Today, children are at great health risk and danger from cigarette and tobacco smoke aside from the young teenagers and adults who are active as well as passive smokers. Children belong to a high risk group as they get exposed to passive smoke, environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) or better known as the second hand smoke. Cigarette smoking effect on children is very dangerous because at a very young age, they are still in the developing age and also their breathing rate is faster than the adults.

Children’s breathing rate is much faster than the adults. An adolescent or young adult breathes around 16 times in a minute while a child breathes way more than this rate. A normal 5 year old can breath more than 20 times a minute which can sometimes increase to 60 times every minute. As the breathing of children is more, the cigarette smoking effect on children becomes more intense as they take in more air that is filled with cigarette smoke. Because of this, the children’s lungs will receive a higher percentage of toxins and poisons than that of the young adults.

The different cigarette smoking effects on the children and there children are numerous. In detrimental effect is that babies who are born to mothers who smoke during her pregnancy are much more prone to be born below the normal weight than those who are born to mothers who do not smoke. Cigarette smoking significantly affects a baby’s weight because of developing a less resistant body. Another cigarette smoking effect on children is high percentage of occurrence of sudden infant death syndrome to be suffered by babies whose mothers are smokers. Likewise, babies win smoking mothers are at greater risk of suffering from learning disabilities and cerebral palsy.

In the case of young children, one cigarette smoking effect on children is the development of the condition of respiratory difficulties and illnesses such as asthma. If children are already asthmatic, it can get worse by second hand smoke. Second hand smoke is one of the leading causes of new asthma cases and other respiratory complications every year. Another very serious cigarettes smoking effect on children is the development of pneumonia or pulmonary bronchitis. In the United States alone, many pneumonia sufferers caused by cigarette smoking are children.

Other cigarette smoking effects of smoking on children are as follows:

Children have increased water or fluid in the middle ear, developing in a hearing and even speech problems.

Children’s lungs function less efficiently. Likewise, their immune system becomes less strong and protective than that of young adults.

Another cigarette smoking effect on children is the inability of the child’s body to develop fully; his height and weight development is adversely affected. The child exposed to cigarette smoking has a great tendency to not fully achieve his over-all physical and intellectual development. Babies whose mothers smoke during their pregnancy are born with a deficiency in height and weight.

By: Dr. Mark Clayson

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