Use a Smoke Filter Mask If you can’t avoid secondhand smoke in public places, avoid breathing it in by covering your mouth in smoky areas. A filter mask, such as the N95 respirator mask, which is shown to block 95% of air particles,2 is a handy and lightweight method to prevent exposure.

How to avoid secondhand smoke

• If you smoke, quit. There are many resources to help you.
• Do not smoke or allow people to smoke in your house or car. Ask people who smoke to step outside.
• Find smoke-free restaurants, hotels, and rental cars.
• Ask caregivers and relatives to stop smoking around you and your children.

When Secondhand Smoke Invades Your Home

1. Enforce a No-Smoking Lease. If the smoke that disturbs you comes from someone who rents, find out if the rental agreement contains a no-smoking clause; these clauses are becoming more common.
2. Enforce a No-Smoking CC&R.
3. Sue Your Neighbor.
4. Check Your State’s Laws.

There is no treatment for breathing in secondhand smoke. But there are ways to manage your exposure and treat conditions related to secondhand smoke inhalation. If you are regularly near secondhand smoke, you can reduce the danger by: Moving away from the smoker and finding a smoke-free place.

Children still have a higher prevalence of secondhand smoke exposure than adults, and most are exposed in the home. In 2019, an estimated 6.7 million (25.3%) of middle and high school students reported secondhand smoke exposure in the home.

Exposure to secondhand smoke has immediate adverse effects on the cardiovascular system and can cause coronary heart disease and stroke. Secondhand smoke causes nearly 34,000 premature deaths from heart disease each year in the United States among nonsmokers.

Ways to clear the lungs

1. Steam therapy. Steam therapy, or steam inhalation, involves inhaling water vapor to open the airways and help the lungs drain mucus.
2. Controlled coughing.
3. Drain mucus from the lungs.
4. Exercise.
5. Green tea.
6. Anti-inflammatory foods.
7. Chest percussion.

Exposure to secondhand smoke causes an estimated 41,000 deaths each year among adults in the United States: Secondhand smoke causes 7,333 annual deaths from lung cancer. Secondhand smoke causes 33,951 annual deaths from heart disease.

Steven Schroeder, MD, director of the Smoking Cessation Leadership Center at the University of California at San Francisco, says that smokers are commonly self-conscious about the smell of smoke on their clothes and in their hair. And the smell of their breath is one of particular sensitivity to most smokers.

Symptoms of smoking and smoking-related diseases

• Bad breath and yellowing of the teeth.
• Cold hands and feet.
• Frequent or recurrent lung infections and other diseases, such as influenza, common colds, bronchitis, and pneumonia.
• Hypertension (high blood pressure) and rapid heart rate.
• Loss of taste and smell.

Most women find smokers unattractive, a new survey has revealed. Amongst more than 1,000 singletons, researchers found that 70 per cent of women are repelled by those who smoke and 56 per cent said they wouldn’t date a smoker.

Tell-tale signs of smoking

1. Stains. Nails and fingers: Nails and fingers of smokers may take a yellow stain due to repeated exposure to smoke and tar in smoke.
2. Burns.
3. Skin changes.
4. Smell of smoke.