Health Effects of Exposure to Environmental Tobacco Smoke: Final Report

The Scientific Review Panel on Toxic Air Contaminants (Panel) reviewed the report, Proposed Identification of Environmental Tobacco Smoke as a Toxic Air Contaminant, prepared by the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) and the California Air Resources Board (ARB) of the California Environmental Protection Agency (Cal/EPA). This report, a comprehensive update of an earlier report first released in 1997 (Cal/EPA, 1997) and later published by the U.S. National Cancer Institute (NCI, 1999), describes the public’s exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) and its adverse effects on our health. The new research published since the 1997 report confirms and strengthens the conclusions of the original 1997 report and allows several new conclusions to be drawn.

The Children’s Environmental Health Protection Act of 1999 amended the toxic air contaminant statute to explicitly require consideration of any evidence on special susceptibilities of infants and children to the effects of candidate toxic air contaminants. The updated report fulfills this requirement.