Parental smoking and passive smoking in infants: fathers matter too

This study examines mothers ’ and fathers’ smoking patterns in different kinds of smoking households, and assesses their relative contri-bution to infants ’ exposure to environmental tobacco smoke. It uses data from a cross-sectional survey of 314 smoking households (infants: mean age 10 weeks) in Coventry and Birmingham, England, examining reported to-bacco consumption and objective measures of exposure: the study infant’s urinary cotinine: creatinine ratios and their mother’s salivary cotinine. The study shows that both mothers’ and fathers ’ tobacco smoke make substantial contributions to infant exposure to tobacco smoke. Households were more likely to contain a smoking father than mother, with over two-thirds of households including a smoking fa-ther. In households where both parents smoke, fathers ’ tobacco consumption was found to be significantly higher than in households where only the father smokes. This suggests that the interaction between parents needs to be consid-ered rather than focusing on mothers ’ or fathers ’ smoking behaviour in isolation. The implications for health promotion programmes are discussed, particularly the need to place more emphasis on tackling fathers ’ smoking. Currently, fathers ’ smoking receives far less research or health promotion attention than mothers ’ smoking. Protecting infants from fathers ’ as well as mothers ’ smoking is key to reducing environmental tobacco exposure in early infancy, when the risk of Sudden Infant Death is highest