Should second-hand smoke be illegal in a home with children?

starzrn · Mar 12, 2011

I admit, I am very, very torn on this subject. The first time I went into this woman's home (years ago), she was sitting at her table smoking a cigarette. Her 6 month old baby, who was born at 25 weeks gestation, was lying in the living room with her nasal cannula and oxygen tank in use. I was shocked! I asked why she didn't smoke outside and she admitted to me that it wouldn't matter if she went outside or not because the baby's father refuses to smoke outside. Over the years, she and I developed somewhat of a friendship. So many times I tried to talk her and her boyfriend out of smoking around her baby. I showed them both supporting evidence of the dangers of second-hand smoke. Nothing I did helped.
That baby is now a 5th grader with mild learning disabilities and a chronic smokers cough. As a matter of fact, all of her other children have some sort of learning/behavioral problems, and every one of them have a smokers cough.
Now I don't know if their cough is an actual smokers cough. But they have moved many times, so I don't know if there is an association to where they have lived, but all of the kids have a year round cough. Every time she attempted to quit, she would joke that her kids were going through nicotine withdrawal because they seemed irritable.
Just because a child may appear normal and healthy does not mean they are. Smoking is dangerous and I feel that this family was grossly negligent.

HOW SAD!!! At least a heroin needle doesn't cut off your airway! I am just making a point!

LaughingRN · Mar 12, 2011

Uggh

I agree with the Op and suffocating with asthma, but not all asthma is related to smoking. This is such a great topic but it needs to not be so personalized.

Again, my asthma wasn't related to smoking.

Mine was triggered by allergies. Allergies to cats and dogs, dust and mold anything seasonal. Again, I was hospitalized numerous times.

Should it be illegal for parents to own animals with a child that has asthma and reacts similarly?

avert · Mar 12, 2011

Yes, it should be illegal.

starzrn · Mar 12, 2011

I would like to know, OP, what did you do when you walked into the house full of smoke with an infant?

I asked the grandparent if he was smoking around the infant...I could barely breathe! He said yes. His obesity is keeping him inside, so he has no choice but to smoke inside (he told me). I found this out after i instructed him not to smoke around the infant. He said "the baby isn't here all the time" but i couldn't stop thinking about it. I wanted to call for help! I begged him not to smoke around the child. I educated him on the effects of second hand smoke. He did not have much of a response! It was a tiny apartment...and his caretaker was smoking too! The baby had two smokers. Isn't this like handing the baby 8 cigarettes? If a person spends more than two hours in a room where someone is smoking, the nonsmoker inhales the equivalent of four cigarettes.

rmfs0889 · Mar 12, 2011

I absolutely believe second hand smoke should be illegal in people's houses. There are plenty of idoits out there who stay cramped up in their bedroom and smoke in their bedrooms with their 2 week old baby in there b/c they're too lazy to go outside and smoke and now they have to have breathing treatments like my little sister. Plus why do people want their house smelling all nasty anyway. On a more serious note though I strongly believe people should not smoke in front of their kids inside of a house because their kids are the people who are suffering

starzrn · Mar 12, 2011

Uggh
I agree with the Op and suffocating with asthma, but not all asthma is related to smoking. This is such a great topic but it needs to not be so personalized.
Again, my asthma wasn't related to smoking.
Mine was triggered by allergies. Allergies to cats and dogs, dust and mold anything seasonal. Again, I was hospitalized numerous times.
Should it be illegal for parents to own animals with a child that has asthma and reacts similarly?

If the child can not breathe due to an animal...I would think so...ABC

starzrn · Mar 12, 2011

I can't smoke in many public places, I cannot have my car windows tinted too dark, I cannot J-walk (not that I would just saying), I cannot park at certain times and certain places b/c I will get a ticket (b/c the town is poor not for safety), gay couples cannot marry, there is a 10% tax on indoor tanning, I cannot drink beer in public (not public intoxification), it seems that people in 3rd world countries may have more daily liberties. What's the next the goverment is going to tax me/not allow me to cut my hair??

it's not about you...it's about another life that may be suffering!

NurseLoveJoy88, ASN, RN · Mar 12, 2011

I believe one of the sole responsibilties of parenting is keeping their child free from hurt , harm , and danger as much as they can or the child allows them. Parents should be mandated to smoke outside or in a completly different area from the child. So far as making it legal.... I don't know and who cares, What i care about is sick kids due to sick parents that makes their addiction number one instead of their child.

LaughingRN · Mar 12, 2011

If the child can not breathe due to an animal...I would think so...ABC

And we come a full circle.

It is extremely evident that you are focusing only on the effects of second hand smoke in relation to asthma and on this alone you are trying to promote discussion on creating a new law.

I am have been trying to present the thought- that of course smoking in enclosed ares with children is horrible, but we can not ignore all other lifestyle choices that effect children negatively. Many other posters have presented other situations that are equally harming, but they seem to go unheard.

There has not been a single suggestion on how you would police such a law, or the consequences if this hypothetical law is broken. Do you propose to fine families? Socially that would probably make their overall situation worse in many cases. Perhaps the children would only eat twice a day instead of three because of lack of funds.

Would you threaten to place children in foster care? If that is your solution, please look into the dismal state of foster care systems in the US. To make a long story short, they're already lacking, and children placed are often times no better off than they were before. The graduation rate for foster children is poor, lifetime poverty high and mental repercussions abysmal.

Who would report such discrepancies in following this new law? Neighbors? The children themselves? Have you read the book 1987?

How would the law be applied equally, because honestly I see this as leaning towards another poverty based discrimination type situation.

Do you think that the police are going to remove a child that lives in a 4500 sq foot house with private sailing lessons on the weekend from his CEO dad that smokes in the library and place the child in foster care, or do you think it more likely that it will be the low-income single mother with three kids in a 2 room apartment that feels the brunt of this "law".?

Again, all this for smoking, but why not childhood obesity? Why allow Mothers to take Ambien while their children sleep, or speed in their vehicles, or have a get-together and allow adults to become intoxicated? Own animals with children with allergies, feed diabetic children chocolate coco puffs for breakfast? sleep with infants in their beds? not breastfeed?

The root of the problem is how much can be controlled and how much should be controlled.

KyPinkRN · Mar 12, 2011

I think smoking should be illegal, period. I know this is an extremely unpopular belief, though. Also know it will probably never happen.

The loss of tax revenue alone will prevent this from ever happening.

neuroms · Mar 12, 2011

LaughingRN, you surely recognize that it is wrong when a parent actively does something that he or she knows is harmful to the child. And this is not a case of 'it might hurt the child,' as suggested by your lumping it with not breastfeeding or taking ambien. This is a level of active harm for which you have not provided a symmetric comparison, such as forcing a child to drink alcohol or running a meth lab in the living room.

Now, I wouldn't claim to have any expertise whatsoever in forming policy or policing such, but I took this to be an exercise in the formation of our ethical sense. You may wish to defer by playing the pragmatist, but question remains.

WildcatFanRN, BSN, RN · Mar 12, 2011

What I would love to know. Where all the children of these suddenly abusive and unfit parents going to go? The foster care system is weak as it is a someone else previously posted. You want to make smoking illegal, in the home or car, when around children. What punishment will be imposed? Fines? Prison? Smoking Offender Registry? What about those that drink in front of their children? What about those that are morbidly obese and have children around them? If you want to make something illegal because of being harmful for a child then you better make it illegal to feed your child junk food or to have a child with a BMI over the recommended limit for their age. Because childhood obesity is imho 10 times worse than an otherwise good person who smokes in their own home.

Remember alcohol was illegal at one point in our recent past. How well did that work out from a socioeconomic standpoint? Did it solve anything? Did it "save" anyone?