- What I wanted to do today
was not necessarily give you a really dry dissertation
on tobacco use and all this, but I wanted to make this more
of a storytelling about tobacco use and some tobacco facts,
because actually, tobacco does affect all of us.
Even if you aren't a user, being exposed to tobacco smoke
has the same affects on your body
as if you were smoking a cigarette.
So, we do know that smoking is the number-one
preventable cause of illness and death in this country,
and in fact, right now, it is the number-one
preventable cause of death and illness,
and it's about 440,000 deaths a year.
Now, if you're like me, those kinda numbers,
you know, when you get paid in pennies,
talking about big numbers don't make a lot of sense.
So let me put that in perspective for you.
Do you remember where you were on 9/11 and when you heard
how many people died on 9/11 and how shocked we were
that over 3,000 people died that day?
This is the equivalent of a 9/11 every other day.
This is the equivalent of three jumbo jets
going up into the air and crashing into each other,
completely filled, every day.
But we don't see the same kind of outrage
that we did with 9/11 with this
because it's very insidious, and it's very quiet,
and we have the tobacco companies, of course.
They're putting a lot of money into hiding these things.
But I want y'all to just kinda keep that in mind.
It is involved in all sorts of cancers.
Most people think of lung cancer when they think of smoking,
but it's involved in bladder cancer,
kidney cancers, pancreas.
Kidney and bladder cancers especially
are affected by nicotine and the toxins
that come out of the cigarette smoke.
And we always talk about this
when we're talking with other people,
that alcohol causes more deaths, or excuse me,
tobacco causes more deaths than alcohol,
cocaine, crack, heroin, homicides, suicides,
car accidents, fires, and AIDS combined each year.
And so, I wanted just to why that is.
Everybody knows it's the smoke,
but what is it about the smoke that's so bad?
Well, let's look.
There are 4,000 chemicals in the smoke,
but look at these.
Do you know benzene?
If you are a truck driver that transports benzene,
they make you get in a full environmental suit
with respirator, I mean, completely covered,
just because if there's potentially a drop or two
that drops out of the benzene transfer,
that that's how toxic it is, and yet,
tobacco smoke has it that everybody can breathe.
It's just real interesting.
Ammonia, did you know that they soak the leaves
in ammonia to make the tobacco burn faster?
That's the purpose of that.
So if it burns faster, it burns hotter,
it delivers more nicotine and more tar into the lungs.
But how many of you thought
they actually washed the tobacco leaves?
That would be about the closest they come to washing
the tobacco leaves, is when they soak it in the ammonia.
Disgusting, isn't it?
I have a confession to make.
The reason I got into this, well,
probably led to it is I'm an ex-user myself,
and I mean, I started at 14 and whatnot.
And so, I give these talks,
and I think about how smart I was at 14.
But I wanna talk a little bit about secondhand smoke.
If you are not a user, you're not immune
to what goes on with tobacco smoke
if you're in the same room with someone.
When we talk about second-hand smoke and clean air laws,
we are having a struggle
in this state passing a clean air law.
It keeps going to committee, and there's a great possibility
that it will die again this year
and we will not have it in Michigan.
But one of the things I always encourage people
to think about, having a smoking section
and a non-smoking section is like having a peeing
and a non-peeing section in the pool.
It's exactly the same thing.
Now, if we knew that there was a peeing section in the pool,
how many of you are gonna jump in the pool?
(audience laughs)
My thoughts exactly.
Well, that's exactly what it's like with second-hand smoke.
We've got two types of smoke.
In fact, second-hand smoke,
most of the smoke is out and in the environment.
We've got the side stream smoke, which is the stuff that,
when they're just sitting there holding the cigarette
that's coming off the end of the cigarette,
but then there's mainstream smoke.
Remember, when they inhale, they exhale it too,
and it comes out and goes into everybody.
And in fact, I'm gonna tell you a little story.
I went bowling, I'm so embarrassed to tell you this story,
'cause I was a terrible bowler,
and I should tell you, I had 13 gutter balls in a row.
It was a very embarrassing event.
But I was there for an hour and a half with non-smokers,
and we weren't near any smokers,
and when I walked out after an hour and a half,
I could tell I smelled like smoke.
I happen to have my carbon monoxide monitor in my car,
so I took a CO reading, just to see,
'cause remember, I wasn't anywhere near smokers.
I had a 21 parts per million CO reading, which meant
that in the literature, I had just had a cigarette.
And that was exposure to other people's smoke.
I'd inhaled that much carbon monoxide.
So, I know a lot of people like to think
that being around cigarette smoke
doesn't really bother them, but it really does.
Everything that they inhale and all those toxins
that we talk to them about when they're smoking cigarettes,
exposure to second-hand smoke,
you are also getting that if you're sitting there.
Of course, we know that it is a human carcinogen.
Actually, of the 4,000 things that are on tobacco smoke,
43 of them are identified as carcinogenic materials.
And just being around second-hand smoke
can cause breathing problems, can reduce lung function,
can cause lung infections, and it can increase
severity of asthma attacks in asthmatics.
In fact, one of the things that we see at U of M hospital
are children who are asthmatic,
and parents go to give 'em a hug.
They're not even smoking; they're just giving 'em a hug,
but the residue of the tobacco smoke
from having just had a cigarette triggers an asthma attack,
because that material, think about it,
tar, all that stuff lands on something,
and their body is one of the things.
Some research that just came out recently
is second-hand smoke may increase the risk of breast cancer,
that there are 20 chemicals that are in smoke
that does cause cancer, breast cancer, in rodents,
and granted, it is a rodent study.
There is also something that just came out this week
on it does look like that exposure to smoke
in some people does increase
the risk of cancer significantly, quite a bit.
It obviously can cause premature death
and disease in children and adults.
When we talk about here in Michigan,
we have about between 18 to 19,000 people die in Michigan
due to their own smoking every year,
but we also have about 35 to 4200 people
who die from second-hand smoke exposure.
So it does have effect on those who aren't.
Now, I wanna tell you a little story
about the immediate effects of heart and blood circulation.
You know, med students are poor.
They're always looking for money,
so they did this really interesting study.
Only med students would do this.
They took a little room,
and they had cigarettes going in there.
The med students would go in,
and there were just these cigarettes.
No one's smoking 'em; they're just sitting there lit,
and the med student sat in there
and did homework for an hour.
Do you know what they found out
with the cardiovascular system?
That it was the same as if that person
had smoked a pack of cigarettes in that one hour,
that the closure in the cardiovascular system,
the effects on blood oxygen, all of these effects
is if they had just been exposed and sitting in the room.
Now, some of you might say, well,
that's not really a fair thing to talk about,
because they were in a little room.
But let's face it, when you're in a restaurant
or when you're in your homes or at someone's homes,
are you in a big, huge cathedral?
No, you're in a small space, relatively small space as well
and concentration of cigarette smoke.
So the bottom line, there's no safe level
of exposure to second-hand smoke.
What would you do if I could give you a pill
that made you feel better when you were sad,
made you happier when you were happy,
pepped you up when you were feeling slow,
slowed you down when you were feeling revved up,
helped you concentrate and focus,
and it suppressed your appetites for sugars?
Would y'all take that pill?
Lemme ask you this,
is there anyone here who would not?
Okay, I thought so.