Secondhand smoke

Information to counter the self-righteous weenies who want to outlaw smoking.

Silly laws     Silly research     Overreactions     Counterintelligence     Weird & stupid

Silly laws

University bans all tobacco use - May 18, 2012

"Starting in summer 2013, anxious Cal State Fullerton students wanting to puff a post-final exam cigarette will have to leave campus to do it. This week, the university's interim president signed an order banning use of all forms of tobacco on campus, the first school in the California State University system to do so. The ban will take effect in August next year..."

NY law would identify buildings with smokers - April 18, 2012

"Bloomberg said this would give potential renters the chance to choose a smoke-free environment, free from wafts of cigarette smoke from other apartments. “Smoking kills and people have the right to know if they are going to be exposed to secondhand smoke,” Bloomberg said."

Calif. city to ban smoking in all apartments - March 22, 2012

"You’ve heard the saying smoke ‘em if you got ‘em. But if you got ‘em and you live in an apartment complex in Elk Grove, the luxury of lighting up may soon go up in smoke. “I think it’s a pretty good idea,” one apartment resident said. He’s talking about the possibility of banning smoking in all apartment complexes in the city."

Calif. city to ban smoking OUTSIDE - February 24, 2012

"A Rocklin resident has asked the City Council to consider a ban on smoking that some say goes way too far. The Rocklin City Council was asked to consider making it against the law for smokers to smoke anywhere outside on their property."

Minnesota county bans smoking ANYWHERE - February 21, 2011

"The most populous county in Minnesota is planning to prohibit smoking on any county property, even if smokers are in their own cars."

Proposed smoking ban in Boston parks - February 9, 2011

"Two Boston city councilors are considering a proposal that would ban smoking in public parks and beaches in the city."

Great Neck bans smoking on public sidewalks - January 6, 2011

"A village on Long Island's "gold coast" is banning smoking on public sidewalks in front of businesses. Violators could face a $1,000 fine."

Bloomberg bans smoking in parks & beaches - September 16, 2010

"Mayor Bloomberg wants to ban smoking in parks, beaches and even the heart of Times Square - and New Yorkers who puff are in a huff."

Should the FDA ban menthol cigarettes? - September 10, 2010

"Once again, we have the federal government acting as nanny rather than allowing adults to make their own decisions."

New York City wants to ban smoking in parks - September 14, 2009

""We don't think it's too far to say that people shouldn't be smoking in parks," Health Commissioner Tom Farley said Monday."

New Jersey town bans smoking on the beach - August 11, 2009

"Nonsmokers complained to the town that, even more than blaring radios and tourists feeding seagulls, the thing most likely to ruin their beach day was secondhand smoke polluting the otherwise refreshing sea breeze..."

Silly research

Researchers concerned about ‘thirdhand smoke’ - February 8, 2011

"You’ve heard of the damaging health effects of smoking and secondhand smoke. But what happens when the smoke settles? According to scientists, smoke literally sticks around for a while, as something they are calling “thirdhand smoke.""

Federal grant to study 'thirdhand smoke' - 2010

"Initial Award Abstract: Today, approximately 2 billion smokers worldwide pose a constant threat of direct/indirect exposure to nearly 4 billion nonsmokers. Secondhand smoke (SHS) consists of several thousand individual chemicals produced mainly by the smoke from the burning tip of cigarettes between puffs (sidestream smoke, SSS) and the smoke exhaled by the smoker (mainstream smoke, MSS). Recently, exposure to thirdhand smoke (THS) - the aged SHS that is adsorbed onto surfaces, where it undergoes chemical transformation, and re-enters the indoor environment, has become a public health concern..."

Surgeon General's report - December 10, 2010

"The new Surgeon General’s Report, or at least the spin it’s being given in the press, can be summed up nicely in a single word: Nonsense. Why? Simple: The Report, despite its 700 pages of largely well-done science, takes that science and then distorts it to support two ulterior goals:"

Maternal smoking causes criminal offspring - May 13, 2010

"The association between MSP and adult criminal offending remained after controlling for propensity scores. Offspring of mothers who smoked heavily during pregnancy... had the greatest odds of an adult arrest record... Findings also suggest that MSP may be an independent risk factor for adult criminal histories marked by multiple arrests."

Potential thirdhand smoke hazards - January 6, 2010

"This study shows that residual nicotine from tobacco smoke sorbed to indoor surfaces reacts with ambient nitrous acid (HONO) to form carcinogenic tobacco-specific nitrosamines (TSNAs)."

The myth of the smoking ban ‘miracle’ - September 24, 2009

"Tales of heart attacks being ‘slashed’ by smoking bans have appeared with such regularity in recent years that it is easy to forget that there is a conspicuous lack of reliable evidence to support them." [More here and here.]

Lies, damned lies, & 400,000 smoke-related deaths - 1998

"Diseases are categorized as smoking-related if the risk of death for smokers exceeds that for nonsmokers. In the jargon of epidemiology, a relative risk that is greater than 1 indicates a connection between exposure (smoking) and effect (death). Recall, however, the National Cancer Institute’s guideline: “Relative risks of less than two are considered small. . . . Such increases may be due to chance, statistical bias, or effects of confounding factors that are sometimes not evident.”"

EPA's famous secondhand smoke study - 1992

"In December of 1992 the EPA released it's now famous report on second hand smoke. The report claimed that SHS causes 3,000 deaths a year, and classified it as a class A carcinogen. Note: Although the official date of this report is December, 1992, it is commonly referred to as the EPA '93 study, probably because it became widely available in '93. This was, and remains, a powerful weapon in the anti-smokers arsenal. If a smoker is only hurting himself, he can argue that it's no one else's business. But if he is hurting everyone around him, all kinds of restrictive legislation can be justified. Did this study show SHS is deadly? Let's examine the facts carefully."

Overreactions

Compnay won't hire people exposed to smoke - February 12, 2011

"Franciscan spokesman Gale Robinette said the company will add a tobacco-detecting urine test to its post-job-offer drug test beginning March 1. That test can detect tobacco use from cigarettes, cigars, chewing tobacco, snus and snuff and even from nicotine patches and heavy second-hand smoke. If tobacco is detected in the prospective employee’s system – no matter whether that tobacco comes from living with smokers or using a nicotine patch – the person won’t be hired, said the health system."

Second-hand smoke lawsuit against Wynn - October 13, 2010

"A Wynn employee's lawsuit, accusing the resort of creating an unsafe work environment due to second-hand smoke, can go forward and seek class-action status, an attorney for the Wynn dealer announced Wednesday. Senior Nevada U.S. District Court Judge Lloyd George denied a motion by Wynn Resorts' attorneys to dismiss the complaint filed by Wynn dealer Kanie Kastroll. Wynn sought dismissal on the grounds the resort had no duty, under Nevada law, to protect employees from the dangers of second-hand smoke."

Sometimes the proles need a firm hand - August 9, 2010

"Suddenly, privacy must be subordinated to a statistical prediction of a health hazard from second hand smoke. Opening a window to ventilate the room while smoking apparently is an alternative option that deserves no consideration. The type of people who read and write for the Globe don't smoke, and they look down on people who do. They see those people as so helpless and in need of guidance from their social and educational superiors that firm measures must be used to control their self-destructive behaviors."

Cigarette smuggler conspired to hire hitman - March 9, 2010

"A Fairfax man at the center of a massive cigarette-smuggling ring has pleaded guilty to conspiring to hire a hitman to kill someone he thought had stolen from him."

Dallas woman sues neighbor over smoke - September 30, 2009

"A Dallas woman has filed a lawsuit seeking six figures from a former neighbor and landlord for damage she says was caused by cigarette smoke wafting through adjoining walls of her high-end townhome."

Counterintelligence

Dupes for the state - May/June 2012

"One of the least-understood functions of private property rights is that of determining who may harm whom in what ways. In a free society, it is presumed that the air in a person’s house, restaurant, hotel, car, or place of business is his or her own property."

Smokers have reduced risk of Parkinson's - March 11, 2010

"...smoking may still have at least one advantage: protection against the development of Parkinson's disease. A large-scale study published in Wednesday's online edition of the journal Neurology further bolsters the connection and concludes that the longer you smoke, the less likely you are to develop the illness."

Are you smoking enough? - Undated advertisement

"When practiced in moderation, smoking can load you up with health benefits you never imagined possible."

Rebuttal of third-hand smoke study - 2009

"Unlike other reports debunking the third hand smoke scare tactic, which are in abundance across the internet, I am going to delve into Dr. Winickoff's past to expose his agenda and why we cannot trust a word he says."

Rebuttal of Surgeon General's opinion - January 27, 2009

"The Surgeon General was incorrect. Second hand smoke may be an irritant and an annoyance, but it’s not a cause of death."

Christopher Booker describes history of anti-smoking campaign - July 1, 2007

"As clouds of self-righteousness billow out over England this weekend, the anti-smokers may be entitled to give us their view that smoking is a thoroughly noxious and nasty habit, even that it can exacerbate respiratory conditions such as asthma or bronchitis arising from other causes. They can even claim that the ban will save lives by persuading smokers to give up. But the one thing they cannot claim is any reliable evidence for their belief that passive smoking is responsible for killing people."

D.C. bars struggling without smokers - February 27, 2007

"D.C. bar owners say business has fallen significantly since the city's smoking ban was implemented almost two months ago."

Myth that smoke kills instantly debunked - February 6, 2007

"How did anti-smoking groups come up with this claim? By a wild stretch and distortion of the science, that's how."

Largest study ever shows no danger from smoke - May 17, 2003

"Conclusions: The results do not support a causal relation between environmental tobacco smoke and tobacco related mortality, although they do not rule out a small effect. The association between exposure to environmental tobacco smoke and coronary heart disease and lung cancer may be considerably weaker than generally believed."

Critique of the Helena Study - 2003

"This study has received widespread distribution and acceptance, and has been used to"prove" that bans improve public health. But it doesn't take much digging to see that the study was a complete fraud; a shameful exercise in junk science."

Debunking various second-hand smoke studies - 2001-2005

"Here we will look at the current secondhand smoke releases and discuss the junk science, the media lies and omissions and the research manipulation and press releases intended to attain more support for their smoke-free agenda."

Study of risks to children with smoking parents - January 2000

"The results of the meta-analyses suggest a small increase in risk of all neoplasms, but not of specific neoplasms such as leukemia and central nervous system tumors. Results for other specific neoplasms were sparse, but the available data did not suggest a strong association for any type of tumor."

Littlewood & Fennell research study - September 15, 1999

"There is no convincing scientific evidence -- either epidemiologic or biologic -- that ETS is a human carcinogen. There has been and continues to be a persistent and disturbing pattern of reaching conclusions prior to rigorous scientific investigation. There has been and continues to be a pattern of ‘data torturing’ and scientific distortion to force an unwarranted conclusion. There has been and continues to be a lack of neutrality in the formation of supposedly ‘independent’ scientific advisory boards convened to assess risks (or lack thereof) associated with ETS. In short, we were appalled at the misrepresentation of data, willful omission of data and bias clearly displayed by the NTP subcommittee for listing ETS as a human carcinogen."

Critique of EPA '93 Study

"You should seriously question the credibility of anyone who refers to this study, or any of the conclusions that it reached, as if they were facts. That includes everyone who refers to the EPA's ruling that ETS is a Class A Carcinogen."

Critique of first WHO study

"On March 8, 1998, the British newspaper The Telegraph reported "The world's leading health organization has withheld from publication a study which shows that not only might there be no link between passive smoking and lung cancer but that it could have even a protective effect."

Weird & stupid