How Smoking Affects Pets

I am a smoker. I'm not all that vocal about it because it's just a habit of mine (or vice, however you wish to view it), but increasingly these last few years, my fellow smokers and I have come under fire. In my state, they have raised taxes nearly $2.00 in the last year on cigarettes and tobacco products - only. In other states, various laws have banned smoking in public places (including bars and clubs!).

And while many are upset over all of this, a few say it's helped them cut-back on their smoking, so they don't mind. However, I'm writing this to inform you of a study one article mentioned in covering these recent changes - one I did not know about and one which made me stop and think.

A study some seven years ago found that smoking also affects your pets. While dogs often get asthma and other respiratory problems similar to those some humans who smoke face, cats were more likely to come down with intestinal lymphoma - because the carcinogens in the smoke settles on their fur and they ingest it when grooming themselves.

And if your cats are anything like mine, they are constantly grooming themselves.

This really worried me because, no matter how bad my cats are (and they are bad), I love them and want them to be around for as long as possible. But I tried to cut-down on my smoking and it lasted for all of maybe three-four days!

Still, it's been a really rough few months; maybe once my stress decreases some, I can actually do it. And once it warms-up, I am going to get in the habit of going outside to smoke. That alone helps curb your habit more than anything else I have ever tried, because I lived in places where I had to do it, so I speak from experience.

Anyway, I've wanted to pass that along since I read it a few weeks back.

© C Harris Lynn, 2009