Secondhand smoke has been classified by the EPA as a known cause of lung cancer in people, resulting in several thousand lung cancer deaths in nonsmokers each year. It also contributes to and worsens asthma in children.

• Did you know that the smoke coming from a lit cigarette in an ashtray is even more dangerous to you than smoke you inhale? Inhaled smoke goes through the cigarette filter and is also filtered by your lungs. Unfortunately smoke directly from the lit cigarette in an ashtray is not filtered at all. It is breathed in by non-smokers (particularly young children) in a much more dangerous form than a smoker receives through a filter.

• On October 16, 2001 the Environmental Protection Agency began a campaign to ask parents to sign pledges to voluntarily refrain from exposing their children to the secondhand smoke given off by cigarettes, pipes and cigars, or exhaled from lungs.

• Children exposed to secondhand smoke in their homes are especially vulnerable to respiratory illnesses such as asthma because they absorb greater concentrations of smoke than adults do. Children who breathe secondhand smoke are also more likely to suffer from bronchitis and pneumonia, wheezing and coughing spells, ear infections and more frequent and severe asthma attacks.