[Occurrence of passive smoking in Denmark]

The occurrence of passive smoking in the adult population in Denmark has not been described previously. This article publishes data from three investigations all of which were carried out in 1987. One was an interview investigation of a random section of the Danish population carried out by the Danish Institute for Statistics and Social Research (n = 1,464), the second was an investigation in Glostrup and the third was an investigation of employees in the Danish Customs and Excise (n = 3,775). Despite differences in the formulation of the questions and populations, the three investigations showed consistent results as regards the occurrence of passive smoking among adult Danes. About 12% of non-smokers were exposed to passive smoking for at least eight hours and 40% for at least one hour daily. Altogether 73% were exposed to passive smoking daily. About one third of the non-smokers were inconvenienced by passive smoking at work and a corresponding fraction had taken steps to reduce the extent of passive smoking in their daily life.