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Blawnox High-Rise Fire Caused By Cigarette  

Investigators say a fire in Blawnox that forced dozens of elderly residents of a high-rise to evacuate was caused by smoking.

Officials say a resident fell asleep while smoking a cigarette in a fifth-floor apartment.

Two years ago, a fire started in the same building because a tenant threw a cigarette in a wastebasket.

The Allegheny County Housing Authority is considering changing its policy.

"What we're going to do is send a survey out . . .

Aggazio says he spoke with evacuated residents at Hoboken Presbyterian Church.

"And I talked to smokers and non-smokers alike and it was very unanimous that they wish that we could ban smoking in the units," he said.

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Olathe Fire Victim Dies from Injuries  

75-year-old man critically injured in an Olathe duplex fire Saturday night as died from his injuries. When Olathe firefighters arrived at the duplex on Jan-Mar Drive in Olathe they were expecting a medical emergency, not a fire. . . .

"They believe he was smoking while he was wearing oxygen for a previous medical condition," said Keiter.

Emergency works said the victim had burns on 98 percent of his body. The man died Sunday from his injuries and firefighters said it's a tragic lesson others should take to heart.

"People who are on oxygen are probably on oxygen because of their history of smoking," said Keiter. "It's a hard habit to break, and they just don't realize the danger they put themselves into smoking and being on oxygen at the same time."

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• El Dorado Hills couple sues neighbor over cigarette smoke  

"In a senior community, you think we'll all be compatible and have the same values," said Richard Ganguet, a retired El Dorado County sheriff's deputy.

But three years after settling into their single-family home in El Dorado Hills' Four Seasons development, the Ganguets are suing their next-door neighbor over cigar and cigarette smoke they say wafts into their backyard and house.

Because of the smoke, the couple say, they no longer sit on their patio. They also try to sandwich in swims in the side-yard lap pool between their neighbors' smoking sessions.

Doug Smith, attorney for the neighboring homeowner, Florence Solone, said the issue is a trivial one that should be resolved by neighbors talking with each other, not with a lawsuit in El Dorado Superior Court.

But disputes between neighbors over secondhand smoke are increasingly making their way into courtrooms and city council chambers.

With smoking banned in workplaces, restaurants and bars, Californians are less willing to tolerate the smell of smoke in their houses or backyards, said Robin Salsburg, a staff attorney with the Oakland-based Public Health Institute's Public Health Law and Policy program.

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Age, Lifestyle Affect Cardiorespiratory Fitness  

Action Points

* Explain to interested patients that cardiorespiratory fitness declines throughout adulthood, but this decline accelerates if they are physically inactive, obese, or smokers.

* Also explain that the decline begins to increase rapidly after age 45.

After age 45, cardiorespiratory fitness declines at an accelerated rate and is independently influenced by body mass index (BMI), physical activity, and smoking, a longitudinal study confirmed. . . .

The analysis revealed that current smoking also was associated with lower cardiorespiratory fitness, with a decline of 0.29 METs in women (95% CI −40 to −0.19) and a decline of 0.41 METs in men (95% CI −0.44 to −0.38).

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WEB FIRST: Senior smokers out in the cold 

It's my way or the highway when it comes to smoking anywhere on Rota Villa property.

Evelyn Wilson, a Rota Villa resident, says a recent AGM resolution has forced smoking residents to stand out on the street if they want to smoke.

"I think it is terrible they have banned us to the highway," said Wilson of the resolution which forbids smokers to smoke anywhere on the property.

Wilson, a senior who has been a Rota Villa resident off and on for six years says that when she first moved to the seniors' housing complex smoking was accepted, even in the units. . . .

According to Plamondon, the board was caught between a rock and a hard place. "We have lots more residents who complain about the smoking, than those who complain about having to smoke off the property," Plamondon said.

In fact, said Plamondon, it was the residents who voted for the smoking resolution after having to endure cigarette smoke wafting through their open windows.

Plamondon said although the rule is now in place, the board is willing to listen to the smokers' concerns.

"They can write a letter.

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Mom's cigarette ignites oxygen supply; son charged 

A western Pennsylvania man has been charged with neglecting his disabled mother who weighed just 70 pounds when she died of burns caused when her cigarette caught her oxygen supply on fire.

Police say 53-year-old Rosemary McCurdy died Dec. 26 after suffering facial burns from a "flash fire." The woman had multiple sclerosis and had been bedridden for five years when she was burned Dec. 21.

Police say 22-year-old Victor McCurdy didn't take her to the hospital until five days after she was burned.

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VIDEO: Lit Cigarette Blamed For Fatal Assisted-Living Home Fire 

BRIDGEVILLE, Pa. --

The state fire marshal said a lit cigarette is to blame for a fire at an assisted living high-rise that killed an 86-year-old woman.

More than 100 senior citizens were evacuated Monday from the 11-story Bridgeville Towers at 479 Bank St.

Fire crews were called to the building shortly after 7 p.m. and found Dorothy Haskins burned inside a fourth-floor apartment, where the fire started.

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Careless smoking blamed in deadly fire  

Careless smoking is blamed for starting a fire that killed two elderly siblings in South Philadelphia.

Investigators released that finding on Wednesday. . . .

Once inside, the body of 68-year-old Madeline Hart was found on the first floor. The second victim, a 73-year-old Robert Ermilo, was found on the second floor. Paramedics attempted to resuscitate the man, but to no avail.

Neighbors say the victims were an elderly brother and sister. Ermilo had been caring for his sister, who suffers from osteoporosis and deteriorating eyesight.

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• Smoking And Heart Disease Risks Can Cut Life Span By 10 Years 

Middle aged men who smoke, have high blood pressure and raised cholesterol levels can expect a 10-15 year shorter life expectancy from age 50 compared with men without these risk factors.

The Oxford University study published in the British Medical Journal reports data from the Whitehall study, in which the health of 19,000 male civil servants has been followed for almost 40 years since 1970, when they were aged 40-69.

'We've shown that men at age 50 who smoke, have high blood pressure and high cholesterol levels can expect to survive to 74 years of age, while those who have none of these risk factors can expect to live until 83,' says Dr Robert Clarke of the Clinical Trial Service Unit at the University of Oxford, who led the research team. . . .

Dr Clarke says: 'The results give people another way of looking at heart disease risk factors that can be understood more readily. If you stop smoking or take measures to deal with high blood pressure or body weight, it will translate into increased life expectancy.

'It also provides support for existing public health policies. Bans on smoking in public places, efforts to lower saturated fats and salt, combined with medications for those at high risk of cardiovascular disease, when taken together will result in substantial improvements in life expectancy across the population.'

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Cigarette to blame for nursing home fire  

BOISE - Fire investigators said Sunday that an unattended cigarette is to blame for a second alarm fire at a local nursing home.

Investigators believe the cigarette belonged to a person visiting the home.

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VIDEO: How Do Social Behaviors Affect How We Age?  

Identical twins -- they come from around the country once a year to attend a festival of twins in Twinsburg, Ohio, just outside Cleveland.

For researchers, especially those studying how people age, having access to so many pairs of these genetic carbon copies is a scientific bonanza.

"We can compare the twins that have different social behaviors ... and see how those factors make a difference in their appearance," said Dr. Bahman Guyuron of University Hospital, Case Medical Center. Guyuron is the author of the study comparing 186 pairs of twins.

Many times there is a glaring difference reflected in the photos of twins. When comparing a pair of twin sisters, one who smokes and one who doesn't, for instance, the smoker has tiny, telltale vertical lines around her lips and longer, deeper wrinkles around her eyes.

"That's because smoking shrinks tiny blood vessels in the face so the skin is not being nourished," said Dr. Darrick Antell of St. Luke's Roosevelt Hospital and the author of one of the first twin studies. "Smoking dehydrates the skin so it's much drier."

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Hormone Therapy May Make Lung Cancer More Likely  

Taking a combination form of hormone replacement therapy, which includes both estrogen and progestin, increases a woman's risk for dying from lung cancer, a new study has found.

The finding stems from an analysis of data from the Women's Health Initiative trial on 16,608 postmenopausal women, aged 50 to 79, in the United States who had been randomly assigned to take either a once-daily tablet of 0.625 milligrams conjugated equine estrogen plus 2.5 mg medroxyprogesterone acetate or a placebo.

After eight years, 73 women taking the hormone therapy and 40 women in the placebo group had died of lung cancer. That meant, according to the researchers, that women who took the drug were 71 percent more likely to die from the disease . . .

The researchers urged that the findings "be incorporated into risk-benefit discussions with women considering combined hormone therapy, especially those with a high risk of lung cancer ... such as current smokers or long-term past smokers."

Dr. Apar Kishor Ganti, from the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, wrote in an accompanying editorial that "because the optimum safe duration of hormone-replacement therapy in terms of lung cancer survival is unclear, such therapy should probably be avoided in women at a high risk of developing lung cancer, especially those with a history of smoking."

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Life expectancy in relation to cardiovascular risk factors: 38 year follow-up of 19 000 men in the Whitehall study (PDF) 

WHAT IS ALREADY KNOWN ON THIS TOPIC

There has been uncertainty about the limits of life expectancy and the relevance of cardiovascular risk factors for prediction of life expectancy

WHAT THIS STUDY ADDS

Despite substantial variability within individuals in levels of cardiovascular risk factors, the presence of three major risk factors (smoking, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol concentration) recorded on a single occasion in middle aged men was associated with a 10 year shorter life span from age 50 (23.7 v 33.3 years) compared men with none of them

More extreme categorisation of these risk factors including BMI, diabetes mellitus/glucose intolerance, and employment grade was associated with a 15 year difference in life expectancy from age 50 (20.2 v 35.4 years)

Continued public health strategies to lower these risk factors could result in further improvements in life expectancy major risk factors throughout the population to achieve improvements in life expectancy.22 We have also shown that a greater proportion of older people in the UK are surviving to very old age. Continued public health strategies to lower mean levels of the three main cardiovascular risk factors, together with more intensive medical treatment for “high risk” sub- groups, including use of medication to lower blood pressure23 24 and cholesterol concentration,25 that have proved efficacy could result in further improve- ments in life expectancy.26

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Cigarettes and alcohol will take 10 years off your life 

Doctors have for the first time quantified the effect of the three major killers of middle-aged men: smoking, high blood pressure and high cholesterol. Men who smoke and fail to give up, or to control their blood pressure and cholesterol (where necessary) are sacrificing 10 to 15 years of their lives.

Results from the 40-year Whitehall study, landmark research into 19,000 civil servants begun in the late 1960s, shows that men who reached the age of 50 with all three risk factors lived on average to the age of 73, while those without any of the risks lived till 83. When other risks were included, such as diabetes and obesity, they found the least healthy lived until 70 on average, while the most healthy lived till 85.

Professor Peter Weissberg, medical director at the British Heart Foundation (BHF), which helped fund the research published in the British Medical Journal, said: "This important study puts a figure on the life-limiting effects of smoking, high blood pressure and high cholesterol. It provides a stark illustration of how these risk factors in middle age can reduce life expectancy."

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Middle-aged people could die 15 years earlier because of lifestyle, study says 

Middle-aged people who are overweight, smoke and have raised blood pressure and high cholesterol will die on average 15 years sooner than those without such problems, research suggests.

A study of 19,000 men has calculated the impact of different risk factors on life expectancy, and how many years are lost once a person is past the age of 50.

It concludes that a combination of smoking, high cholesterol and high blood pressure reduces life expectancy by ten years, while those with other added health worries, such as being overweight, may die 15 years earlier.

The research, published online in the British Medical Journal, comes as a report from the Care Quality Commission (CQC), the health regulator, suggests greater efforts to prevent cardiovascular disease.

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