World Cancer Day 2025: Keeping Our Communities Safe from Secondhand Smoke
By Communities Energized for Health, a project of ETR | February 4, 2025
World Cancer Day is an international day observed every February 4th to raise awareness about cancer, encourage its prevention, and mobilize action to address the global cancer epidemic.
For Communities Energized for Health (CEH), a project of ETR, this annual observance highlights the importance of our work in addressing secondhand smoke exposure where Californians live, work, and play.
We’re deeply committed to ETR’s vision of a world where all individuals and communities can achieve their best health. Healthy environments start at home, which is why smokefree multiunit housing is vital to creating a protective space for residents to thrive away from the harmful effects of secondhand smoke.
Health Effects of Secondhand Smoke
Secondhand smoke is the smoke exhaled by a person who smokes or the smoke that comes from a burning cigarette, cigar, pipe, or hookah. When someone inhales secondhand smoke, they can take in nicotine and the 70 + cancer-causing chemicals found in commercial tobacco smoke in the same way as a person who smokes.
Research has shown that there’s no safe level of exposure to secondhand smoke. In fact, the more secondhand smoke someone breathes in, the more these harmful chemicals will be found in the body. Exposure to these toxins can cause lung cancer and increase the risk of other cancers in the larynx (voice box), nasopharynx (the part of the throat behind the nose), nasal sinuses, and breasts in adults.
There’s also an increased risk of certain childhood cancers for babies exposed to secondhand smoke during pregnancy, such as lymphoma, leukemia, and brain tumors.
The Importance of Smokefree Multiunit Housing
One aspect of CEH’s work is our promotion of smokefree multiunit housing in Northern California’s rural counties like Yolo and Tehama.
Unfortunately, secondhand smoke is not fully confined to a resident’s home in multiunit housing. It travels between apartment units through air vents and ducts, as well as small cracks in electrical outlets, fixtures, pipes, and baseboards.
One study found that up to 65% of air coming into a given apartment came from other units in the building. Results from indoor air monitoring confirm that when neighbors smoke indoors, that smoke can drift into other units and affect the health of residents who do not allow smoking in the home. Smokefree multiunit housing policies also reduce the possibility of smoking-caused fires. In 2019, smoking-related fires in multiunit housing caused 65 deaths, 190 civilian injuries, and $94 million in losses.
Smokefree multiunit housing policies can be part of a larger approach to helping people quit smoking and are linked to higher rates of smoking cessation. These policies can also have an important impact on youth. In 2023, 12.6% of high school students and 6.6% of middle school students in the U.S. reported using tobacco products in the last 30 days. Smokefree housing establishes smokefree environments as the norm and reduces the likelihood of young people smoking.
Why Smoking Cessation is Vital to Public Health
Increasing the number of people who kick their smoking habit is crucial to reducing secondhand smoke, exposure to its cancer-causing chemicals, and to creating healthy environments.
Public health policy dedicated to reducing tobacco-use in areas where Californians live, work, and play does not restrict individual freedom. It’s about providing non-smokers with the freedom to breathe clean air.
Our project understands the importance of finding common ground and centering the values we do agree on in tobacco prevention work. We hope we can agree that youth and communities deserve to live in healthy environments with clean air, free from the cancer-causing chemicals found in commercial tobacco smoke.
The World Cancer Day theme for 2025 is “United by Unique.” This theme centers the unique experience people can have with cancer and how it will take a united effort to reimagine a world where millions of cancer deaths are preventable by working together.
We can all play a role in reducing the global impact of cancer. While events and activities take place in hospitals, parks, places of worship, schools, and clinics in commemoration of World Cancer Day, consider the personal and collective actions that can be taken in your community.
For tobacco prevention outside of policy, consider joining the Tehama County Tobacco Education and Community Health Coalition to stay involved with tobacco cessation efforts. This can be a place to not only have your voice heard, but to also find solutions that work best for locals. Search for your local County Health Department here, and find out more information on getting involved with your local coalition.
Together, we can prevent secondhand smoke in multiunit housing to build a healthier future for youth and communities—preserving our ability to breathe clean air for generations to come.
Resources for Tobacco Prevention
Want more tools for tobacco prevention? Check these out!
Communities Energized for Health (CEH) can work directly with healthcare centers and decision makers to expand smokefree indoor policies and Kick It California’s free tobacco cessation referral system. Learn more on how they can assist you at the CEH webpage.
Take a look at the ETR Store. We offer tobacco prevention materials that feature the latest updates on the epidemiology of tobacco-related disease, the prevalence of smoking and other tobacco use, and the risk factors related to tobacco use.
Watch our on-demand 3 in 30 webinars on How to Talk to Teens About Vaping and Youth-Led Substance Use Prevention, where guest experts deliver three tips in 30 minutes.
Tobacco Education Clearinghouse of California (TECC), a project of ETR, is a statewide technical assistance (TA) provider that supports the development and distribution of effective educational materials and social media messaging for California Department of Public Health (CDPH) and California Tobacco Prevention Program (CTPP) funded projects at no cost.
Communities Energized for Health (CEH) is a project of ETR that addresses exposure to secondhand smoke in rural areas of Northern California through meaningful partnerships with the communities.
