Professor Studies Costs of Secondhand Smoke Exposure on Children
Contact: Mary Davis, (207) 581-3163; George Manlove, (207) 581-3756
ORONO, Maine — Children in Maine who are exposed to secondhand tobacco smoke in homes, cars and other environments can suffer serious health problems, resulting in $8 million-$11.5 million a year in medical-related expenses, a University of Maine economist says.
The study includes only the cost of illnesses that have been causally linked with secondhand smoke exposure. Other associated illnesses would push the economic consequences even higher, according to economics professor Mary E. Davis, whose research interests include air pollution.
Davis found through a review of medical and scientific research and statistics, provided by various state and national offices and organizations, that children exposed to secondhand tobacco smoke typically suffer from more respiratory illnesses, such as cough, wheezing, asthma, pneumonia, bronchitis and reduced lung function, in addition to ear infections, tooth decay and impaired neurological development than their non-exposed counterparts. In infants, secondhand smoke has been connected with Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, she says.
“There is no acceptable, risk-free level of secondhand smoke exposure to children,” Davis says in her report, released this week. “Recent efforts to educate smoking parents and to impose smoking bans in public places have had a positive effect on decreasing childhood exposures in Maine. However, one out of every five adults in Maine still smoke, and nearly half this group have children.”
Davis conducted her research in the summer and fall of this year at the suggestion of Bangor pediatric dentist Jonathan Shenkin, who successfully persuaded the Bangor City Council last fall to pass an ordinance making it illegal to smoke in a motor vehicle with anyone under age 18 present. The Maine legislature is considering whether to discuss a statewide ban on smoking with young people in a vehicle. According to Davis, California, Arkansas and Louisiana have adopted such bans, and New York is considering one.
Davis, who was not compensated for her work, says her research looks at the immediate and cumulative effects of secondhand smoke on children generally, and not specifically from exposure in motor vehicles.
“The question isn’t what is the impact of this legislation,” she says. “The question is what is the impact of secondhand smoke in Maine for children? This report is a compilation of all these materials that had not been put together before. The strongest conclusion is the percentage of illnesses that can be attributed to second-hand smoke.”
Davis calculated that 6-12 percent of the childhood illnesses studied for her report can be attributed to exposure to secondhand smoke. The range jumps to 10-21 percent for children in the MaineCare program for low-income youngsters.
Based on a recent Maine Department of Health and Human Services survey, Davis reports that 21 percent of adults smoke and 43 percent of smokers have children. Further, an estimated 43 percent of Medicaid recipients in Maine are smokers, and more than 25 percent of children in Maine are routinely exposed to secondhand smoke.
She says that subjecting children to secondhand smoke in a motor vehicle is the same as subjecting a child to secondhand smoke in a pub or bar that allows smoking. The effects on children’s health are worse than for adults, she notes, since children are still developing physiologically.
“Kids have smaller airways and they breathe faster,” she says. “For a variety of reasons, they’re much more susceptible.”
Davis found a correlation in previous studies between income and education levels for families with smokers. The higher a family’s income and education levels, the less likely it is that a family will have smokers. That correlation might explain in part, Davis says, her finding that while MaineCare insures less than a third of the children in the state, MaineCare pays 65 percent of the estimated direct smoking-related healthcare costs for afflicted children.
Other resources that Davis used in her research included the National Center for Health Statistics, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention, in addition to the Maine DHHS, which oversees the MaineCare program.