A disturbing report from the Academy of Medicine states that every second infant in France is exposed to the harmful effects of tobacco within the first two months of life. 25% of French women smoke during pregnancy. More preterm children and smaller and more fragile babies and a significant risk of developing respiratory diseases from birth. All studies confirm that smoke promotes bronchitis, nasopharyngitis and otitis. This is a very important factor in sudden infant death. One in four children is exposed to tobacco before birth. Action is urgently needed because the laws protecting non-smokers are not being respected enough. Street call to a pregnant woman complaining about the harms of smoking: "it’s bad for me and the baby". Interview with Alain GRIMFELD (paediatrician pneumologist at the Trousseau hospital): he explains that passive smoking begins before birth for babies of smoking mothers. Interview with Professor Maurice TUBIANA: "We must inform women and help them to stop smoking and their spouse".
On the occasion of World No Tobacco Day, a report on the dangers of passive smoking, which has caused many victims. Illustration images around this dangerously deadly incivility and interviews with Robert LE CAM, president of the association "Rights of non-smokers", Jocelyne SOUISSI, mother of a young asthmatic and Professor Alain GRIMFELD, paediatrician pulmonologist at the asthma center of the Trousseau hospital.
Is an employer responsible for the damage that passive smoking can cause in his company? This is a first in France: the sister of a woman who died of cancer complains against her employer, believing that this disease is due to the smoking of her colleagues, suffered for 18 years in an office of the bank where she worked. Interview with Rose OZEIR (sister of Leila, the victim) who shows a photo of her sister and talks about the smokers who caused her sister’s death. For 18 years at the French bank in the East, Léila worked in the same office, surrounded by smokers. She herself did not smoke. She died of smoking cancer, as three reports state. Rose sued the bank for refusing to hear Leila’s demands. Interview with Luc BIHL (lawyer) believing that Leila died of smoking-type lung cancer. But the court will have to be convinced of the causal link between smoking and death.
Tobacco is one of the main causes of lung cancer and other diseases, not only for smokers, but also for those who work with them and "take advantage" of their smoke. Professor Maurice TUBIANA, a cancer specialist at the G. Roussy Institute, speaks on this subject. In France, laws exist to protect non-smokers, but in practice they have little recourse. Etienne ANDRÉ, president of the national committee against smoking, deplores this dysfunction. It is difficult to dare to display hostility to smoking. However, some restaurants or tea rooms have made this choice, an example to follow.
According to one expert, smoking is harmful not only to the smoker but also to others, especially the woman, when she is expecting a baby and when she is breastfeeding. It also evokes the danger faced by non-smokers living in a smoky atmosphere.
In the context of the Veil Act raising awareness about anti-smoking, meeting with a doctor about the harms of passive smoking. He recalls that according to Human Rights, "no one can impose a nuisance on anyone". And therefore, even if there is only one person in any one community affected by tobacco, "this nuisance must be avoided to those who suffer from it".