Outdoor Smoking Bans Not Based on Science

[The Straight Story]

To smoke outdoors or not smoke outdoors? That's the controversial question and some fighting words among people. As West Hollywood begins to follow in the footsteps of Los Angeles, which is close to completing its own law banning outdoor smoking around restaurants, the WeHo News this week published an article about the science, or lack thereof, of studying the effects of second hand smoke near outdoor patios.

No study on second hand smoke at patios had been published before last November, said the WeHoNews. That study found "increased levels of SHS in their subjects, but not levels considered to be risky... The study acknowledges other faults, including not doing 'an accurate count of the total number of cigarettes lit during each sampling period,' and not measuring how the 'concentration of components of SHS in an outdoor location is… influenced by meteorological factors, such as wind speed, temperature, and humidity.'” The same researcher is expected to do a more comprehensive study this Spring.

West Hollywood businesses are concerned about the proposed smoking ban because, unlike Los Angeles' proposal, the law would make smoking at bar and club patios verboten, too. "We have already in place the ability for customers and businesses to choose," former chair of the Chamber of Commerce Joe Clapsaddle told the WeHo News last month. “I don’t want to be Calabasas, I don’t want to be Santa Monica, I don’t want to be Berkeley, I don’t want to be Beverly Hills - I want to be West Hollywood, California.”

http://laist.com/2010/01/12/outdoor_smoking_bans_not_based_on_s.php

[ixion]

1. k/r

:applause:

[Kansas Wyatt]

2. Quick...

Send all the smokers back inside bars & taverns where they belong.

[seaofsees]

3. I once read about a 105 year old man who smoked unfiltered

cigarettes and started each day with a big shot of whiskey. This was in "Parade" magazine about 20 years ago. The man lived in
Florida.

The woman next door to me recently stopped smoking. Now, she's a chubette. Soon, she might be a real porker. She looked much better
before and I imagine the increased strain on her heart, combined with the other effects of added weight can't make her more healthy than she was when she was a relatively light smoker.

[Maru Kitteh]

4. I don't care. I don't like walking through the stench of cigarette smoke. It's DISGUSTING.

I support banning them from the face of the earth. It sickens me the way the evil big tobacco corps. have shifted their markets to the poor of this nation and the poor of the world. Yeah. That's just what the poor need. Another way to get sick and die early.

[ZombieHorde]

10. This is why I want outdoor music banned. I like music, but I rarely like the music I hear outside.nt

[notadmblnd]

12. the stench of exhaust from cars is pretty nasty too and probably more toxic.

People have actually died from breathing car exhaust. Do you complain about that as much? How about a bonfire or leaves in the fall? Oh and how much do you rant about those smokestacks that billow with toxic fumes? Yeah, I didn't think so. Just another non smoker looking for a reason to belly ache about smokers.

Significant Statistics

Carbon monoxide from vehicle exhaust is the single most common cause of poisoning deaths in the United States.

Varon, J., and P.E. Marik. “Carbon Monoxide Poisoning.” The Internet Journal of Emergency and Intensive Care Medicine, Vol. 1, No. 2 (1997). http://www.uam.es/departamentos/medicina/anesnet/journals/ijeicm/vol1n2/articles/co.htm

Approximately 500 people die each year in the U.S. as a result of accidental carbon monoxide poisoning, and about 10,000 others are sent to the emergency room. Of the fatal CO poisonings, approximately 60% are caused by motor vehicle exhaust, and 40% are caused by consumer products, primarily heating systems. Other causes of death include charcoal grills, gas water heaters, gas ranges and ovens, and fuel-burning camping equipment.

Non-Fire Carbon Monoxide Deaths and Injuries Associated With the Use of Consumer Products: Annual Estimates. U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, October 2000.http://www.cpsc.gov/LIBRARY/co00.pdf

Nationwide, 81% of all carbon monoxide emissions come from transportation sources, with the largest contribution coming from highway motor vehicles. In high-traffic urban areas, as much as 95% of all carbon monoxide emissions can be attributed to car exhaust.

1995 Air Quality: Status and Trends-Six Principal Pollutants: Carbon Monoxide. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Air and Radiation. http://www.epa.gov/oar/aqtrnd95/co.html

Due to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency regulations that forced vehicles to be fitted with catalytic converters, which convert carbon monoxide to carbon dioxide, in the 1970s, today’s cars are capable of emitting 90% less carbon monoxide over their lifetimes than their uncontrolled counterparts of the 1960s. As a result, outdoor carbon monoxide levels have dropped, despite large increases in the number of vehicles on the road and the number of miles they travel.Longterm or Delayed Health Effects

* Neurotoxin = Can harm brain and central nervous system
* Asthma Trigger
* Development Toxicant = Can interfere with normal development of a fetus or child

Other

* Inhaling carbon monoxide, even at low levels, can cause headache, fatigue, queasiness, nausea, vomiting, dizziness, difficulty concentrating, memory and vision problems, confusion and incoordination. Because some of these symptoms resemble the flu, CO poisoning victims are often not correctly diagnosed, sometimes leading to death.

Even low levels of carbon monoxide can cause chest pain in persons with heart disease. Carbon monoxide exposure can cause cardiovascular arrhythmia and cardiomyopathy. Infants and young children, the elderly, smokers, and individuals with anemia or respiratory diseases such as asthma are also particularly sensitive to CO exposure.
* High levels of CO can cause severe headache, brain and heart damage, convulsions, unconsciousness and death.
* Repeated exposure may increase the risk for heart disease and damage the brain and central nervous system.
* Birth defects and stillbirth. Carbon monoxide readily crosses the placenta. Exposure to high levels of carbon monoxide during pregnancy may increase the risk that the child could be born with brain damage, congenital heart defects, or reduced birth weight, or that it could be stillborn.
* Temporary blood damage. Breathing very high levels of carbon monoxide forms carboxyhemoglobin in the bloodstream, which inhibits the ability of the blood to carry oxygen to organs and tissues. This can damage body tissues and organs and cause them to die of a lack of oxygen, resulting in flushing and redness of the skin and mucous membranes, followed by convulsions, coma and death. After exposure has ceased, it may take a long time (around 10 hours) for carboxyhemoglobin levels to return to normal.



Automobiles and Carbon Monoxide. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, January 1993.http://www.epa.gov/otaq/consumer/03-co.pdf

[Luminous Animal]

27. It is amazing how much traffic stinks.

When I go camping, it is usually at a hike-in spot. I'm not around cars & traffic for days on end. Just starting up my car for the trip home, the smell of gas, oil, and exhaust is jolting and becomes more oppressive when I get closer to more congested areas, and then increasing yet more to the point of being nearly unbearable when I get to my urban home.

Conveniently, I get used to the smell in a short amount of time and don't even notice it by the time I wake up in the morning. Of course, it is still there but I am accustomed to it.

[Scout]

35. i must be unusual or something ....

because standing at the bus stop, with the traffic driving by (cars, trucks and busses), i do not smell car exhaust. but when those smokers walk up to the bus stop, even when i'm upwind i can smell the nasty reek. makes me gag.

[notadmblnd]

38. yet the exhaust is way more dangerous and you are probably exposed to

a lot more of it than any group of smokers could ever expose you to. It's how you've been conditioned.

[Luminous Animal]

24. When they ban outdoor driving, I'll accept a ban on outdoor smoking.

[invictus]

32. +1

[reggie the dog]

40. a tobacco ban will never work, they try to eradicate cannabis

and we still smoke it.

[jgraz]

5. Neither are outdoor shitting bans

They're based on courtesy.

[Sgent]

6. Nope

they are based on health. Ever heard of typhoid, cholera, etc? It comes from shitting without proper sanitation.

[jgraz]

9. We let dogs shit outside.

As long as we pick up after ourselves, what's the problem?

[Toots]

33. And we all know how healthy smoking is or even breathing smoke from any burning object.

:shrug:

[reggie the dog]

41. ah yes,

living in LA is worse for your health than breating in a tiny scent

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

7. Neither are public urination bans.

It's really more of a quality of life issue.

[amborin]

8. I can detect smoke if it's 1 part per billion; it gives me a headache

[Touchdown]

11. I can detect bullshit with the same parts per billion.

[amborin]

13. a neighbor who lives three

houses away smokes at night on his back patio

we can smell the smoke wafting over and into our open windows

how many parts per billion do you think it represents?

[Touchdown]

15. I don't know. That's your level of expertise.

Mine is bullshit.:hi:

[mrbarber]

16. Well, better ban him from smoking outside than.

[amborin]

17. LOL but actually,

someone else, not us, has complained to him

[mrbarber]

18. I hope he had some choice words for the person who complained.

And it ended with "get the hell off my property".

[starroute]

19. I get very tired of having to close my windows in the middle of summer

... just because the guy two houses down or across the street decides he needs to smoke out in his yard.

I get tired of waiting for the neighbor who likes to smoke as he shovels snow to finish so that I can go outside and clear my own sidewalk.

I get awfully fed up with having to avoid from parades and music festivals because people feel free to wander around with cigarettes anywhere they choose.

Let the smoke-at-will types try living for a while with the limitations that I face and then try to tell me complaining about outdoor smoking is unreasonable.

[Touchdown]

21. How horrible it must be to be you.

To have to put up with other people! The nerve of them! If only the world was filled with just you.O8)

[U4ikLefty]

23. I think they were being sarcastic.

at least I HOPE it was sarcasm.

[Scout]

36. not just "expert" at detecting bullshit....

pretty damn good at dishing it out, too, eh?

[Touchdown]

46. Look, I'm the first one to admit that people have health problems

, and problems with environmental issues, as well as those pertaining to the activities of others. They have names for these maladies...

Hypochondria
Narcissistic personality disorder
Persecution complex
Probably more.

[Luminous Animal]

25. So I take it,

no fireplace fires, campfires, bonfires, or charcoal BBQs in your life then?

[reggie the dog]

42. I have plenty of non smoker friends

and they have never complained about me doing a joint on their balcony or whatnot. Hell, when you are outside you can smoke and the smoke goes up in the air and dissipates. Where does your electricity come from? Coal? Oil? something that stinks????

[Luminous Animal]

26. There are some perfumes and colognes that trigger my asthma.

I ride the bus every day to and from work. Sometimes someone gets on and, even though they are 10 - 20 feet away from me, I have to get off and wait for the next bus.

I am so looking forward to being a warrior in the ban perfume brigade.

And don't get me started on pot smokers. In San Francisco on a weekend night, you can't walk two blocks without getting a noseful of that!

And the power plants that allow me to live a life to which I am accustomed? Well, they are located on "the other side of the tracks" and their emissions are responsible for the highest rates of childhood asthma than measured any other part of town. Where is your power plant located? How's the health of the children who live there?

[mrbarber]

14. The rabid anti-smokers in this country need to put out a movie.

Call it "Tobacco madness" or something similar.
]B

[reggie the dog]

43. right on right on

i saw some kind of film like that once

[Withywindle]

20. You know what drives me BATSHIT outdoors?

The sounds of shrieking children. Their voices are SO high pitched, they go right through my eardrums and give me stress headaches. Why do they have to make so much noise anyway? Why can't they just sit the fuck down and shut the fuck up with a picture book?

No, seriously. I like certain loud noises (like doom metal) that have a certain grounding bass energy and rhythmic regularity--but random high-pitched nonsensical babbling from little assholes who don't even have a clue what they're saying, they're just chanting idiot syllables at high volume for no reason, well, that's fucking nasty. Especially when they try to talk to me, and get my attention, when their mouths are so totally not competent to form words yet, I have no idea what they're trying to say, and I really don't want to pretend to care.


I am serious about this. I HATE this. It gives me headaches, earaches, and anxiety attacks--which are just as real as anti-smokers' feigned coughs (I wonder how those people would have survived to adulthood 40 years ago)--and yet I would NEVER actually offend someone by saying anything.

Guess what? Your prissy specificities don't have a right to dictate to the rest of the world any more than mine do.

I'm going back to focusing on Haiti now. I bet they don't give a shit about either smokers or noisy children there.

[Egnever]

28. ..

:headbang:

[Randall Flagg]

29. I wish we could rec individual posts.

Well said.

[monmouth]

30. Damn..I need a cig after reading that..Whew!..n/t

[Robb]

34. ...

:rofl:

[laughingliberal]

44. +1

[Touchdown]

22. A smoking Doctor shouldn't perform circumcisions outside when they're eating Tofurkey.

The trifecta of flame bait.:woohoo:

[ret5hd]

37. ...eating Tofurkey at Olive Garden while breastfeeding.

(just thought I'd finish your OBVIOUSLY incomplete sentence for you)

[Touchdown]

45. ... while driving a non-union Toyota to Wal*Mart

... even though I'm pro union and don't shop at WM.:D

[invictus]

31. Smoking should be banned near the entrances to buildings and banned outside windows.

I shouldn't have to breathe that crap every time I walk into or out of a building or open my window.

[reggie the dog]

39. the can put any ban they want in place

I will still blaze joints outside. I dont give a damn, the joint is already illegal anyways.