Dr. Erik Steele’s Channel 5 News discussion of teen-agers’ sleep habits on April 23 did not tell the whole story.

Children who live with parents who smoke in their homes are breathing massive amounts of toxic pollution, which makes them drowsy and lethargic, and brings on headaches.

Federal standards allow somewhere between zero and 100 parts per million of carbon monoxide as tolerable, but tobacco smoke contains 42,000 parts per million. Bigger kids who don’t smoke probably stay out of those homes as much as possible. Schoolchildren cannot think clearly enough in that atmosphere to do their homework properly, and feel less like doing it. Chemically impaired children in those homes are apt to sleep longer and be harder to wake up.

Ray Perkins Jr.

Founder and president Mid-Coast Maine Promotion

“For Clean Indoor Air”

Waldoboro