Second Hand Smoke Won't Kill You

[Ravenseye]

There is no evidence that second hand smoke causes cancer.

People who think that smoking should be banned on a governmental level are stalinist pigs.

:popcorn:

[Katherine Brengle]

1. flame-bait if i ever saw it...

:toast: :popcorn: :hide:

[Ravenseye]

3. who me? nah

I just think that there was one study that showed that second hand smoke was harmfull, and everything since has been based on that one study. Every organization that talks about it references that same EPA study, which was later torn apart.

Oh and that not smoking in bars is something that even Pol Pot and Hitler could get behind.

:popcorn:

[nickinSTL]

9. anyone who doesn't think that secondhand smoking is harmful

either:
1. smokes
or
2. is NEVER around secondhand smoke for long periods of time.

As a kid, my parents smoked. As a result, I had borderline bronchial/lung infections all the time. At virtually any time, I could cough up green goo (sorry for the graphic description, but I want to make my point)

After my parents quit, when I was about 12, it took a YEAR for my lungs to clear up completely. But they did, and after a childhood of recurrent chest colds and bronchitis, I rarely get sick anymore (or at least didn't until I developed allergies :P )

So, anyone who tries to tell me secondhand smoke isn't harmful gets absolutely NO respect from me. You're wrong, and my experience proves it to my own satisfaction.

[KitchenWitch]

61. thank you NickinSTL

I have ended up in the ER from exposure to second hand smoke (asthma and radiation fibrosis of the lungs).

[Radical Activist]

2. It will give you asthma attacks

Thanks for making any outing to a bar a health risk for me and millions of others! What would one call someone that inconsiderate of others...a nazi pig?

[Ravenseye]

5. Hitler was anti-smoking

He started anti-smoking campaigns to get germans to give up smoking.

Are you saying Hitler was right?

:popcorn:

[Radical Activist]

8. Are you avoiding my point?

Why yes, yes you are.

The US military passed out cigarettes to soldiers in WW1 and WW2. Would you agree that smoking is a tool of the military-industrial complex to further enrich their war machine and enslave the populace?

[Ravenseye]

16. Yes and Yes

Don't tell me you have a problem with the military industrial complex enriching their war machine and enslaving the populace? Sheesh....we get all types here.

:popcorn:

[LSK]

18. and what if Hitler said that you should breath air

Would you stop breathing just because Hitler said it?

[Ravenseye]

21. Pfff

That's a strawman.

:popcorn:

[LSK]

24. you started it

:popcorn:

[Ravenseye]

25. You can't strawman a strawman

Then you end up with a freak of nature that will ravage and destroy downtown Tokyo. Are you so insensitive to the innocent people of Japan?

:popcorn:

[LSK]

26. i just did

Sorry Japan

:popcorn:

[no name no slogan]

43. He was a vegetarian, too

{INSERT MILITANT ANTI-PETA REFERENCE HERE}
:popcorn:

[Kailassa]

59. Hitler breathed.

does that mean I should avoid breathing?


Aww, I was beaten to it. Next time I should read the whole thread before I post.

[LynneSin]

4. Damn, why don't you just call liberals dumb & stupid

[Ravenseye]

6. I think everyone is stupid

We're all just a bunch of glorified apes who like bright shiny objects.

:popcorn:

[LynneSin]

7. Like this?

[Ravenseye]

10. OOOOOOO

Pretty...hee hee....shiny!....shiny ball....heee hee...

[LynneSin]

13. And you wonder why we democrats can't get elected

ooooo.....maybe I'll vote for Bush

[Ravenseye]

14. Bingo

Democrats try and win people over based on ideas, because more people agree with us.

Republicans try and win people over with shiny objects (tax cuts) and stories of people coming to kill us.

We need to find our own bright shiny object.

[LynneSin]

15. KILLER BEES!!!!!

[Ravenseye]

20. *door slamming*

*voice from outside*

RUN RUN FOR YOUR LIVES...THE BEES ARE HERE!!! THEY'VE BEEN HERE FOR A DECADE IN HIDING!!!

RUN!!!!!

*commercial on television in the foreground* "When Clinton took office the killer bees weren't in America. He didn't do a thing to stop them. George W. Bush and the Republican party hate bees. We don't even eat honey. Democrats. Wrong on Bees. Wrong for America *end commercial*

[Oeditpus Rex]

19. We've got one

[Ravenseye]

23. Not shiny enough

That's too old an object. It hasn't been shiny enough for 30 years. Maybe 35.

We need something that reaches the inner ape.

[Deep13]

32. That's Bill O'Rielly's job.

Also, we are screechy and unhinged and pinheaded, ideologue zombies. (In case you were wondering.)

[Redstone]

11. Especially in bars. Leave us the fuck alone when we're at the bar.

Restaurants, fine. But not bars.

Redstone

[Radical Activist]

22. That's what I say

Leave me the fuck alone when I'm in a bar and stop giving me asthma attacks.

[Deep13]

33. Why?

I never go to bars because they stink so badly. Can't tell you what a treat it was to go out back East and not need to take a shower and wash my clothes as soon as I got home. In MA regular people frequent taverns but do not feel it necessary to poison themselves and everyone else in the process. You know full well that there is no reason to smoke and every reason not to do so. Why don't you just quit and make this a non-issue.

[LynneSin]

58. I'll second what you said

Plus as someone who relied on working in a bar for years in order to make ends meet, why should I be subjected to someone elses poison. Waiting tables & Bartending is an excellent way to make great money especially if you know how to work it for tips. After three years in the industry I sounded like a freaking smoker the way I hacked. Oh, and I worked with two women who were pregnant.

[Oeditpus Rex]

12. Popcorn will, however

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=105x4902192

:popcorn:

[ET Awful]

17. Second hand smoke may not kill you, but those who have to smell it might

:evilgrin:

[Ravenseye]

40. I can't help but think...

There are many non-smokers who don't really care so much about the health risks. They're more concerned about not reeking of smoke after they go to a bar, and it's more of a revenge thing.

:popcorn:

[hyphenate]

71. I watched my dad suffer for over a year

after being diagnosed with lung cancer, as it soon left his lungs, traveled to his lymph nodes with a massive tumor on his neck, which finally burst and went into his brain.

Squamous cell carcinoma, in a man who had begun to smoke when he was about 14. The fastest cancer from what I understand, and he hung in there after a bronchoscopy, radiation therapy, and inpatient chemo therapy where he went from a 140 lbs down to 90 lbs. A man, who in the end was denied--yes, DENIED--morphine just a few hours before he died. He was 58 years old.

I hate smoking and I only wish that those who do smoke would get it through their skulls what they are likely to go through some day. Smoking is a very long term form of suicide. It don't get much worse than that.

[edbermac]

27. Suck up those cancer sticks...

[Oeditpus Rex]

28. Eat right. Exercise. Don't smoke.

Die anyway.

[Ariana Celeste]

29. I'll smoke to that!

Damn commies tryin' to take away my pleasure sticks! *paranoid grumbling*



:7

[Oeditpus Rex]

30. You smoke while you're playin' your bass?

Cig hangin' from a corner of your mouth, about an inch of ash built up on it, smoke curlin' up into your eye, makin' you squint?



That's jazz. :thumbsup:

[Ariana Celeste]

34. Haha! Hell yeah

Then I mess up when the smoke unexpectedly goes up my nose, and then have to give up my badass image til the next smoke. Woot!

I think I have a picture of exactly that... I'm going to hunt it down. :7

[Ariana Celeste]

36. Here, an image just for you.

;)



That was taken just a few minutes before the pic you like.

[Oeditpus Rex]

42. All you need now

is a beat-up old fedora.

[Deep13]

31. CDC says otherwise.

I don't want to have to choose between my job and my safety. Only a Stalinist pig would require that. Anyway, it is just smoking. Do it later or somewhere else. It is no different than saying you cannot drive golf balls indoors or at the office or in a movie theater or in a restaurant etc. There's no backlash against anti-golfers.

[Ravenseye]

38. The CDC (and most else) bases it on false data

From a 1992 EPA report. Every organization that says second hand smoke is harmfull references this or that, but they all eventually get back to that single 1992 EPA report. The report itself claimed that 3000 deaths a year were the result of second hand smoke, and therefore classfied it as a class A carcinogen. The study was a Meta Analysis, which means that it just gathered together other studies and pasted them together. The study claimed that passive smokers took in about 1/5th of a cigarette per day. Other studies have shown that to be much to high and it's actually closer to the equivalent of 6 cigarettes a year.

http://www.ornl.gov/info/press_releases/get_press_release.cfm?ReleaseNumber=mr20000203-00

Much of the EPA data came from survey's, which are notoriously unreliable, and not any actual hard numbers. Three other large US studies were in progress during the EPA's study. The EPA used data from one uncompleted study, the Fontham study, and ignored the other two, Brownson and Kabat. The Fontham study showed a small increase in risk. The 1995 The Congressional Research Service report referred to it as "a positive risk that was barely statistically significant." The Brownson study, which the EPA ignored, showed "no risk at all." Even after excluding most of the studies, the EPA couldn't come up with 3,000 deaths, but they had already announced the results. So they doubled their margin of error. No evidence to support the numbers at all, but since they had released that data incorrectly prior to the completion of the study, they felt pressure to actually find that result.

In 1998 Judge William Osteen vacated the study - declaring it null and void after extensively commentating on the shoddy way it was conducted. His decision was 92 pages long. Osteen used the term "cherry-picking" to describe he way the EPA selected their data.

And on and on. What about later studies? The World Health Organization conducted a study of Environmental Tobacco Smoke (ETS) and lung cancer in Europe. This was a case control study using a large sample size over seven years in 12 locations and seven countries. The study found no statistically significant risk existed for non-smokers who either lived or worked with smokers. The only statistically significant number was a decrease in the risk of lung cancer among the children of smokers. The WHO quickly buried the report. 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." Finally, the WHO issued a press release. Although their study showed no statistically significant risk from ETS, their press release had the misleading headline "Passive Smoking Does Cause Lung Cancer - Do Not Let Them Fool You." In paragraph four they admitted the facts: "The study found that there was an estimated 16% increased risk of lung cancer among nonsmoking spouses of smokers. For workplace exposure the estimated increase in risk was 17%. However, due to small sample size, neither increased risk was statistically significant." The press release doesn't mention the one statistically significant result from the study, that children raised by smokers were 22% less likely to get lung cancer.

Anyway, my point is that the science just isn't there to claim that it's a safety issue. We've been lied to about the reports about this. If you don't believe the actual science, that's fine. If you don't like to smell like smoke, I can dig that too. Just realize that all these organizations from the CDC to the American Lung Association and more all rely on that single EPA report, and when the WHO found no statistically significant risk, it was buried.

:popcorn:

[eyepaddle]

47. Hmmmm.....

That seems to be a pretty good foundation study, but there is clearly a need for follow-up. As they mention--but do not specify--what effects may be caused by sampling in different establishments. Also, I am not sure which sampler they used, the picture looks like it is an ud-to-date model, but it may be the more common (and inaccurate) 37 mm cassette sampler.

It is notoriously difficult to determine the effective dose received by a person from an ambient concentration, and in any case within worker variability far outweighs between worker variability as a source for error.

I'll admit to a personal bias: I am an industrial hygienist and my personal desire/professional judgment is that keeping as many particles as possible out of a person's lungs is the way to go. As an aside one of my favorite haunts from college had ridiculously foul air, I always wondered if they were in violation of CO standards and exposure guidelines for other organics. It was before I knew where my career path would take me, but in retrospect I always wondered if instead of tobacco smoke it were some contaminant like forklift exhaust, would they be able to get away with it.

Again, this is just my personal suspicion, but the bars with the foulest air are the ones LEAST likely to permit rigorous air sampling.

On edit: Other important questions are what is the effect of smoking on other health conditions, pulmonary capacity, heart disease etc, lung cancer is just one outcome, and far from the most common? I've looked and have seen the EPA study you mention, but haven't found it available for download. It looks to be mainly concerned with cancer, are the heart disease and asthma studies drawn from tat or are they separate work?

It seems to me that it would be interesting to see what the burden of Carbon monoxide is in non-smoking bar workers--is it elevated from the general population's and so on.

[Ravenseye]

49. More studies need to be done

I agree with pretty much everything you're saying. I can't believe that it ISN'T harmful, but there has been no established evidence of this. People are told that it's bad for you by the Television and they believe it. The television told you its' bad for you because the CDC and ALA and AMA said so. They said so becuase of that one EPA report that was cherrypicked to show what they wanted it to show, and later tossed.

I'm sure you could simulate the environments necessary if you can't get enough willing bars to accomodate you.

The other question though is really how much damage does that actually do to a persons body over time, which is one thing the WHO study tried to cover without anything statsitically significant coming out of it other than that bizarre aspect that it is beneficial to second hand smokers who are children. Something has to be wrong there.

More studies are necessary, but instead laws are being passed on lies and bad science. That pisses me off. It might end up being the right thing to do, but people who think they already know the answer are kidding themselves.

[eyepaddle]

53. fyi, I added some stuff to the end of my last post,

and rather than re-type it, I'll just give you the heads0up here.

Oh yeah, one more thing, I'm a little steamed to have to be going back into epi. All the unpleasant thoughts of mortality from the world of medicine, coupled with the breakneck excitiment of statistics. Plus confusing and often contradictroy vocabulary! :scared:

I however, am very glad there are many talented people who don't sare my prejudices! :D

[Ravenseye]

54. OK read the last post

I agree. Tons of work needs to be done. I can't find the study but I do think it is an asthma irritant. Of course so is perfume and car exhaust.

[eyepaddle]

57. Don't get me started on car exhaust! ;)

Perfume too. I am an asthmatic and I know I am stuffy as hell after a night in the smoky bars, but I don't actually any numbers to back that up, so I figured we'd leave that for another day. With perfume it seems to depend somewhat on the particular fragrance, but in general I like to avoid artifical scents as much as I can.

With smoking I'd think the acrolein in it alone would make it an asthma irritant.

[Radical Activist]

62. Maybe we should only trust studies done by the tobacco companies.

:)

[Radical Activist]

63. Maybe we should only trust studies done by the tobacco companies.

:)

[Ravenseye]

65. What the WHO isn't good enough?

[Radical Activist]

68. I love the Who

especially Who's Next. Its one of my favorite albums.

[Tikki]

35. Let's say that you are the.....

grandma who takes care of your grandchild while the parents work....
You get the little guy ready for school as you puff away on a smoke or two or three..
and he arrives at school smelling like an ashtray.

So someone says to him..."Do your parents smoke?"...the little guy says..."NO, you're smelling
the smoke on my clothes from my grandma's cigarettes"....:(



Tikki

[Ravenseye]

41. I quit smoking for my daughter

Well I did it for me, but the reason I quit was that I didn't want the smell of smoke to rub off on my baby girl. I didn't want her sensory memories of me to be of an ashtray.

I think it's a big concern that smokers don't fully realize until they stop smoking and their noses open up again. Smokers smell BAD. All the time. They smell like ashtrays.

:popcorn:

[American Tragedy]

75. Whenever I stand next to somebody who smokes

I always think, "My God, if you only knew." There have been times when the stench was almost gag-inducing.

[slide to the left]

37. gives me an asthma attack

that might kill me, then what would you do? HUH? :evilgrin:

[Ravenseye]

39. take your inhalers

I have asthma from my wife's cat. Albuterol inhaler costs are going to rise sharply soon. I'd rob your dead body of your drugs.

[alarimer]

44. It is, however, extremely disgusting to be around

And makes those with allergies sick.

[Ravenseye]

45. I feel the same way about most women's perfumes

They give me massive migranes just to smell them.

BAN PUBLIC USE OF PERFUME AND COLOGNE!

:popcorn:

[Swede]

46. Smoke your cancer sticks at home.

Fuck is it that hard to understand?

[Ravenseye]

50. Hey I don't smoke

filthy habit...

I just think that people should realize that the science isn't there to prove a connection between second hand smoke and cancer. Most people are just told that it is and believe it and don't realize that the only studies shown for it have either been scrapped because of bad science or buried becuase of unfavorable results to the second hand smoke as causing cancer thing.

Also I don't like when people regulate what other people should do. If a business owner wants to run a cigar shop, he should be able to have a smoking lounge, and if someone doesn't want to breath in second hand smoke while working there, then they shouldnt' work there in the first place. It's supposed to be a free country.

:popcorn:

[Swede]

60. Having a smoking section in a building

is like having a peeing section in a pool.

[Ravenseye]

67. Ah excellent point

And is there a law preventing someone from having a business where they have a pool for people to swim and pee in at the same time?

[Kailassa]

72. Probably not, because healthy urine will not make you ill.

It can even be used as a healing agent. The old solders' remedy for "jungle-foot" was to pee into their boots brfore they put them on. I even used it myself (externally) when I should have had grafts due to having a foot and ankle dipped in concentrated nitric acid and couldn't go to hospital. There is nothing like stale pee for rebuilding tissues. Not a scar to be seen now.

But if a business kept a pool open for people to swim in after someone had defecated in it, that would be a different story, and I guarantee there would be some law against it. And as no billion dollar industry is making a fortune selling fecal matter for recreational use, we are not going to see studies supposedly proving its safety, or see people told they are living in a fascist society if they are not free to "shit-and-swim".

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

48. I knew a couple people who would debate you

if they could, but they died of lung cancer.

Slowly.

Painfully.

[Ravenseye]

52. My Grandmother has smoked for over 70 years

She's fit as a fiddle and approaching 90.

Anecdotal evidence does not science make. The science isn't there. The EPA report is highly flawed. The WHO report was buried because they couldn't show a statstically relevant incease in cancer risk from second hand smoke. If we're going to legislate things we really shouldn't base it on anecdotal evidence or flawed studies should we?

[Mojambo]

51. Neither will stepping outside for 5 minutes. n/t

[Ravenseye]

55. Dunno

Certain places in Colorado in the winter time? It could be cold enough to kill you. ;)

That said, when I smoked I actually prefered to step outside weather permitting. Get some fresh air. Stretch my legs. Plus you go home not reeking of as much smoke. Also if I was smoking at a bar, when I smoked, I'd smoke a pack in a matter of hours and I'd feel it the next day. If I had to go outside, I'd smoke far less and felt better for it.

Still I just can't get behind these laws. If an owner wants the establishment to be smoking, then people can choose not to go, and people can choose not to work there. It's supposed to be a free country. Hell I also think that if they want to smoke pot there they should be able to, as long as the owner is ok with it. This kind of government interference, especially based on non-science, is dangerous at best.

[Random_Australian]

56. HIlary for President in 2006!

:popcorn:

[Jamastiene]

64. Yo, man, let me offer you a wheelbarrow...

to carry those things around. I know the weight must be hurting... :evilgrin:

:popcorn:

[Kailassa]

66. A quick google of "passive smoking danger" is enough

to prove that the OP's assertion is completely incorrect.

I am sickened by the fact that someone would use a forum like this to post misleading information that could lead to the suffering and death of more innocent people. The only people benefiting from this belief are the tobacco industries, and they are spending a great deal of money on misleading studies to muddy the waters and on lobbying politicians.

In Australia, where smoking is progressively being banned in public places, the owners of public venues were afraid the new laws would drive their clientelle away. But some have realized the reaction was quite the opposite. They had no idea just how many people wanted to go out, but ended up staying home to avoid the smoke. Now some bars in Melbourne are jumping the gun and going completely smoke-free before they have to just to attract the newly socializing customers.

[hyphenate]

69. Oink! Oink!!

:)

[mongo]

70. My question is...

If second hand smoke is so harmfull, that it send people to the ER on a regular basis, then where were people who were allergic to cigarette smoke in the 40's, 50's and 60's, when you could smoke anywhere, and half the adult population smoked?

Seems like there must be other factors at play here. This whole medical epidemic was virtually unknown before the 80's.

[Swede]

73. Yeah,remember how no one was afraid of cancer back then?

Ah the good old days,when you lived to a ripe old age of 60. I really miss those days.

[alarimer]

74. We are generally healthier now

and have better medical care (or at least treatments for diseases that used to kill easily). But I also think (although I am not sure of the actual stats) that things like cancer and heart disease are on the rise and have been for a while. I believe those may be lifestyle-related. Our diets are less healthy and we are more sedentary.

For me the issue of second hand smoke, as I said above, is not fear of cancer. I may have that risk anyway. But it is awfully unpleasant to be around, especially indoors. If governments (local, state, federal) can make rules regulating the food served in restaurants and the conditions under which it is served (such as no rats or bugs), they can also regulate the air quality indoors. They already do in terms of ventilation, etc. Why can they not regulate smoking indoors? It is when they start trying to regulate it in people's homes or outdoors where the criticism of such rules is warranted.

[Minnesota Libra]

76. Oh, and we all know car exhaust don't cause pollution either. nt