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Environmental tobacco smoke
Pronunciation
Definition 1
Smoke that comes from the burning of a tobacco product and smoke that is exhaled by smokers. Inhaling environmental tobacco smoke is called involuntary or passive smoking. Also called ETS and secondhand smoke. (NCI Dictionary)
Definition 2
Smoke that is emitted from burning tobacco, including cigarette, pipe and cigar, and from tobacco smoke exhaled by smokers. Environmental tobacco smoke consists of a huge variety of chemicals that are produced during the burning of tobacco. Among them are known or suspected toxicants, carcinogens and respiratory irritants, including nicotine, ammonia, formaldehyde, sulfur dioxide, acrolein, hydrogen cyanide, phenol, nitrogen oxide, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, N-Nitrosamines and radionuclides. Environmental tobacco smoke has numerous adverse health effects, is mutagenic and is a known human carcinogen that is associated with an increased risk of developing lung cancer. (NCI Thesaurus)
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