You should think about protecting your pets from secondhand smoke. According to researchers at Oklahoma State University, secondhand smoke has been determined cancer-causing for household pets, such as dogs, cats, and birds

"There have been a number of scientific papers recently that have reported the significant health threat secondhand smoke poses to pets," says Dr. Carolynn MacAllister, an Oklahoma State University Cooperative Extension Service veterinarian. "Secondhand smoke has been associated with oral cancer and lymphoma in cats, lung and nasal cancer in dogs, as well as lung cancer in birds."

The news about smoking just keeps getting worse and worse. When we will get the hint?

It seems these days like killer toxins are lurking in every corner of your home, office or school. Here's another finding to fuel your paranoia -- a fire retardant used in many couches called PBDE has been linked to lots of problems, including cancer and autism in children. While PBDEs aren't used in sofas any more, chances are you have an older sofa in your house -- I know I do. What's more, a different fire retardant chemical, called Tris, is replacing PBDEs in furniture, and it's been shown to be just as deadly.

What can we do, aside from building our own furniture, to escape the onslaught of harmful toxins in our home? Or is it something we should even be concerned about in the first place?

Don Herbert, also known as television's science teacher Mr.Wizard, died at his home Tuesday of bone cancer. He was 89.

Mr. Wizard's target audience was kids (baby boomers: you may already know this) and his lessons taught youngsters to use the thinking skills of scientists through workshop experiments using simple household items. His 1950s series Watch Mr. Wizard was so good it won a Peabody Award in 1954, and Herbert was one of David Letterman' first guests when the show Late Night With David Letterman debuted in 1982. Herbert's show made it to Nickelodeon too and ran from 1983 to 1991. Reruns were shown until 2000. Nickelodeon's Mr. Wizard episodes are available here.

A native of Waconia, Minnesota, Herbert graduated from LaCrosse State Teachers College in 1940; served as a U.S. Army Air Corps pilot during World War II; and worked as an actor, model, and radio writer before reaching fame on Mr. Wizard in Chicago -- and then New York -- on NBC.

He is survived by six children and stepchildren and by his second wife, Norma.

Nearly a decade ago, women in Long Island began to worry about their high rates of breast cancer. So they advocated and lobbied and pushed until a public law was passed that allowed for the creation of the Long Island Breast Cancer Project. Funded by both the National Cancer Institute and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, great data has emerged from this project -- like the data linking breast cancer and household pesticides.

Although much research has linked cancer with pesticides in work and industrial settings, few studies have investigated what these chemicals can do in households -- until now, thanks to research conducted as part of The Long Island Breast Cancer Project.

Published online in the December 13 American Journal of Epidemiology, researchers found an association between lifetime residential pesticide use and breast cancer risk in a sample of 1,508 Long Island women diagnosed with breast cancer between 1996 and 1997. These women were compared to 1,556 random controls. All women were asked to self-report their pesticide exposure and to offer blood samples for the study of organochlorine compound levels -- found in lawn and garden products.

As expected, researchers found an increased breast cancer risk for women whose blood samples showed the highest levels of organochlorine compounds. They also found it hard to find women who did not use lawn and garden pesticides to some degree.

Use of household pesticides has infiltrated our society, says researcher Susan Teitelbaum, assistant professor in the department of community medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, who reports she is happy to see a movement toward use of alternative methods, like integrated pest management.

Teitelbaum has just one recommendation as result of this study. It's quite simple really -- stop using pesticides.

When Robin Levin's healthy and athletic sister whose diet consisted of organic food loaded with good nutrition was diagnosed with breast cancer, Levin wondered how that was possible when they had no family history or lifestyle risks for breast cancer. Levin began to do research and found evidence that environmental pollutants and chemical toxins in the home can increase a woman's risk for breast cancer.

Based in part on Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) studies that have found the air in homes is two to five times more chemically polluted than outdoor air, and
The Breast Cancer Fund report that stated 50 percent of breast cancer cases are the result of pollutants in the environment, Levin set out to find safer chemical-free products.

The search was not as simple as Levin might have thought, as she found many of the natural cleaners on the market still use synthetic chemicals for colorants and small amounts of ammonia and harsh additives. She came to the conclusion the only way to be certain of the ingredients in a product is to make them yourself from scratch.

ECO-Me is Levine's company, and Eco-Me Home Cleaning Starter Kit is the product she is hoping will make a difference in reducing cancer risks. Levin donates part of the profits from the sale of her kits to The Breast Cancer Fund and Cancer 101. To learn more about Eco-Me, read information in Eco-tips and Eco-news, the company has a website here.

As American consumers, I think we have been living with a false sense of security when it comes to the products  we buy at the store. For decades, we have been sold smells like the real thing but it's not household cleaners that make everything in our home cleaner-than-clean, and have gone on the assumption that if the product is on the store shelf it must be safe.

However, independent investigations into chemical industry practices, and the government's current regulatory practices to insuring consumer safety, have revealed we have not been nearly as safe as once thought.

Dr. Samuel Epstein hasn't made many friends in the Canadian and American Cancer Societies or with the federal government because he has been a publicly vocal critic to what he believes is their complete lack of attention to the every day cancer risks that each of us encounter in life. His criticism is justified.

Dr. Epstein, who teaches environmental and occupational medicine at the University of Illinois, wants us to know that we are exposed to cancer-causing chemicals when we shampoo our hair, put on makeup, tidy the house, control garden pests, in how we store our food -- and in the food we eat.