Letter: The sins of the smokers ...

Sir: If "living with a heavy smoker more than doubles your risk of heart attacks" (report, 28 August), maybe the increased incidence of heart disease among the middle-aged, about which we hear so much, is partly attributable to childhoods lived with heavily smoking parents.

I have seen no references to research into whether or not the effects of passive smoking during childhood are discernible in the health now of those who were brought up in the 1940s and 1950s, when the wartime stress and post-war food rationing turned many parents into heavy smokers. It would be interesting to know.

JANET GODDEN

Oxford