New Delhi: People who are exposed to second-hand smoke may face the risk of developing fractures, says a new study.
Researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health studied over 14,000 men and pre- and post-menopausal women in rural China and measured their hipbone mineral density and recorded non-spine fractures and smoking history, reported the online edition of BBC News.
Pre-menopausal non-smoking women who lived with a smoker had more than double the risk of osteoporosis compared to those who lived with a non-smoker.
Osteoporosis is a disease that makes bones prone to fractures. It affects one in three women and one in 12 men, is responsible for 200,000 broken bones per year and 40 deaths a day in Britain
Although it is thought of as an old age disease, its roots are believed to lie in adolescence.
Further, those who lived with two or more smokers were found to have a threefold greater risk of the condition. They also had a 2.6 times greater risk for a non-spine fracture, compared to those not exposed to smoking, the study said.
A separate study by researchers at the Gothenburg University studied 1,000 men aged between 18 and 20-years-old.
It was found that the bone density in the spine, hip, and body as a whole of smokers was lower than that of the non-smokers.
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