Passive smoke 'slows healing process'

Smoke-filled bars could be damaging your skin's ability to heal, scientists have found.

Researchers at the University of California, Riverside have found that breathing second-hand smoke reduces the speed at which wounds heal, allowing scars to form more easily.

The move comes as fresh calls are made to ban smoking in pubs across Britain.

Amanda Sanford of anti-smoking group Ash said: "This is just more evidence pointing to the fact we need to ban smoking in public places and workplac e s. We ' ve known smokers are affected but the extent of the damage to passive smokers hadn't been quantified before. Something needs to be done to protect non-smokers."

The study, which is published in the journal BMC Cell Biology this week, found that when healing cells in the skin called fibroblasts are exposed to smoke, they are unable to move quickly to a cut to heal it.

When the researchers added a solution containing the components of second-hand smoke to fibroblast cells, they separated from one another.

In second-hand smoke, many components are more concentrated than in first-hand smoke. Nicotine, tar, nitric oxide and carbon monoxide levels are at least twice as high as those the smoker inhales.