Tobacco-Free Campus Initiative

Facts from the U.S. Surgeon General's Report
The US Surgeon General’s 2010 Report, “How Tobacco Smoke Causes Disease: The Biology and Behavioral Basis for Smoking-Attributable Disease,” states that there is no safe level of exposure to tobacco smoke. Any exposure to tobacco smoke – even an occasional cigarette or exposure to secondhand smoke – is harmful. It also states:

• You don’t have to be a heavy smoker or a long-time smoker to get a smoking-related disease or have a heart attack or asthma attack that is triggered by tobacco smoke.
• Low levels of smoke exposure, including exposures to secondhand tobacco smoke, lead to a rapid and sharp increase in dysfunction and inflammation of the lining of the blood vessels, which are implicated in heart attacks and stroke.

In addition, The 2006 US Surgeon General’s Report, “The Health Consequences of Involuntary Exposure to Tobacco Smoke,” has concluded that:

• Secondhand smoke exposure causes disease and premature death in children and adults who do not smoke
• Children exposed to secondhand smoke are at an increase risk for sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), acute respiratory problems, ear infections, and asthma attacks, and that smoking by parents causes respiratory symptoms and slows lung growth in their children
• Exposure of adults to secondhand smoke has immediate adverse effects on the cardiovascular system and causes coronary heart disease and lung cancer
• There is no risk-free level of exposure to secondhand smoke
• Establishing smoke-free workplaces is the only effective way to ensure that secondhand smoke exposure does not occur in the workplace
• Evidence from peer-reviewed studies shows that smoke-free policies and laws do not have an adverse economic impact

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