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P & T and Secondhand Smoke

Sushi said:
So we need faith-based measures to protect us? If there is not strong enough evidence are we supposed to speculate?
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Well when the leap of faith is so small, yeah. It's up to you of course, you can keep breathing in something that appears to be having negative results... or you can say because the causation is not yet there I'm going to ignore all of that.
 
My view from Canada

Current federal government policy in Canada is to reduce the incidence of smoking among the Canadian population (15 years and older) to as low was possible--the slogan for the campaign is "Toward a smoke-free Canada." The primary motivation is reducing the enormous expense the smoking population incurs on our government funded healthcare system. Secondary motiviations include improving the overall health of Canadians, reducing sick days from work, and improving birth weights. (Dying of lung cancer or emphysema is not only expensive, it's incredibly unpleasant.)

The Canadian strategy is first to try to prevent people from taking up the habit. For those who are smokers, the strategy is to make cigarettes expensive and reduce the comfort level of smokers, in the hopes these will encourage them to quit. The government makes many printed materials available to people wanting to quit, but unfortunately does not supply funding to individuals for things like the patch.

Here is a link to a PDF document describing the Canadian program.

Where I live (Manitoba) the two major cities have gone non-smoking in all pubs and bars. I know of (only) one restaurant that lost enough clientele to go under; doubtless there were others. But most did not. Some bars have seen an increase in customers because people started attending who would never have done so before because of the smoke.

When the cities started musing about a smoking ban, the bar and restaurant trade went ballistic. Campaigns were mounted to stop the bylaws before they went to vote at council. Where did a lot of the FUD come from in the campaigns? Tobacco companies feeding stories to the restaurants.

People from Manitoba who travel to areas where smoking bans are not in effect comment on how (when they get back home) nice it is to be able to sit in a restaurant and not have to contend with other people's dirty habits.

Here's my take on the SHS issue: as a smoker, you have a right to abuse your body as you see fit. (I'm not in support of banning smoking; prohibition and the War on Drugs are sufficient proof that strategy will not work.) But you don't have a right to stink up my clothing, eliminate my enjoyment of my meal, or protentially cause an allergic reaction. If you want to stink up your own clothing and reduce your own taste experience, go right ahead. But not where you share airspace with me at a public establishment; do it in your own home.

I'm scared that someone will call for a ban on smoking at home because it will harm the children. That would be a nasty debate.
 
I'm scared that someone will call for a ban on smoking at home because it will harm the children. That would be a nasty debate.
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I think before we went that nazi over smoking there are some worse habits that need to be addressed.
 
There is no "safe" level of smoking.

There is not "magical" transformation of smoke whether it is inhaled directly or indirectly it is the same substance.

Second hand smoke exposure can be measured on urine tests.

A ban on second hand smoke in a small town in Montana or Wyoming was accompanied by a sharp drop in ER visits for chest pain/angina with a return to higher number of visits shortly after the ban was repealed...

And I still think all such bans of smoking on PRIVATE PROPERTY are WRONG....morally wrong. I have recently walked out of two restaurants because they were too smoky...I avoid Vegas for vacation because it is too smoky...I avoid sitting in casinos and bars for the same reason in Vegas. Vegas had a brief flirtation with non-smoking casinos---it failed...the market will determine these things though. In general I think businesses would cater to both smokers and nonsmokers if each made their economic pwer felt as they should...it is different now than it was and people will vote with their wallet. Call a restaurant..ask if they allow smoking...if they do...say sorry I am taking my business elsewhere...

When I flew out of TAM/LV I was going to rent a DVD player and movie -I wanted to rent The Aristocrats...but INMOTION movies said, sorry corporate decided we won't rent that movie...so I said, "well I could rent some other movie, but based on your corporate decision to ban that movie, I am not giving you any business whatsoever..." will it matter? who knows...but that is all the power I have and all that I should have.

Another Example--in my town it is a rare restaurant that does not offer FREE Refills on soft drinks...there was no law passed....it has just happened by sheer force of the market...now I am sure this policy raises the price of a beverage for those single serving drinkers or maybe even is spread around to non beverage items and costs non soft drinking customers...but this is what the market wants and it all came about without a law.

Smoking sucks, I hate it...but reducing freedom sucks way worse.
 
Blue Mountain said:
Current federal government policy in Canada is to reduce the incidence of smoking among the Canadian population (15 years and older) to as low was possible--the slogan for the campaign is "Toward a smoke-free Canada." The primary motivation is reducing the enormous expense the smoking population incurs on our government funded healthcare system.
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That's the usual claim, and it almost invariably rings hollow, due to the fact that a lot of non-smoking related programs are funded by cigarette taxes.

Since 1998, when Ballot Proposition 10 was passed, the California Children & Families Commission, aka "First 5 California" has been given control of over US$700 million a year in state tobacco excise revenue, all of which goes to programs aimed at children age 5 and under (hence "First 5"), including such things as "readiness for school" programs and "oral health care initiatives." Despite the fact that Medi-Cal is one of the more developed state health-care systems in the US, it seems it's not so burdened by smokers that it requires every cent of taxes raised on tobacco sales. The Netherlands used the revenue generated by a hike in cigarette taxes in the mid-1990s to fund increased security on public transport (including buses and trams, where you're not even allowed to smoke). In 2001, for every £1 the British National Health Service spent on treating smoking-related disorders, the Exchequer raised £3.60 from tobacco sales (in tobacco excise and VAT); British smokers aren't just paying for their own medical costs, they're paying for a fair chunk of everbody else's. According to one estimate, if everybody in the UK quit smoking, income taxes would have to be raised by 8% to make up for the budget shortfall.

The harsh fact is that cigarette taxes are convenient little earner for governments, with the added bonus that they can be jacked at short notice to cover shortfalls in the budget without too many people raising a fuss. That's why few government will ever take steps which would lead to smking being eradicated. If governments were serious about actually reducing smoking, they should try following Bhutan's example, where the sale of tobacco was banned entirely in 2004 (though not the possession; Bhutanese citizens are permitted to bring cigarettes into the country from abroad ofr personal use, but are charged 100% import duties).
Fun2BFree said:
A ban on second hand smoke in a small town in Montana or Wyoming was accompanied by a sharp drop in ER visits for chest pain/angina with a return to higher number of visits shortly after the ban was repealed...
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Ah yes, the infamous Stanton, Shepard and Glantz study regarding the city of Helena. The study went unpublished, though not unreported, for over a year, and its methodolgy and conclusions were subjected to severe criticism, even by scientists who heartily support smoking bans.
See letters to the editor of the BMJ by Geoffrey C. Kabat, epidemiologist and anti-smoker; and Brad Rodu, professor of pathology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
Or, as Jacob Sullum noted in Reason:
California's ban on smoking in workplaces took effect in 1995; it was extended to bars in 1998. Yet according to CDC data, the number of heart disease deaths in California did not drop substantially in either year. If smoking bans cut heart attacks in half, surely the effect would have shown up in these numbers.

Likewise, Delaware should see a sharp drop in heart attacks now that it has banned smoking in all workplaces. So should New York City, where a smoking ban took effect this month, and New York state, which recently passed a ban that takes effect in July. Ditto Boston, Chicago, Dallas, and Florida. Or is there something special about hearts in Helena?
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Euromutt said:
That's the usual claim, and it almost invariably rings hollow, due to the fact that a lot of non-smoking related programs are funded by cigarette taxes.
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A) All your counter claims are from California, the Netherlands and the British goverment. This is not an indication that this isn't true for Canada.

B) The actual claim for raising taxes was:
For those who are smokers, the strategy is to make cigarettes expensive and reduce the comfort level of smokers, in the hopes these will encourage them to quit.
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That claim doesn't say anything about using the increased taxes to pay for healthcare, it merely claims that making cigarette prices higher will reduce the number of smokers. For anecdotal evidence I would offer that my brother dropped smoking pretty quickly after New York's huge tax increase.

Of course claiming that eliminating smoking would force an income tax increase are unprovable. You could always increase other "sin" taxes too. Alcohol and gambling are probably prime targets.
 
Blue Mountain said:
The Canadian strategy is first to try to prevent people from taking up the habit. For those who are smokers, the strategy is to make cigarettes expensive and reduce the comfort level of smokers, in the hopes these will encourage them to quit.
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Because that's worked so well for the US...

The government makes many printed materials available to people wanting to quit, but unfortunately does not supply funding to individuals for things like the patch.
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Nor should they, IMO. If a person want's to quit, it's their responsibility to quit. Not the governments.

Some bars have seen an increase in customers because people started attending who would never have done so before because of the smoke.
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So what you're saying is that alcohol consumption went up once smoking decreased. Hmmmm..... (just kidding)


I'm scared that someone will call for a ban on smoking at home because it will harm the children. That would be a nasty debate.
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Oddly enough, though, I'd agree with that. At least for inside the home. Children don't have the ability to just up and leave the house whenever they want. And parents are ultimately responsible for the health and welfare of their children. Also, as the docs at Balboa take great pleasure in informing me everytime I see them, the younger a kid is, the more affected they are by the smoke. In my household, the smoker (me), goes outside to smoke, then takes a shower (or at least, changes shirts).

Marc
 
Smoking is gross. I live with a smoker and it's nasty. Sometimes he smokes while sitting at the computer in the bedroom where I have to sleep. I am very allergic to cigerette smoke. I usually tell him to go outside, but the only time he goes out there really is when I'm sick with the flu. Everytime he gets in the car he lights up like he can't drive without a cigerette in his fricking hand. GROSS>>>>I'm thinking about divorce. lololo
 
Rockin' Rick said:
Maybe we should ban incense?
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Well, incense is illegal in most northern states. I think you can marry and / or copulate with second cousins in the south, and I have seen some european websites where not only is it legal, but it seems to be the norm, and one can buy videos of this type of activity.

As far as smoking, I say let the market sort it out, until and unless the science shows exposure to second hand smoke is more dangerous then is other activities of daily living.
 
damn communist nazi big brother thought police

BAH

dont smoke if you dont want to

dont go where smokers are hanging out

you pitiful totalitarians are one of the big reasons the music biz is in the state its in right now
 
pipelineaudio said:
damn communist nazi big brother thought police

BAH

dont smoke if you dont want to

dont go where smokers are hanging out

you pitiful totalitarians are one of the big reasons the music biz is in the state its in right now
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Gee, you sure know how to push the buttons on this forum :)

I think I'll start carrying around a perfume mister full of skunk oil. Every time I catch a whiff of a cigarette, I'll give the smoker a couple of shots of the oil, so he can enjoy that for the rest of the day.

pipelineaudio said:
dont smoke if you dont want to
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There's more to smoking than the health risks. Your right to swing your arms ends where my nose begins. Should be the same for the foul odour of cigarettes, too.

pipelineaudio said:
dont go where smokers are hanging out
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Like restaurants, movie theatres, shopping malls, public sidewalks, parks ... ?

Like the smoker I saw who discarded her lit cigarette into healthy green grass where children were running around barefoot? Then chewed me out when I pointed this out to her?

There's rights, then there's courtesy. Smokers seem to forget that all too often.
 
ponderingturtle said:
Wearing perfume in public should be illegal to by that logic.
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There are already campaigns underway by people sensitive to perfume to reduce the amount of perfume and cologne they encounter on a daily basis.

Where I live smoking is banned in all indoor public places, including restaurants and bars. Makes going to them much more pleasant. Some people have even started talking about banning smoking in outdoor public places, too. We'll be a while getting there, though.

In my opinion, the smoking of cigarettes should be strongly discouraged pretty much everywhere, every time. Not banned, though; look how effecive drug prohibition has been on reducing the consumption of marijuana (not!). Therefore, I'm not in favour of prohibiting people from smoking in the privacy of their own homes or back yards.

But keep your filthy stinking habit away from my nostrils and my clothes. It does you no good and does me no good. I see no reason why I should have to suffer while you're paying a megacorporation to send you to an early grave on a slave ship.
 
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