The harmful effects of cigarette smoke on children

(Baonghean.vn) - The harmful effects of cigarette smoke on adults are many times greater on children.

Children can get many diseases from passive smoking. Photo: Internet

According to the National Tobacco Control Program, children exposed to secondhand smoke are at increased risk of:

Lower respiratory tract infection

Children exposed to secondhand smoke are at increased risk of lower respiratory tract infections, including bronchitis and pneumonia. Experts estimate that each year between 150,000 and 300,000 children under 18 months of age develop bronchitis or pneumonia related to exposure to secondhand smoke.

Children under 1 year of age whose parents smoke have twice the risk of bronchitis or pneumonia, are more severely ill, and spend 20% more time in hospital than children of non-smokers.

Prevalence and severity of asthma

Smoking by parents, especially mothers, also increases the incidence and severity of asthma in young children. Children in households with smokers require more medical care, have twice the risk of daily asthma attacks, and are hospitalized more often for asthma than children whose family members do not smoke.

Worldwide, between 200,000 and 1 million children with asthma are affected by their parents' smoking.

Acute and chronic otitis media

Exposure to secondhand smoke also increases the risk of chronic otitis media and effusion. Otitis media causes deafness and imposes a lifelong economic burden on children. Deafness at a very young age can easily lead to mutism and learning disabilities.

In addition, from the effects of passive smoking, children can also suffer from other respiratory diseases and affect the heart and intestines.

Experts estimate that each year, Vietnam has about 150,000 - 300,000 children under 18 months old with bronchitis or pneumonia related to environmental tobacco smoke. Children under 1 year old who are children of smokers have bronchitis or pneumonia twice as often as children of non-smokers. Another survey showed that 60% of Vietnamese children aged 13-15 are exposed to tobacco smoke at home.

In Hanoi, nearly half of the population is exposed to second-hand smoke, mostly women and children. That is why, although only 2% of Vietnamese women smoke, their lung cancer rate is still fourth, after breast, uterine and stomach cancer.

Every year in Vietnam, 40,000 people die from tobacco-related causes, three times the number of deaths from traffic accidents. Among them are people who die unjustly from inhaling other people's cigarette smoke.

Therefore, parents or relatives, before smoking, should consider to maintain their own health, and at the same time reduce the risk of disease for children. In addition, from now on, everyone needs to have a form of protection and timely treatment to reduce the number of Vietnamese children infected with diseases caused by tobacco./.

Thanh Son

(Synthetic)