Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Kids who live in homes with smokers miss more days of school

A new study by Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston finds that children who live in homes where at least 1 person smokes inside the house miss more days of school than those who live in non-smoking homes. Researchers found that living with someone who smoked in the home raised a child's likelihood of missing school and living with more than one person who smoked in the home raised that likelihood even higher: Kids living with one adult who smoked in the home had 1.06 more days absent from school per year than kids who lived with none. Kids who lived with two or more adults who smoked in the home missed 1.54 more days than smoke-free kids.

In all, researchers attributed 24% of absences among kids with one smoker in the house to smoking-related illness. For kids living with two or more indoor smokers, that went up to 34% of absences. A child's likelihood of having three or more ear infections in a year went up with the number of people who smoked in the house. Kids with two smokers in the house had more colds.

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