to knock and tell my neighbours what dirty, smelly, filthy, smoking bastards they are?

[VinegarTits]

because my 3yr has been up all night long coughing and i am permanently wheezing (asthma) because they smoke so much my house smells like a fucking ashtray, seriously, the smell is so strong it knocks you out

Fucking sick of it, sick of wheezing, and sick of waking up to the taste of cigarette smoke in my mouth [angry)

Could the dregs of smoke from another house actually cause all night coughing and wheezing? Genuine question.

I mean, I assume there is a point where you will still be able to smell the smell but not taking anything into your lungs iyswim?

There is nothing worse. You live on tenterhooks waiting for the next disruption to your life about which you can do nothing. We moved away from neighbours that sounded much like expats. The one good thing about the hellish experience is that when you do move away you appreciate every single day the peace and calm and having quiet gentle retired doctors next door who make you jam.

"Passive smokers have to live with someone who smokes over 20 daily for over 20 years in order to run any sort of risk"

The thing is, it only takes one carcinogenic particle to cause one mutation in the DNA of one cell, and voila, you have cancer.

The more smoke you are exposed to, the more likely it is that you will develop cancer, but equally, one single particle of cigarette smoke can cause it.

There is no such thing as a 'safe' exposure to smoke.

If you can smell it, the it's going past your nose into your lungs.

I think it's reasonable to suggest smelling smoke could exacerbate asthma.

Precisely how a bad temper (if VT does have a bad temper and there's nothing to suggest that she has) exacerbates asthma, I wouldn't know.

Yes, I guess my question is - if you're smelling the smoke then are you being exposed to the toxins (I realise in close proximity, yes), is there a point where all you're exposed to is a residual aroma?
Or is the presence of the smell definitely indicative of presence of the toxins?

I am sure you have a case for environmental health.

JV - just tried googling on it - but I came up with a load of websites that I'm not sure I'd trust for impartial advice iykwim "raisesmokefreekids" etc

am sure with a bit of proper googling could find the answer out there somewhere.

Just posting quickly as got to run, but I had same problem.

Communal area was enclosed, and the other residents smoke was stinking my flat out, it must have been seeping through my letterbox, and was wafting in from communal area when I opened my front door.

I got legal advice and was told that it was the responsibility of my landlord to prevent noxious fumes from entering my home so I could live in peace, or something along those lines.

Landlord agreed to put up 'No Smoking' signs, but admitted they were not prepared to uphold the signs, as this would mean installing CCTV camera's to catch the culprits who were walking through the communal area smoking, and take steps against those individuals.

Suffice to say I was not happy with this, as it seemed to be a smokescreen (excuse the pun) and I was put on the transfer list for a house.

I have now been living smoke free in my house for a few years.

Incidentally, the landlord has now deemed all communal areas to be smokefree under the ban on smoking in a workplace (cleaners would come to hoover and clean the communal area's), but I was allocated my house before they were prepared to take this step.

oh i am pissing myself laughing about the suggestion that it could be my bad temper exacerbating my asthma

Yes i have a fiery temper indeed, but only when i am seriously provoked and have never had to use my inhaler after an outburst

However, in the last year (since smelly bastards moved in) i have had to use my inhaler more often, and in the last 6 months it has been every day, well every night, i go to bed wheezing and i wake up during the night wheezing

I have to add that i never have to use it during the daytime when i am out of the house

but thanks for making me at your ludicrous suggestion

Mumsnetters never let the facts get in the way of a good thread - no wonder the Mail lerve you so deep.

At no point has anyone on this thread - inc me - claimed passive smoking is harmless.

I pointed out that I don't know (and wasn't prepared to pay to access research databases online, which GPs get free) how you measure the risk to non-smokers by proximity of exposure to secondhand smoke. All the studies I can see refer the effects on non-smokers in their homes, workplaces, instututions - not the home next door, the office in the next building, an institution up the road.

Just wondering, because if this type of risk-assessment existed it would help the OP.

Must get back to work - Philip Morris needs me.

I can sympathize with you we lived above a couple like this a few years ago. It stank and I hated lying in bed being able to taste the smoke eww. Opening windows did nothing to help. In the end we moved, we just couldnt bear bringing our baby home to that - they had a baby too god knows what his lungs look like now.

sweetnsour the point is the smoke from next door is GETTING INTO THE OP'S HOUSE.

I haven't read all the thread but if actually smoke is coming in to your house, is there a fire risk?

Have you tried extractors?

I think you could have made the same point Sweet in an altogether less confrontational manner and it would have been received quite well.

So are you not a mumsnetter, as well?

I have even wondered if my nieghbour is living in my house during the day instead of his own

You mean like if he gets pissed and passes out while having a ciggie, sets his house on fire and burns my down too FAB?

Well, that as well but I was thinking of sparks from the cigarettes.

Who cares whether the smoke is a health issue or not?? It's just bloody horrible and unpleasant. I don't want my house to stink of fags any more than I want it to stink of raw sewage, or cooking fat. If you can take action against a restaurant for pumping stinky fumes into your house (and I think you can), why isn't it enough that the OP doesn't like the stink of fags? If it's a health issue then maybe that means the action should be more urgent or whatever, but I think the key point is that the neighbours' actions are affecting the OP's enjoyment of her own property.

Housing assns have rules about assessing fitness to occupy, which may mention things like this, VT. If I were you I would:

1. download the HMO questionnaire from the Internet (search under HMO questionnaire; takes forever, but you will eventually access the assessment paperwork councils themselves. Bone up on relevant terms.)

1. Go and see the doctor and discuss. Email the council (not the housing assn) and ask for an appt from a housing officer. Don't be fobbed off. Don't go and see them - get them into your house so they can smell the problem. (They usually do visits.)

1. List to them your increasing health problems that you believe have come about because of the smoke. State that you can't prove it was the smoke (maybe not mention Mumsnet at this point), but you really believe it can't be anything else.

Press list of health issues into hands of housing officer. Supply any info from doc too. Ask housing officer to help you & if they can prove it was the smoke and what their policies are. They may tell you that they have a policy that covers this regardless of proof. Housing person should then write to you saying something helpful.

1. Tackle housing assn with nice folder of paperwork.

Sorry if I was annoying - looking back now I evidently needed a ciggie.

Complain to the HA, complain to the council, complain some more and keep complaining until they do something.

Tis the squeaky wheel that gets the oil

Thankyou sweetandsour (good name so it seems )

I will look into that

Not good VT - it must be driving you batty. There is nothing worse than the smell of stale fag smoke indoors - and I say that as a social smoker (I am one of those annoying twats who 'borrows' a fag when out for a drink).

I have no idea re practical advice, all would say is contact the HA because surely there should not be ingress between one house and another. Surelyu that is an insulation problem.

I think ever since the ban on smoking in public places smoking is gradually seen as a less and less acceptable practice wherever you are. Which can only be a good thing.

Expat - is that in your new flat? Am so sad for you that you had all that crap re finding a place to live last year, and now you have got one you are near aresholes.