DON'T PUFF AROUND PUFF!

THE EFFECT OF SECONDHAND SMOKE ON CATS

- Candilee Jackson

Introduction: The war on smoking and tobacco products began in 1964 with the Surgeon General's Report on Smoking and Health. The battles were few and far between until the 1970s when groups and health organizations such as the American Cancer Society and the American Lung Association picked up the stop-smoking mantle and ran with it. The skirmishes were fierce because society had been lulled into submission since the 1920s when movies, magazines, roadside ads, war effort drives, and other forms of tobacco advertising were prominent. And the big surprise: nicotine was determined to be addictive.

There is little evidence that smoking around family pets was addressed early on in the push to stop tobacco use. Even in today's society, the general public remains ignorant of the effects of tobacco, secondhand smoke, and even thirdhand smoke on pets; especially on cats and dogs.

Secondpaw Smoke

Thanks to good advertisement and court cases against the tobacco industry, the general public was given a wake-up call to both the dangers of smoking as well as the inherent dangers of secondhand smoke, with literally ALL the information geared toward human tobacco use.

It is common knowledge "that smoking affects the health of not just the one smoking, but everyone exposed to the secondhand smoke.

But what about secondpaw smoke? Rover and Mittens are susceptible to the health effects of secondhand smoke just like the rest of the family."2 The American Lung Association along with the American Cancer Society are among the few organizations that have taken the research completed by the Federal Drug Administration and applied this knowledge to the health of pets. Animals that groom via licking their fur can ingest carcinogens and toxins "if that fur is coated with smoke residue.

"C" is for Cats and Cancer