College students at SIUC are very concerned about the health and safety issues caused by second-hand smoke; especially where they live. And they are doing something more than just talk about it-- they are taking action, right now! For example, they are circulating a petition offering their support to the Administration to make ALL Student Residence Halls 100% smoke-free. (To sign the petition, click here.)
 
Why Second-hand Smoke is a Health Issue, not a “Rights” Issue
 
Second-hand smoke can cause many of the same health problems for non-smokers as it does for regular smokers.Over the past two decades, medical science has shown that nonsmokers suffer many of the diseases of active smoking when they breathe secondhand smoke.

Second-hand smoke, sometimes referred to as environmental tobacco smoke, is a mixture of the smoke given off by the burning ends of a cigarette, pipe, cigar, and the smoke emitted at the mouthpiece and exhaled from the lungs of smokers. Second-hand smoke contains at least 250 chemicals known to be toxic or cause cancer, including ammonia, formaldehyde, arsenic, and carbon monoxide.

If you are a non-smoker, this means that every time you are around friends, roommates, or others who smoke, you are putting yourself at risk – for short and long-term health problems. If you are a smoker, it means every time you light up around someone else, you are forcing them to smoke, too . . . and suffer similar consequences as you. Somewhere along the line, you chose to smoke. They didn’t. Yet, they will be paying the price along with you.

Unfortunately, the general public’s exposure to secondhand smoke is much higher than most people realize. Every year, more than 53,000 non-smokers die from exposure to secondhand smoke, making it the third leading cause of preventable death in the U.S. (National Cancer Institute.) Put another way, for every eight smokers the tobacco industry kills, it takes one non-smoker with them. (Glantz, Stan and Parmley, W., "Passive Smoking and Heart Disease: Epidemiology, Physiology, and Biochemisty," Circulation: 1991; Taylor, A, Johnson, D., and Kazemi, H. "Environmental Heart Disease and Cardiovascular Disease," Circulation: 1992).  

Across America, students as well as University management are now more than ever realizing the damaging effects of second-hand smoke. In many cases the students are taking the lead in raising the awareness, and are challenging the University to provide 100% smoke-free campuses and residence halls. 
 
Why Second-hand Smoke is a Safety Issue
 
Cigarettes are the #1 cause of fire death in the U.S.  Cigarette-caused fires often kill more than just the smoker.  They kill innocent people too.  A Tufts university student recently died in a dorm fire caused by cigarettes, and a baby recently died in an apartment fire caused by cigarettes.  Cigarette-caused fires have also taken adult lives in discos, nursing homes, hotels, etc.  Virtually every day, cigarette-caused fires kill someone.  (Joe Cherner,www.smokefree.org/fire) Need more be said about safety? And we haven’t even mentioned damages to property, both personal and belonging to the University.
 
How to Become Involved
 
If you are also concerned about the health issues of second-hand smoke, or if you just want to be assured a more comfortable and safe place to live in student housing, click here. You can sign up to learn how to be a student advocate, meet others who feel as you do, and have fun in the process!
 
 
College Campuses are Latest in Front of Smoking Rights Battle
By C. Meagher, News Staff, Boston [edited]
 
College campuses are the latest battleground for smokers and anti-smokers. Since the turn of the
century, cities and towns throughout Massachusetts and the nation have forced restaurants and
bars to go smoke-free. Health boards in Framingham, Weymouth and Canton recently pushed for
smoke-free establishments and now encourage neighboring towns to follow their lead, so as not
to hurt local business. In step with the towns, colleges across the country have gone smoke-free or are considering the move.
 
A 1999 study by the Harvard School of Public Health found that 27 percent of non-commuter
colleges and universities banned smoking everywhere—including all residence halls—while 55
percent allowed it in residence halls.
 
Despite the national trend, Residential Life Director M.L. Langlie says the university considered
going smoke-free after noticing a decline in freshman requests for smoking apartments and
favorable feedback on the university's four non-smoking upper-class halls. Langlie says the
reassessment is not only due to the decline in applications, but also because of health concerns for
students. "It is not about whether we like people who smoke or not, it is that there is a lot of research out
there that says smoking causes cancer," she said.
 
As a former smoker, Executive Director Kevin Kroner says he too felt that smoking bans
infringed on his rights. After quitting, however, Kroner says he realizes that smoker's rights are
non-existent. "There is no mention of smoking in the Constitution," Kroner said in a recent interview. "The
only notions that a restriction [on smoking in dorms] impacts are certain general notions of
fundamental liberty."
 
Kroner says the United States has been infringing on individual liberty since its foundation, but
does so through fair and equitable processes. The center supports the banning or segregation of
smokers because the move preserves individual liberties and protects public health.
 
" Your right to put those substances into your body should extend as far as you neighbor's lungs,"
Kroner said. He added that it is natural to ban smoking in college housing where the conduct of
one individual easily affects other people.
 
As a private university, it is legal for Northeastern to discriminate in its housing practices as long
as it does not break federal laws that protect against discrimination based on race or religion. The
same rules apply for apartment owners, Kroner says, who are legally allowed to ban pet-owners
or young renters.
 
Langlie says the future of smoking in Northeastern residence halls will be decided in May and put
into place by 2003. Though she says a system of punishments will be put into effect to enforce
any changes, it will be up to students to enforce the changes in their apartments.
" We're not going to have RAs sniffing under doors," she said. "We hope the students themselves
can come to an agreement on a suitable living situation.”

This website is made possible through a grant from the Illinois Department of Public Health, Illinois Tobacco Free Communities Program.