Asthma & Smoking

How Does Smoking Affect Asthma?

Smoking is an unhealthy habit for anyone, but it's especially bad for people who have asthma. Smoking makes the airways become swollen, narrow, and filled with sticky mucus — the same problems that cause breathing trouble in people with asthma. For this reason, a smoker who has asthma is more likely to have more frequent and severe flare-ups.

Smoking may also undo the effects of medicines kids take to keep their asthma under control. Kids with asthma who smoke also may need to use medicine more often for quick relief of symptoms, visit the doctor or the ER more often, and miss school because of flare-ups.

Being a smoker is an obvious risk, but just being around people who smoke — and breathing in secondhand smoke — can cause problems, too. Parents can help kids and teens with asthma by protecting them from the effects of tobacco smoke.

How Does Secondhand Smoke Affect Asthma?

Secondhand smoke is a well-known asthma trigger. It can harm the lungs, cause long-term breathing problems, and make existing breathing problems worse.

Kids with asthma who live in households with smokers:

• may have flare-ups more often
• are more likely to have to go the ER with severe asthma flare-ups
• are more likely to miss school because of their asthma
• must take more asthma medicine
• have asthma that's harder to control, even with medicine

Exposure to smoke also can cause sleeping problems and make it hard for kids to do sports or other physical activities. And of course, there are the long-term health consequences, like heart disease, lung disease, and cancer.

How Does Secondhand Smoke Harm Other Kids?

Even kids who don't have asthma are at risk of problems if their parents smoke. All kids are more likely to get upper respiratory infections, middle ear infections, and even pneumonia when they're around people who smoke. Being exposed to smoke may put kids at risk of developing asthma, even if they've never had any breathing problems before.

Hidden Risks

Cigarette smoke can also get absorbed into upholstery, clothing, and carpeting, leaving behind things that can cause cancer (called carcinogens), which can't be washed away with soap and water. Kids who touch, mouth, play on, or breathe near contaminated surfaces may develop breathing problems from this kind of "thirdhand" smoke.

Protecting Kids From Secondhand Smoke

Quit Smoking 

If you smoke, consider quitting, especially if your child has asthma. Children whose parents smoke are more likely to smoke when they get older.

You don't have to quit on your own. Talk to your doctor about possible strategies — from support groups to medicine. If you do keep smoking, don't smoke in the house or car.

Talk to Others About Not Smoking

Even if no one in your household smokes, kids will still be around secondhand smoke at times. Try to help them avoid it as much as possible.

If your child has asthma, let friends, relatives, and caregivers know that tobacco smoke may cause an asthma flare-up. To protect your child from having to breathe in smoke:

• Don't allow guests to smoke in your house or car.
• Avoid smoky restaurants and parties. Choosing the nonsmoking section is not enough protection.
• Ask friends and relatives not to smoke around your child.
• Choose caregivers who don't smoke or, if they do, ask them not to smoke around your child.
• Encourage family members who smoke to quit.

How Else Can Parents Help?

No one wants their child to start smoking, but it's especially important to discourage this bad habit in kids who have asthma. Encourage your kids to say no if offered a cigarette.

To help prepare them for that moment:

• Teach them the facts about smoking and the short- and long-term damage it can do.
• Talk about how expensive cigarettes and other tobacco products are.
• Discuss how smoking gives people bad breath, smelly clothes, and yellow teeth.

Despite the risks, preteens and teens may not respond to an antismoking message because they often feel invincible. Instead, talk about the immediate effects: Smoking will cause more asthma flare-ups and make asthma harder to control. When it isn't controlled, asthma gets in the way of what kids want to do, like playing sports or going out with friends.

What About Vaping?

Vaping (using e-cigarettes) also can irritate or damage the airways, making asthma flare-ups more likely. Experts are still studying the effects of vaping on asthma in children and teens.