Some people said that smoking wasn't that bad for you, years ago (advertisements used to claim that doctors said that one particular brand of gaspers actually benefited people with respiratory problems…remember
Not a cough in a carload?). That's been debunked pretty thoroughly, and even the cancer stick manufacturers now admit that smoking causes lots of health problems in the majority of people who indulge.
Then the dangers of second-hand smoke came to the fore, and in many countries and jurisdictions smoking was banned in indoor public spaces such as offices, bars and pubs, restaurants, and the like. Smokers were banished outside to puff away and annoy passers-by from their doorways and alleys. David Hockney, the artist, has railed against anti-smoking legislation, denying (from the wisdom of his medical degree, presumably) that second-hand smoke is dangerous at all.
But now, scientists have found that
the clothing and hair of smokers actually can leach nicotine into the walls, carpets, and furniture of their indoor refuges when the smokers return, coughing, to resume toiling for their benevolent employers. This is referred to as "third-hand smoke".
Well, rubbing my hands together gleefully, now it seems that smokers will have to be decontaminated in special chambers before they return from their puffing sessions outside.
