What You Need to Know About Childhood Smoke Allergies?

It was every parent’s worst nightmare. John aged 4 years was brought into the Emergency Room with severe difficulty in breathing. His lips had turned blue and he was starting to become unresponsive and was clutching his chest. This has happened before and his parents are worried sick of sending him out of home for the fear of recurrence of such attack.

Dr. Richard Gray who heads the Asthma Clinic at Children’s National Medical Center said that they are seeing an increasing number of families coming in with such conditions and hence they have chalked up a dedicated program to teach families how to manage such chronic situations by eliminating allergens and managing with medication so that they can avoid petrifying and expensive trips to the ER.

Scary Facts

Several studies have conclusively revealed that Background or Second-Hand Environmental Tobacco Smoke (ETS) exposure in children is linked with the development of allergic asthma. Asthma is the most common chronic disease in kids, affecting nearly 1 in 10 U.S. children under age 18. Horrifyingly ETS has also been found to cause about 3,000 deaths from lung cancer each year in the United States. Passive smoking is an important cause of respiratory illness. Children are particularly vulnerable as their developing lungs are at prone to illnesses such as bronchitis, pneumonia, tracheitis (inflammation of their upper airway) and asthma. Infants who are exposed to ETS have been shown to more likely develop Otitis Media (ear infection). ETS is associated with hundreds and thousands of infections of the lower respiratory tract in infants under 18 months. These infections in turn lead to thousands of hospitalizations each year. The incidence of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) quadruples if the mother or both parents are smokers. Continued exposure can permanently impair the lung functioning in children.

Common Misconceptions

Many people believe that their kids or kids around them are not affected by ETS if they smoke in a different room or outside the house or from a distance away. This is not true. Smoke allergens can be carried from the clothes of smoker too! Second hand smoke contains the same 4,000 chemicals, including traces of poisons like formaldehyde, arsenic, DDT and cyanide that the first hand smoke contains! Worse yet only a small class of specially made air purifiers can remove smoke from the air effectively. Second hand smoke has been classified by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as a Group A carcinogen.

How to prevent childhood smoke allergies?

· If you are a smoker, quit smoking; no smoking in the house, outside, in the car or even when the kid is not at home.

· Make your home a non-smoking zone even for visitors and guests. Your house, your Rules!

· Walk away immediately if anyone is smoking near you and your kids and instruct your kids to do the same.

· In case of any unavoidable exposure use masks to cover nose and mouth.

· Ensure that your children’s schools and daycare facilities are smoke-free.

· Start early; ensure a smoke free womb environment.

Smoking kills, not only the smoker but also the people around.