Scientific Claims

Comments on their scientific claims

The Claim: Smoking Bans lower the amount of hospital admissions for hearts attacks (AMIs)

The Truth:

Dr. Michael Siegel, Professor in the Department of Community Health Sciences, Boston University School of Public Health thoroughly analyzed a series of anti-smoking studies that have spread like bad weed over the last few of years in unsuccessful attempts to prove that smoking bans have immediate effects in reducing heart attacks. The conclusions of these studies were extremely important to the anti-tobacco industry because they would have supported their no safe level of tobacco smoke mantra and the benefits of smoking bans. Each and every study failed miserably to support the conclusion that smoking bans lower the number of heart attacks, yet they are continuously used as a propaganda tool to convince politicians and the public that economic losses and social havoc the bans have caused anywhere they were implemented are all worth it

• Prominent Tobacco Control Researcher Cautions CDC that Helena Study Should Not Be Used to Conclude that Smoking Bans Immediately Reduce Heart Attacks

• CDC: Pueblo Smoking Ban Reduced Heart Attacks by 41%, Due Mostly to Decreased Secondhand Smoke Exposure; But Conclusions are Biased and Invalid

• More Shoddy Science: First Helena, Then Pueblo, Now Saskatoon

• New Study Concludes that Bowling Green Smoking Ban Reduced Heart Disease Admissions by 47%; Unfortunately, Science is Weak and Conclusions Unjustified

• Piedmont Italy Study Becomes the Latest in a String of Junk Science Papers on Effects of Smoking Bans on Heart Attack Admissions

• French Heart Attack Conclusions are Based on One Data Point; Stroke Admissions Increased After Smoke-Free Bar Law; Shoddy Science Exposed

• News Article Invokes Smoking Ban as Major Cause of 49% Decline in Heart Attack Admissions in North Cumbria; Junk Science on this Issue Running Rampant

• Official Data Show No Effect of England's Smoking Ban on Heart Attack Admissions During First Nine Months

• Study Attributes Fall in Cardiovascular Admissions in Toronto to Smoking Ban and Decrease in Secondhand Smoke Exposure, But Methods are Faulty

The Claim: Smoking Bans lower the amount of smokers in a country

The Truth:

While it is true that reasonable public health campaigns against smoking did well in lowering the number of smokers, they stopped being effective the day they became a ruthless war against smokers themselves. Very few people like to be bullied and shamed into compliance for the betterment of the collective we and this is exactly what public health has been doing to smokers in the last decade through smoking bans and other extreme campaigns and policies. The unintended, albeit predictable, consequences are that smoking rates have been more or less stagnating and even increasing [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] in most countries ever since public health went from respectfully educating the people to brow-beating them into complying with its dictates.

The Claim: Smoking Bans cause no damage to the hospitality industry

The Truth:

In reality, government-mandated smoking bans have significant damaging impact upon the hospitality industry. The type and amount of impact differ from one segment of the industry to another, but all will feel a negative influence from such government interference in their free commerce. Antismoking advocates argue that such bans are both good and necessary, despite any negative impact, because of a significant negative impact to the health and safety of workers who are "forced" to work in environments where people are smoking.

We will look at two aspects of this argument: (A) the "forced to trade their health for a paycheck" argument; and (B) the evidence of health effects from the levels of normal exposure itself.

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(A) *FORCED TO WORK*

Antismoking advocacy groups will almost always show up at legislative hearings with a model young mother (preferably widowed) with young children who works as a waitress, bartender, or hotel/casino employee. To emphasize the point of the vulnerability of the person and their family the children may, if old enough, be present in the legislative chambers, or, if not old enough for that, then a blown-up photo of the mom and her kids will be displayed.

The testifier will note that this job is the ONLY job available to her for various reasons and that she is distressed because it will likely soon kill her and leave her children as orphans simply because she needs to earn money to feed them. In reality of course, there are usually many waitress type jobs available in voluntarily non-smoking establishments and at least a modest selection of bartending jobs also so available. No one is "forced" to work at one of these jobs in a Free-Choice job atmosphere long enough to have any legitimate health concerns even if the claims of the disputed EPA Report were valid {as will be discussed further in Section (B)}

The job limitation problem may be somewhat more valid in two cases:

First, if the job is at a casino. There is usually not as wide a selection of job opportunities in voluntarily smoke-banned casino facilities since the impact of banning smoking is so extreme in the casino setting and since there are usually a very limited number of casinos within commuting distance of anyone seeking employment. Additionally the worker may claim that the high pay available at a casino is necessary for the welfare of her children. HOWEVER: given the movement within the casino industry to voluntarily designate significant amounts of their floor space as non-smoking, and the likelihood that most work managers will seek to allocate their work resources in ways that reduce the tensions and concerns of their employees, it is unlikely that there would be many instances of objecting employees being "forced" to work in smoky conditions.

Second, if the hospitality job is in a small town with only one or two bars, restaurants, or diners, it is possible that work options would be limited and that the available jobs are all in Free-Choice smoking environments. This sort of situation is rare enough that it should be considered in the same light as jobs "forcing" employees to work in a situation servicing customers outdoors under the sun. Yes, there will be some cases where employees may object to being forced to risk malignant melanomas from such employment and who feel that the "partial protection" provided by awnings or sunscreen are not adequate to their desires or needs (the "needs" come into real play in the case of individuals suffering various degrees of xeroderma pigmentosum or milder sun sensitivities); but such situations, just as the "forced" smoking situations, are rare enough that blanket legislation is a poor choice of remedy.

(B) *HEALTH RISKS OF WORK EXPOSURE*