There is apparently an article in the July 1999 issue of the Archives of
Pediatric and Adolescent
Medicine (APAM) entitled 'Breast-feeding and Environmental Tobacco Smoke
Exposure' by Allan B. Becker et al. I have not seen it (yet) but I am told
the APAM editor Dr. Catherine D. DeAngelis adds the following comment at the
beginning of the report: "I hope no one interprets this study as a reason to
discourage breast-feeding among mothers who smoke. It is better to use the
study to convince mothers who breast-feed to not smoke."

I have been asked by a pro-breastfeeding colleague who works in
environmental health if I can track down any references which allow an
approximation to be made between the number of cigarettes smoked by a
pregnant woman and the amount of tobacco toxins her baby might receive. For
example, a women who smoked 10 cigarettes a day during her say 40 week
pregnancy would smoke a total of 2,800 cigarettes.

Has anyone seen an estimate of what the baby's exposure would have been,
perhaps based on carboxyhaemaglobin levels in the blood, nicotine/cotinine
or some other marker, and expressed as cigarette equivalents?

If anyone can help, please email me privately as well as to Lactnet, as I am
flat out organising the IBLCE exam in my region and getting ready to escape
to see you all in Scottsdale at the end of the month. Yeah!

Ros Escott BAppSc IBCLC
Tasmania, Australia
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