Fostering Good Care: Take It Outside

COLLEGE STATION – Foster parents in Texas have just been given another reason to make quitting smoking their No. 1 New Year’s resolution this year.

“As of Jan. 1, foster parents in Texas will no longer be allowed to smoke in their homes or vehicles,” said Courtney Schoessow, Texas Cooperative Extension program specialist for health education and development. “They need to take it outside.”

The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services’ publication, “Minimum Standards for Child-Placing Agencies,” states that as of New Year’s Day, “caregivers and other adults may only smoke tobacco products outside” and “no one may smoke tobacco products in a motor vehicle while transporting children in care.”

For more information visit the agency’s Website at www.dfps.state.tx.us

Smoking doesn’t affect only the smoker, Schoessow said. Children living in homes with smokers can develop some serious medical conditions.

According to figures from the Environmental Protection Agency, babies and children who live with adult smokers are “at increased risk of lower respiratory tract infections and are more likely to have symptoms of respiratory irritation like coughing, wheezing and excess phlegm,”

Schoessow said. “The EPA estimates, with children under 18 months of age, secondhand smoke causes between 150,000 and 300,000 lower respiratory tract infections, resulting in 7,500 to 15,000 hospitalizations each year.”

Children who live with smokers are also more likely to have ear infections than children who don’t, she added. And the EPA estimates as many as 1 million children with asthma have more – and more severe – episodes each year if they live with adults who smoke.

Opening windows isn’t enough, she said.

“Ventilation systems in homes cannot filter and circulate air well enough to eliminate secondhand smoke,” Schoessow said. “Poisons from smoke linger in the air up to seven days.

People may be exposed even it they are not present while a person is smoking.”

But deciding to stop isn’t all it takes. Quitting can be extremely difficult, she said.

Smokers often need some help with this resolution. That’s why Extension developed its “Put It Outside for Healthier Kids” program. This program will help adults stop smoking – or at least teach them the importance of keeping their smoke away from children, she said.

For more information on the local availability of this program, contact any county Extension office.

More information on secondhand smoke and how it affects non-smokers is available on Extension’s Family and Consumer Sciences Web site at http://fcs.tamu.edu/ . Click on the link to HealthHints newsletter and scroll down to the newsletter on Secondhand Smoke.

The HealthHints newsletter called “Tobacco Cessation” also gives steps on quitting tobacco use.

Schoessow also recommended getting more information by calling the American Cancer Society at 800-227-2345, the National Cancer Institute Smoking Quitline at 877-448- 7848 (877-44U-QUIT) the Texas Department of State Health Services at 800-345-8647 or the EPA at 800-490-9198.

“We need to make all children in the state of Texas as healthy as possible, and secondhand smoke is very harmful to children,” Schoessow said.

Anyone who “has concerns about a foster child’s care or the behavior of a foster parent, call 800-252-5400,” she said.

For more information on this and other health issues, visit the Web at http://fcs.tamu.eduand click on the link to Health.