Cigarette smoking kills nearly half a million Americans each year, making it the leading preventable cause of death in the United States.
So the Department of Housing and Urban Development thinks it’s time to ban cigarette smoking from some 1.2 million subsidized households across the nation.
HUD Secretary Julián Castro unveiled a proposal last week intended to protect residents from secondhand smoke in their homes, common areas and administrative offices on public housing property.
“We have a responsibility to protect public housing residents from the harmful effects of secondhand smoke, especially the elderly and children who suffer from asthma and other respiratory diseases,” Castro said, adding the proposed rule would help public housing agencies save $153 million every year in health-care, repairs and preventable fires.
Stanford Law School professor Michelle Mello, PhD, JD, who is a core faculty member with Stanford Health Policy, has researched and written about this issue extensively, including in a 2010 article in The New England Journal of Medicine.
In a piece published yesterday, I asked Mello about her views on the federal smoking ban proposal. A sampling of the Q&A:
What would be the greatest benefit to banning smoking in public housing?
There are lots of benefits, but to me the greatest benefit is to the 760,000 children living in public housing. Although everyone knows that secondhand smoke exposure is extremely toxic, not everyone knows how much children in multiunit housing are exposed — even when no one in their household smokes. Research shows that smoke travels along ducts, hallways, elevator shafts, and other passages, undercutting parents' efforts to maintain smoke-free homes. Also, chemicals from cigarette smoke linger in carpets and curtains, creating hazardous "third-hand smoke" exposure that especially affects babies and small children.
Beth Duff-Brown is communications manager for Stanford Health Policy.
Photo by Getty Images iStock
