look around for tobacco cessation courses that may be offered at a local hospital, or through your health plan, the American Lung Association, or the American Cancer Society.
  
• Ask your doctor, nurse or health plan for suggestions about programs with a good reputation.
  
• When looking for a program, ask for details about the cost and length of the course.
  
• Are the presenters trained cessation counselors, and do they have a background in health?
  
• Will your health plan cover all or part of the cost for attending?
  
• Look for programs that teach avoidance (staying away from tobacco), stress management, coping, interpersonal and refusal skills.  It should also address diet, exercise and other health behaviors.
  
• Will the program help you decide if you are ready to quit?  Will it help you determine your motivation for quitting smoking?  Will it help you pick a quit date?
  
• The program should highlight the short and long-term costs of tobacco use.
  
• Different types of instruction methods should be used. (video, group interaction, demonstrations)
  
• The program should help you to understand how smoking fits into our society (most people don’t smoke).
  
• The program should teach media awareness – an understanding of how your tobacco use is influenced by others.
  
• The program will be better and more effective for you in a building where participants cannot have tobacco products, and where policy limits smoking.
  
• You can improve your success at quitting by choosing a program with courses that have at least four to seven sessions, and are at least 45 minutes long.
  
• Are refresher courses offered? Or can you drop in on another session if you have a slip or feel a need for some extra support?
  

Tobacco Use Quitline
 

Telephone-based cessation counseling provides tobacco-product users with support in counseling.   A Free call to the Michigan Department of Community Health's I Can Quit helpline 1-800-480-QUIT (7848) can help you stop smoking.   It provides up to seven sessions with a personal health coach who will call and work with you in the comfort of your home or office to develop your personal plan to successfully quit smoking.

Prescription and Over-the-Counter Tobacco Cessation Medications

The Food and Drug Administration has approved six medications to assist smokers in quitting:

•  Five are nicotine replacement therapies that relieve withdrawl symptoms. They include nicotine gum, patch, nasal spray, inhaler, and lozenge.

•  The sixth medication, bupropion SR (sustained release), is a non-nicotine medication that is thought to decrease the urge to smoke by affecting the same chemical messengers in the brain that are affected by nicotine.

Prescription and Over-the-Counter Tobacco Cessation Medications

Source: Coverage For Tobacco Use Cessation Treatments, Department of Health and Human Services, Center for Disease Control and Prevention

Helpful Cessation Web Site Addresses

Other helpful resources are cessation web sites.  Here is a list of web sites that offer information about quitting, and two that offer computer-based cessation programs.

American Lung Association (Freedom from Smoking):  www.lungusa.org/ffs/index.html American Lung Association’s cessation program, which can be done online for free.

Dr. Koop Online: http://www.drkoop.com/ency/93/002032.html
Contains facts, information and research to help people stop smoking.

Massachusetts Dept. of Health: www.trytostop.org
Massachusetts Department of Health’s online cessation program called Quit Wizard.  It is completely private and free.

Mayo Clinic: http://www.mayoclinic.org/nicotine-rst/
Contains facts, information and research about quitting

Smoke free Families (Pregnancy): www.smokefreefamilies.org/
Contains facts, information regarding smoking and pregnancy

Other Important Tobacco Links