Even a single cigarette butt carelessly thrown on the pavement can be fatal if it falls into the wrong hands.

 

A cigarette butt contains enough nicotine to kill a small child if swallowed. Unfortunately, smokers tend to carelessly drop their cigarette butts wherever they walk or stand. Very few people think about this habitual behaviour.

Young children put almost everything they find in their mouths because they are not yet aware of the dangers of their environment. A discarded cigarette butt can quickly be put in their mouth. If the carer does not act quickly enough to remove the foreign object from the child's mouth, the child can swallow the cigarette butt in a fraction of a second.