Smokefree Homes

Smokefree Homes is a project that aims to promote healthier homes across Northamptonshire. In the last few years the Smokefree Homes project has been delivered to thirteen schools in the borough of Wellingborough, in which 850 ten and eleven year olds were involved. The project raises awareness of the dangers of second hand smoke to young people. Second hand smoke can affect children more than it affects adults as children have smaller lungs which causes them to breath faster, therefore they breath in more second hand smoke.

 

Tobacco smoke contains over 4,000 chemicals, many of these are poisonous, some radioactive, and 50 of these are known to cause cancer. Dogs are also 50% more likely to get lung cancer if their owner smokes in the home. The project encourages families to look at making the home smokefree or certain rooms smokefree in order to protect young people from the effects of second hand smoke. There are three different pledges parents or guardians, relatives and friends can make, these include:

 

• Gold Pledge - A pledge to make the home and car (if owned) smokefree at all times

•  Silver Pledge - A pledge to only smoke/allow smoking in one well ventilated room in the home

• Bronze Pledge - A pledge to make at least one room in the home smokefree
  

The programme has been set up as a partnership project between the Borough Council of Wellingborough and the Fire and Rescue Service.