Missing out on what happens at school is just one more price that children who live with smokers have to pay. In a study funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and published in the October Pediatrics, a group of Boston-based researchers have concluded that tobacco smoke exposure has significant consequences for children and families above and beyond child morbidity, including academic disadvantage and financial burden. Absenteeism among children aged 6 to 11 years living with smokers could be reduced 24 to 34 percent by eliminating smoking in their homes. Caregivers’ lost wages and time due to child absenteeism was valued at $227 million a year. Another good reason to quit smoking? Nicotine dependence has emerged as a risk factor for suicide attempts. Read about it in Psychiatric News. Also see Nicotine in Psychiatry: Psychopathology and Emerging Therapeutics from American Psychiatric Publishing.
(Image: Elena Kouptsova-Vasic/Shutterstock.com)