By Staff Reports
(Hawaii)– From the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, I’m Ira Dreyfuss with HHS HealthBeat.
A study finds a rider in a car with a smoker gets cancer-causing chemicals by breathing second-hand smoke. At the University of California, San Francisco, researchers tested the urine of 14 nonsmokers who sat in a back seat for an hour while a smoker in the drivers’ seat smoked three cigarettes.
The researchers say the nonsmokers had higher levels of chemicals, including three of the top five contributors to overall cancer risks from smoking.
Researcher Gideon St. Helen:
“We’d encourage smokers – whenever there are non-smoking adults, or children, in the car – to just avoid smoking in cars.”
The study in the journal Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention was supported by the National Institutes of Health.
Learn more at healthfinder.gov.
HHS HealthBeat is a production of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. I’m Ira Dreyfuss.