Second-hand smoke causes lung cancer, too

• "He didn't die from a bomb or a bullet," said Dr. Fadlo Khuri, a lung cancer specialist and professor at Emory University's Winship Cancer Institute.
• The Aug. 7 death of one of America's most urbane, sophisticated news anchors at age 67 from lung cancer came with a sad lesson: People who appear to be on top of the world get lung cancer from smoking, and most of them die from it.
• Dana Reeve, wife of the late Christopher Reeve, revealed she has lung cancer.
• Researchers think second-hand smoke could be to blame.
• They say more studies are needed, but sufficient funds are not available because this devastating disease, often associated with smoking, has become stigmatized.
• While cigarette smoking is implicated in about 85 percent of all lung cancers, Garst and others said they do not think that patients with lung cancer should be blamed for having an addiction, especially one that many acquired before they knew of the dangers of cigarettes.
• In the vast majority of cases, the disease has spread to other parts of the body before X-rays pick up malignant growths in the lungs.
• And while a major national study is under way to determine whether a three-dimensional CT scan might be a good diagnostic tool, the American Cancer Society and many lung cancer specialists do not recommend the scan for routine screening yet.
• Lung cancer is actually a group of diseases in which the genes of the cells in the lung are damaged, explained Dr. Michael Thun, an epidemiologist and vice president of the American Cancer Society.
• Doctors group lung cancer into two broad types --- one that has very small but very fast-growing cells and others that are not as fast growing.
• Second-hand smoke inhaled from households in which a parent or spouse smokes may be one factor.