New Zealand: Trust Kids More than ''Smoke-free'' Parents

Source from:  AAP (Australian Associated Press) (au)  05/31/2013

Children are more likely to be telling the truth about people smoking in cars and homes than their parents, New Zealand researchers have confirmed.

Parents were either under-reporting or unaware of their children's exposure to second-hand smoke, say the researchers from Auckland University, whose work is published in the New Zealand Medical Journal.

They say children, who are those most at risk from second-hand smoke, should be given a bigger say when it comes to smoke-free policy.

They questioned 3645 children aged between 10 and 13 and either their mother or father about whether or not the youngsters were exposed to smoke in cars and the home. They then followed up by testing 679 of the children for carbon monoxide levels.

"Parents' and children's reporting of exposure to smoke at home and in cars differed significantly," the authors said.

Only 11 per cent of parents reported smoking in the home while 38 per cent of the children said it happened. The carbon monoxide testing supported the higher figure with 30 per cent of the children showing exposure to second-hand smoke.

"The findings suggest that the children's reports of second-hand smoke exposure in the home were likely to be more accurate than the parental reports indicated."

It was possible parents might not be aware of how much other adults or children smoked around their own kids, or they were being generous about what defined a smoke-free home.

The researchers said that when confined with a smoker in a car, they were exposed to about half the concentrations of a smoke-filled English pub before a smoking ban there in 2007.

Last year Associate Health Minister Tariana Turia asked the Ministry of Health to look at banning smoking in cars, but she admitted it may be too hard.

However, the researchers said such bans are in place in some parts of the United States, Canada and Australia. Enditem