Cigarette smokers are more likely to quit smoking if their doctor cuts through the jargon and tells them how old their lungs are acting.

So say British researchers who tested the “lung age” strategy in 561 smokers aged 35 and older.

All of the smokers got a lung function test. And all were urged by their doctors to stop smoking and were told about local smoking-cessation clinics.

After the lung function test, doctors told half of the smokers their “lung age” and showed them a chart comparing their lung age to a nonsmoker’s lung age.

For instance, a 52-year-old smoker might learn that their lung works like that of a 75-year-old who never smoked.

For comparison, the smokers in the study got a letter about their lung function test results. That letter didn’t mention their lung age.

A year later, 13.6% of the smokers in the lung age group had quit smoking, compared with 6.4% of those who weren’t told their lung age, according to saliva tests they took; the saliva tests verified smoking cessation.

It didn’t matter whether their lung age was a lot or a little older than their chronological age.

“Presentation of information in an understandable and visual way, whether the news is positive or negative, seems to encourage higher levels of successful smoking cessation than when patients are given feedback that is not easily understandable,” write the researchers. They included Gary Parkes, MB ChB, of The Limes Surgery in Hertfordshire, England.

Graphic feedback on lung age might be an opportunity for doctors to “tailor smoking cessation messages to the individual,” states an editorial published with the study in today’s advance online edition of BMJ (formerly called the British Medical Journal).

The quit-smoking drug Chantix is being grounded for pilots and air traffic controllers, and Chantix use may be reason for medical examiners to disqualify interstate truckers and bus drivers.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) ruled on Wednesday that “Chantix was no longer acceptable for use by pilots and controllers,” FAA spokesperson Les Dorr tells WebMD. And the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration — the branch of the U.S. Department of Transportation that oversees trucking and busing — has told medical advisors that Chantix use could put the brakes on an interstate truck or bus driver’s medical fitness for duty.

The FDA has been analyzing reported adverse events — including suicidal thoughts and suicidal behavior — in Chantix users since late last year.

“In November, we had put on the [Chantix] label a precaution about use when operating heavy machinery,” Janet Woodcock, MD, director of the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, tells WebMD.

“Every drug is not right for every person,” says Woodcock. “If they’re in a specialized occupation where sedation or other problems might pose an extra risk, then if they need to go on a drug like this, they need to take a brief pause from that occupation or not do it while they’re, say, flying an airplane.”

Not a pilot, trucker, or bus driver? If you drive at all, you should still take note of drug labels. “Many, many medications can impair your driving ability,” says Woodcock. “People should be very careful when they’re taking any medication that has these labeled precautions.”

A spokesperson for Pfizer, the drug company that makes Chantix, wasn’t available for comment in time for publication.

However, Pfizer updated the Chantix web site with a “new safety information” link, dated May 2008, about reported mood changes, suicidal thoughts or behaviors, and cautions about driving or using heavy machinery. That information is already on the Chantix label.
Chantix Decisions

In July 2007, the FAA decided that Chantix was acceptable for use by pilots and air traffic controllers, with some exceptions, according to Dorr.

“That was before the first reports started coming to the FDA in November of potential psychological symptoms,” Dorr tells WebMD.

Dorr says that earlier this week, the FAA heard from the nonprofit Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP) about a new ISMP list of reported problems in Chantix users.

That study lists problems — including accidents, vision problems, heart rhythm problems, and seizures — reported to the FDA but not proven to be caused by Chantix. The FAA decided to ban Chantix for pilots and air traffic controllers based on that study, says Dorr.

The FAA knows of about 150 pilots and 30 air traffic controllers taking Chantix or have taken the drug in the past, notes Dorr, adding that the FAA told pilots and air traffic controllers to stop taking Chantix and to wait 72 hours before going back to work or flying.

Is that decision permanent? “It’s hard to say,” says Dorr. “We’re always open to new data. … We would have to have some really good data that showed something to the contrary in order to make it acceptable again, and that’s probably not going to happen.”

The FMCSA hasn’t banned Chantix for truckers or bus drivers. In a statement emailed to WebMD, the FMCSA says it defers to doctors and health care professionals to determine drivers’ medical fitness for duty, including the possible impact of medication use.

FMCSA regulations don’t single out medications. But the FMCSA states that “it appears that medical examiners should not certify a driver taking Chantix because the medication may adversely affect the driver’s ability to safely operate a commercial motor vehicle.”
FDA Weighs In

The FDA approved Chantix in May 2006.

In November 2007, the FDA announced that it was investigating reports of suicidal thinking, aggressive and erratic behavior, and drowsiness in people taking Chantix. At the time, the FDA advised patients to use caution when driving or operating machinery until they knew how Chantix may affect them. The FDA also stressed that it didn’t yet know if Chantix was responsible for those problems.

In February 2008, FDA officials noted that they have received nearly 500 reports of suicidal thoughts, behaviors, and completed suicides in people taking Chantix. Those reports don’t prove that Chantix was to blame for suicidal thinking, behaviors, or suicides. The FDA warned people taking Chantix that they might have trouble driving or operating heavy machinery.

The ISMP’s new study hasn’t been published in a peer-reviewed journal.

“We actually chose to go ahead and publish it in our newsletter and offer it online because it can take so long to get into a peer-reviewed publication,” Renee Brehio, ISMP public relations manager, tells WebMD. “ISMP really felt strongly that this was a crucial enough safety issue that we didn’t want there to be that lag time between the findings and getting it published.”

The ISMP report doesn’t analyze the FDA’s raw data on reported adverse events, notes Woodcock. The FDA has been investigating those reports. “We’ve also been considering what further studies could be done to evaluate them,” says Woodcock.

Meanwhile, the FDA asks doctors and patients to report adverse events from Chantix — or any other drug — to the FDA’s MedWatch program.

Smoking in midlife results in poor memory and makes it harder to think and learn, according to research published in the June 9 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine.

What’s more, developing cognitive problems in your 30s, 40s, and 50s may speed the onset of dementia. Smoking damages blood vessels, including those in the brain. Scientists recently concluded that smoking is a risk factor for dementia.

However, the link between smoking and cognitive problems has been hard to determine because few study patients return for follow-up visits or they die of smoking-related diseases before the research is completed.

For the current study, Severine Sabia, MSc, of the Institut National de la Sante et de la Recherche Medicale in Villejuif, France, and colleagues analyzed data from London-based civil servants aged 35 to 55 first enrolled in the Whitehall II study between 1985 and 1988. The study participants answered questions about their smoking habits and completed memory, reasoning, vocabulary, and verbal fluency tests on two separate occasions in 1997-1999 and then five years later.

The first round of cognitive testing showed that smokers were more likely to have the lowest scores than those who never lit up. “Smoking in middle age is associated with memory deficit and decline in reasoning abilities,” the study authors say in a news release.

Ex-smokers tested better than current smokers on vocabulary and verbal fluency tests and were less likely to have cognitive deficits in memory.

Those who kicked the habit before the study started or during the 17 years of follow-up also reported drinking less alcohol and eating more fruits and vegetables.

However, those who smoked when the study started were less likely to take the cognitive tests and more likely to die after the 17 years of follow-up.

“Our results … suggest that the association between smoking and cognition, even in late midlife, could be underestimated because of higher risk of death and non-participation in cognitive tests among smokers,” the authors say.

Smoking-cessation drugs and many nicotine-replacement therapies are more than twice as effective at helping smokers quit than going it alone.

A new analysis of 69 studies comparing seven different smoking-cessation treatments shows six of the seven treatments were more effective than placebo in helping smokers quit the habit for at least six months to a year.

But researchers say smoking-cessation therapies are underused because of problems translating those results to the public and providing widespread access to the treatments.

“We are confident that the recommended treatments will substantially increase rates of smoking abstinence when given to smokers who wish to quit,” researcher John Cunningham of Toronto’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, says in a news release.

For example, Cunningham says these results suggest that offering free nicotine-replacement therapy to adults who want to quit smoking could provide major public health benefits.

(What do recommend for quitting? Share your story on WebMD’s Smoking Cessation support group.)
Helping Smokers Quit

In the study, published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, researchers compared 69 clinical trials on smoking- cessation therapies involving nearly 33,000 people.

The results showed six therapies were more effective than placebo at helping smokers quit, including:

* Chantix (2.4 times more effective than placebo)
* Nicotine nasal spray (2.37)
* Zyban (also known as Wellbutrin) (2.07)
* Nicotine patch (2.07)
* Nicotine tablet (2.06)
* Nicotine gum (1.71)

Although the findings also favored the effectiveness of the nicotine inhaler over placebo, the results were not conclusive.

In a related article in the same journal, Canadian researchers randomly surveyed 825 smokers and asked them if they would be interested in receiving free nicotine-replacement therapy and how they would use it. Nearly 60% of smokers said they would be interested in receiving free nicotine-replacement therapy, and 94% of the interested smokers said they would use it to quit smoking for good.

In fact, researchers found smokers who were interested in quitting smoking for good were more interested in using nicotine-replacement therapy than those who planned to cut back or maintain their smoking habits.

Experts say these results suggest that new strategies to inform smokers who want to quit about their options may be needed to improve use of smoking-cessation therapies.

“Because of a powerful multinational tobacco industry, the need to prevent death and disability from tobacco-related illnesses will not disappear,” writes J. Taylor Hayes, MD, of the Mayo Clinic in a commentary in the same journal. “However, we have effective treatments to assist smokers at their attempts to live free of tobacco. The success of our efforts hinges on our ability to place these products in the hands of people who need them.”

If you’re a smoker or former smoker, you probably remember your first cigarette and whether it brought on fits of coughing or a pleasant buzz.

Now new research suggests a link between that initial reaction to smoking and a specific gene variant that has also been linked to a greater likelihood for becoming addicted to nicotine.

And a separate study published this week also sheds new light on why some people seemingly get hooked when they light their first cigarette.

The two studies join a growing body of research exploring individual differences in vulnerability to nicotine addiction.

“The cigarette companies have told us for years that smoking is an individual choice,” longtime nicotine researcher Ovide Pomerleau, PhD, of the University of Michigan tells WebMD. “But it is increasingly clear that for some people that isn’t really the case.”
Nicotine Addiction and Genes

In their study published online today in the journal Addiction, Pomerleau and colleagues report on the association between initial smoking experiences, current smoking patterns, and a specific variant in a nicotine receptor gene known as CHRNA5.

The study included 435 smokers and nonsmokers. All the nonsmokers had smoked at least one cigarette during their lives (and no more than 100), but had never become hooked. The regular smokers had smoked at least five cigarettes a day for the past five years or longer.

Smokers in the study were eight times more likely than nonsmokers to report that their first cigarettes gave them a pleasurable buzz.

The smokers were also much more likely to have the variant of the CHRNA5 gene that has been linked with increased susceptibility to nicotine addiction.

“It really is a triple whammy,” Pomerleau says. “People with this genetic makeup find smoking pleasurable from that first cigarette and they are more likely to get addicted and develop lung cancer.”
Nicotine and the Brain

In another study that examined the same question in a different way, researchers from the University of Western Ontario identified key areas within the brain that appear to regulate sensitivity to nicotine’s rewarding effects.

“Nicotine doesn’t give you the euphoric high that drugs like morphine give,” researcher Steven R. Laviolette, PhD, tells WebMD. “In fact, during initial exposure many people get sick. But while we understand quite a bit about how the brain processes the rewarding effects of nicotine after dependence is established, we know very little about this initial vulnerability.”

The researchers targeted a brain pathway that has been linked to drug dependence.

In a series of experiments in rats, they identified and were able to manipulate two “hotspots” that controlled whether the rats were rewarded or repelled by their initial exposure to nicotine.

The findings were reported this week in the August issue of the Journal of Neuroscience.

“If humans have naturally occurring differences in the dopamine system in this area of the brain, that might be one reason why some people would find their initial exposure to cigarettes rewarding and others would get sick,” Laviolette says.

Both researchers say their findings could have implications for the discovery of new, targeted therapies that are much more effective than current treatments for smoking cessation.

Pomerleau says such treatment could be a reality within a few years.

“Things are moving really fast in this field,” he says. “We are making new discoveries all the time.”

Call it a “two for one.” California researchers say their state-funded program aimed at cutting smoking can also save a lot of money.

That’s the word from researchers at the University of California, San Francisco who looked at the monetary benefits of their state’s anti-smoking efforts. Started in 1989, the campaign is called The California Tobacco Control Program.

Researchers, led by James Lightwood, came up with figures by comparing California’s anti-smoking efforts to 38 other states.

The comparison states were states that did not have their own anti-smoking campaign in place before the year 2000 and had not increased taxes on packs of cigarettes by 50 cents or more during the course of the study.

Researchers then crunched the numbers to estimate what effect California’s program had on “total personal health care spending.”

They did the same for the 38 comparison states.

What the study found was:

* The estimated total savings from the California anti-smoking program was $86 billion in personal health care between 1989 and 2004.
* If you look at that another way, study authors write, that savings can be seen as a “50-fold increase” on the $1.8 billion spent on the program itself during the same period.
* California’s anti-smoking plan also was associated with 3.6 billion fewer packs of cigarettes sold between 1989 and 2004.
* Researchers say that translates to a big loss for tobacco companies — an estimated $9 billion loss, before taxes.

This study defines “total personal health care spending as including:

* Hospital costs
* Doctor’s fees
* Prescription drug charges
* Home health care costs
* Nursing home care
* Health equipment
* Vision products
* Other personal health care

In background information published with the findings, researchers write that California’s program differs from other states’ programs because it aims to actually “change social norms” about smoking.

It targets getting adults to stop smoking, not trying to prevent teens from picking up the habit.

The thinking is if more adults stop, teen smoking will decrease.

Researchers write that the state wages an “aggressive media campaign” that puts out these three main messages:

* The tobacco industry lies.
* Nicotine is addictive.
* Secondhand smokes kills.

Researchers write that there is a “large amount” of money available (from state taxes on cigarettes and from settlements with tobacco companies), but that “little of it has been invested in tobacco control programs.” The example they give is that out of the $25 billion a year that states receive, only $720 million will be dedicated to tobacco control programs this year.

The percentage of Americans who smoke cigarettes has fallen below 20% for the first time since at least the mid-1960s, according to a new report.

The CDC says in its Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report that the prevalence of smoking fell in 2007 to 19.8%, nearly a full percentage point from 20.8% in 2006.

“This is good news,” Matthew McKenna, MD, MPH, director of the CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health, tells WebMD. “But deaths related to cigarette smoking are still increasing. Almost one in five adult Americans smoke, and many former smokers are succumbing to their habit again.”

Tom Glynn, PhD, director of International Cancer Control of the American Cancer Society, says the CDC report shows that major progress is being made in the government’s war on smoking, but hard battles still loom.

“This is the lowest level since the late 1920s, at least,” Glynn tells WebMD. “We’ve gotten back to where we were more than 80 years ago.”

The CDC says cigarette smoking prevalence has been dropping steadily among Americans 18 and older since it began keeping records in 1965, when 42.4% smoked. The proportion dropped below 30% for the first time in 1987, when 28.8% of Americans smoked.

“We think the proportion is dropping because of excise taxes that make cigarettes more expensive, smoke-free laws [that apply to most workplaces], and the availability of counseling and medications,” McKenna says.

In 2007, the CDC says 22.3% of adult males and 17.4% of adult women smoked. It says 19.8% of African-Americans smoked in 2007, and 21.4% of whites.

The CDC says 443,000 deaths annually are attributed to tobacco use.

Lung cancer, the leading cause of cancer death among men and women, kills about 157,000 Americans a year. A greater number of people die of lung cancer than of colon, breast, and prostate cancers combined.
Trying to Quit Smoking

“The most important thing people can do if they are smoking is to quit,” McKenna says. “These studies show 30% to 40% of smokers try to quit, but chances of being successful without help are only 4% to 5%.”

Progress would be better if more people were aware that their doctors could help and if they knew about a toll-free counseling “quit line” offering advice at 800-QUIT-NOW (800-784-8669), McKenna tells WebMD.

The report also says that:

* 43.4 million Americans are smokers.
* Smoking has declined over at least the past 40 years among all socio-demographic groups.
* Smoking prevalence varies according to education levels. Smokers who had a general education development diploma had the highest prevalence rate at 44%. People with nine to 11 years of education had a prevalence rate of 33.3%, compared with 11.4% of those with college degrees and 6.2% with graduate degrees.
* Mortality rates for people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease ( COPD) increased 8% from 2000 to 2005.
* COPD deaths among women rose to 60,229 annually between 2000 and 2004, up from 56,363 between 1997 and 2001. Among men, annual deaths remained about the same in both periods at 58,000. COPD, which is treatable, is caused mainly by cigarette smoking, but also occupational hazards, air pollution, and secondhand smoke.
* Exposure to tobacco smoke resulted in 5.1 million years of potential life lost during 2000-2004 and $96.8 billion in annual productivity losses ($64.2 billion for males, $32.6 billion for females.)

McKenna tells WebMD that the three leading causes of smoking-related death are lung cancer, heart disease, and COPD. He says between 30% and 40% of smokers try to quit annually, but the success rate is only one in five.

It’s unlikely, he adds, that the U.S. will reach its goal of reducing smoking prevalence to 12% in the next two years. But he says media campaigns, excise taxes, and rules implementing smoke-free environments are playing roles in reducing smoking.

Also, he says, “there are now more former smokers than active smokers.”

Benefits for those who quit are significant, he says, because stopping smoking drastically reduces risks of cardiovascular disease and COPD.

Glynn says the American Cancer Society fears many people who’ve quit may start again because “they are thinking they are self-medicating for anxiety and economic difficulties.”

He says studies “have shown that smoking in the movies” induces youths to smoke. Glynn also says nonsmoking women are getting lung cancer at higher rates than nonsmoking men, but the reasons aren’t clear.

The CDC studies, Glynn says, reinforce that “if we raise taxes [on cigarettes] and continue to widen access to cessation treatment,” prevalence will go down more.

Cigarette smokers who try to quit gradually rather than giving up smoking all at once can safely use nicotine-replacement gum, a new study shows.

Heavy smokers in the study who chewed the highest doses of nicotine-replacement gum as they tried to cut down on their smoking reported no more side effects than lighter smokers who chewed less nicotine gum.

The research was funded by GlaxoSmithKline, which markets Nicorette — the nicotine- replacement gum used in the study. The study appears in the February issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

For the first two months of the study, the smokers were told to gradually reduce their smoking while increasing their nicotine gum use, with the goal of giving up cigarettes altogether.

Compared to smokers randomly assigned to a group using a placebo instead of nicotine gum, use of nicotine gum appeared to triple the odds of being a nonsmoker at six months.

Just 2% of placebo-gum users achieving this goal, compared to 6% of nicotine-gum users.

“Nicotine-replacement therapies like gums and patches are approved for abrupt quitting, but many people prefer to try and quit gradually by cutting down cigarettes rather than giving them up all at once,” study researcher Saul Shiffman, PhD, tells WebMD. “Our finding is very reassuring because it shows this to be a safe way to use these products.”

Smokers Who Quit Gradually

Studies suggest that only about 3% of attempts to stop smoking without the aid of nicotine replacement, other medications, behavioral therapy, or some other type of treatment are successful.

Shiffman, who is a long-time smoking-cessation researcher as well as a consultant for GlaxoSmithKline, says many smokers who want to quit express a preference for quitting gradually.

But it has not been known if they could safely do so using nicotine-replacement products at the same time.

In an effort to study this, the University of Pittsburgh professor of psychology and colleagues recruited almost 3,300 smokers from across the country. All had expressed an interest in quitting smoking gradually instead of stopping “cold turkey.”

The smokers were allowed to choose either 2-milligram or 4-milligram doses of nicotine gum, but some of the participants in both groups unknowingly got a placebo rather than active-nicotine gum.

The 4-milligram dosage is generally recommended for heavy smokers — those who typically smoke 25 or more cigarettes a day.

Participants were instructed to cut down on cigarettes while increasing their use of the gum over a two-month period, but they were not given explicit instructions on how to do this, Shiffman says. Participants reviewed FDA-approved labeling for the gum products.

Those who reported giving up cigarettes at the end of two months were followed for an additional four months, during which time they were allowed, but not required, to continue using the nicotine-replacement gum or a placebo.

During the first four weeks of the study, the researchers evaluated the impact of simultaneous use of cigarettes and nicotine-replacement gum.

They found no difference in adverse outcomes among the heaviest nicotine users (who averaged 22 cigarettes a day and nine pieces of 4-milligram gum) compared to people who used less nicotine.

At the end of six months, smokers on active nicotine-replacement therapy were more likely to have stopped smoking than those who chewed the placebo gum.

Shiffman acknowledges that the success rate for all the study participants was low. But the 6% quit rate for the smokers who chewed the 4-milligram nicotine-replacement gum was roughly double that typically reported in studies evaluating smokers who try to quit without help.

Nicotine Gum ‘Better Than Smoking

The study did not examine nicotine gum use for longer than six months, but it is clear that many people stay on the gum or other forms of nicotine-replacement therapy for much longer.

New York University professor of medicine and smoking-cessation researcher Scott Sherman, MD, tells WebMD that the evidence suggests that long-term use of nicotine-replacement treatments is safe and “a whole lot better for you than smoking.”

While nicotine is the agent that gets people hooked on cigarettes, other chemical toxins in cigarette smoke are the cause of lung cancer and other health effects.

But while long-term use of nicotine-replacement products appears safe, Sherman says there is less evidence that it is effective.

“It is not really clear if using nicotine gum or patches or even other forms of medication for a year instead of three months improves your chances of quitting smoking,” he says. “We can’t really tell people that they will be more likely to be a nonsmoker 10 years down the road if they chew nicotine gum for an extra year.”

Sherman says that people who are trying to quit smoking typically use too little medication rather than too much. “A common mistake people make with gums and lozenges is that they wait until they feel symptoms, and that’s too late.”

Sherman and Shiffman offered other tips for stopping smoking:

* Use medication. People who use nicotine-replacement therapies or other types of drugs approved for smoking cessation are twice as likely to quit successfully, Sherman says.
* Get some support. Most states have smoking-cessation hotlines that can provide counseling and information for people trying to quit.
* Recognize your smoking triggers and have a plan for dealing with them.

If your first attempt to quit smoking doesn’t work, you’re not alone. The average person who successfully gives up cigarettes had tried to quit unsuccessfully at least half a dozen times, Sherman says. “Rather than beat yourself up and feel defeated, these unsuccessful attempts should be viewed as learning opportunities.”

It is widely accepted that tobacco smoke causes most lung cancer deaths. A new study shows that tobacco smoke — including secondhand smoke — may also contribute to non-lung cancers more than previously thought.

Researchers used data from the National Center for Health Statistics and concluded that tobacco smoke may have led to more than 70% of cancer deaths among Massachusetts men in 2003.

“This study provides support for the growing understanding among researchers that smoking is a cause of many more cancer deaths besides lung cancer,” says researcher Bruce Leistikow, a University of California, Davis associate adjunct professor of public health sciences, in a news release. “The full impacts of tobacco smoke, including secondhand smoke, have been overlooked in the rush to examine such potential cancer factors as diet and environmental contaminants. As it turns out, much of the answer was probably smoking all along.”

Researchers compared death rates from lung cancer to death rates from other cancers from 1979 to 2003 among Massachusetts males. Their analysis revealed that the two rates changed in tandem year-by-year from 1979 to 2003.

The researchers conclude that the close relationship between the rates suggests that they have the same cause, which is tobacco smoke.

“The fact that lung and non-lung cancer death rates are almost perfectly associated means that smokers and nonsmokers alike should do what they can to avoid tobacco smoke,” Leistikow says in the news release. “It also suggests that increased attention should be paid to smoking prevention in health care reforms and health promotion campaigns.”

In the study, published online in BMC Cancer, the researchers called for increased tobacco control efforts.

Smokers are motivated to quit the habit to protect their pets from secondhand smoke, a new survey shows.

Researchers led by Sharon M. Milberger, ScD, of the Henry Ford Health System in Detroit, found that 28.4% of smokers who participated in an online survey said learning that secondhand smoke was bad for their pet’s health would motivate them to quit. And 8.7% said knowing the potential adverse health effects of secondhand smoke would spur them to ask their partners to quit.

The results are published in Tobacco Control, a BMJ specialty publication. The researchers write that 3,300 people responded to an online survey for pet owners; 66% were dog owners, 53% kept cats, and 10% had birds. Most of the survey participants were white females from Michigan.

Sixteen percent of nonsmoking pet owners living with smokers reported they would ask their partners to quit smoking to keep their dog, cat, or bird away from secondhand smoke if they had information about the pet dangers of secondhand smoke. Another 24% said they’d tell their smoking partners to go outside to smoke.

The survey shows that about 40% of smokers — and 24% of nonsmokers living with smokers — said they’d like to know more about the effects of smoking, secondhand smoke, and how to kick the habit.

The researchers say public health campaigns aimed at getting people to quit might benefit from reminding smokers that breathing secondhand smoke is unhealthy for their pets as well as for people.

Published evidence is convincing that secondhand smoke is dangerous not only for humans, but for pets, too, according to the article.

Exposure to tobacco smoke has been associated with certain cancers in dogs and cats, allergies in dogs, and eye and skin diseases and respiratory problems in birds, according to the researchers.

“This new source of motivation could be particularly strong for smokers who, aside from their companion animals, live alone,” the researchers suggest.