Photos by meghan erkkinen
SMOKE-FREE CARS. A volunteer smokes in a vehicle while monitors measure the air quality in the back seat of the car. In a similar lab test, smoking a cigarette caused the air pollution in the car to rise to 250 times the level deemed “unhealthy” by the Environmental Protection Agency.
Every year, 70,000 children in Pierce County are exposed to second-hand smoke in vehicles driven by their parents or other adults.
For many of these children, the exposure leads to health problems, such as bronchitis, ear infections and coughs. It can also worsen a child’s asthma or increase an infant’s risk of sudden infant death syndrome.
That is why the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department (TPCHD) is teaming up with MultiCare Health System to get the message out to parents and adults about the risks involved with lighting up while driving. The two organizations are launching a campaign to educate residents and promote state legislation on smoking in vehicles.
“Many smokers are unaware of the damage they may be causing,” said Tacoma City Councilmember Rick Talbert at an event to promote the campaign Sept. 30. “This is a plea to smokers: don’t smoke in your car, especially when children are passengers.”
Several experts on and proponents of the smoke-free cars for children campaign spoke at the event, highlighting the dangers of smoke exposure and encouraging smokers to think of their children when they are driving.
According to Dr. Dave Kalman, chair of the University of Washington’s Environmental and Occupational Health Program, “short of lighting a cigarette and putting it in their mouth,” smoking in a car delivers the greatest second-hand smoke exposure to children.
What is impressive about the research that has been done about smoke levels in vehicles is not only the concentrations of air pollution, but how quickly the concentrations grew, Kalman said.
The Environmental Protection Agency has set a threshold for unhealthy air quality at 0.04 milligrams of fine particulate pollution per cubic meter (mg/m3). In in-car air quality data gathered from tests, the levels inside a car reached more than 10 mg/m3 – 250 times the “unhealthy” threshold. Furthermore, the car’s air quality reached those astronomical levels within seconds of lighting up a cigarette.
Even with windows partially opened, tests showed air quality reached hazardous levels very quickly.
Getting this information out to the public is a key goal of TPCHD and MultiCare, because focusing on prevention of tobacco-related illnesses, in addition to treating them, is key to keeping the public healthy, Kalman said.
The TPCHD board passed a resolution Sept. 3 urging drivers who smoke to refrain from doing so when children are passengers in their vehicles. The health department hopes to see a state law in the future that bans in-car smoking while children are passengers.
Informing children’s parents about the harmful effects of smoking in vehicles was a natural extension of the work TPCHD has been doing, according to George Hermosillo, a prevention specialist with the health department.
“It was a desire to continue on what we were doing with tobacco prevention,” he said. “Ultimately we want to move forward with legislation (at the state level).”
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