Study: Smoking Ban Reduces Heart Attacks
Wed April 2, 2003 10:57 AM ET
CHICAGO (Reuters) - The number of heart attack victims fell by almost 60 percent at one hospital six months after a smoke-free ordinance went into effect in the area, a study showed, reinforcing concerns about second-hand smoke.
Researchers looked at admissions at St. Peter's Community Hospital in Helena, Montana, where a smoke-free ordinance went into effect in June 2002 and was suspended in a legal challenge six months later. The hospital serves almost all of the cardiac patients in the area, with a population of about 66,000.
Medical charts for heart attack patients from within Helena were compared with those from outside the area. Researchers also compared records from the period of the smoke-free ordinance with records from more than four years before the ordinance went into effect.
During an average six-month period, the number of hospital admissions for heart attack from people living or working in smoke-free Helena was just under seven per month, but that number dropped to four during the six-month smoking ban, the study said.
The findings of the study were presented at the American College of Cardiology in Chicago.
Researchers said this is the first empirical evidence showing that smoke-free environments help prevent heart attacks.
"This work substantially raises the stakes in debates over enacting and protecting smoke-free ordinances," said Stanton Glantz, a director of the Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education at the University of California in San Francisco.
Other studies have shown that the effects of secondhand smoke on cardiovascular function take place within minutes of exposure and are nearly as large as they are for smokers. The study was partly paid for by the National Cancer Institute.
What is a smoke-free ordinance? Is that like saying "no smoking in public buildings?" Because Massachusetts has had that ban (along with most of the Northeast) for quite some time, and I've never heard of a study such as this one.
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I'm all for smoking bans. Its a filthy habit and why should I care that people killing themselves with cigarettes have to huddle in the entrances of office buildings during the winter. It sure beats me hacking up a lung because the air is filthy with their vile smoke. Besides maybe it will encourage more people to quit and save their lives and their lungs. I honestly never understood what the attraction was to that habit.
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That's got to be a statistical anomaly. If secondhand smoke was so dangerous that removing it from the environment produces a 60% drop in heart attacks, bartenders all over the country would be dropping dead.
As for smoking bans themselves, if the business's owner wants to ban smoking, that's his call. It's his property. The city and/or the state can go piss up a rope.
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RedImperator wrote:That's got to be a statistical anomaly. If secondhand smoke was so dangerous that removing it from the environment produces a 60% drop in heart attacks, bartenders all over the country would be dropping dead.
The sample size is probably too small for solid conclusions. I can't imagine heart attacks occur at such a high rate among the relatively young people who tend to be bartenders (at least, in Toronto they're usually younger).
As for smoking bans themselves, if the business's owner wants to ban smoking, that's his call. It's his property. The city and/or the state can go piss up a rope.
Actually, no. A business owner has employees, and worker protection laws include the right to refuse exposure to toxic substances without penalty. Therefore, the state does have the right to force him to ban smoking on his premises unless his employees can be isolated from it somehow, which seems impractical to the point of absolute infeasibility.
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Darth Wong wrote:Actually, no. A business owner has employees, and worker protection laws include the right to refuse exposure to toxic substances without penalty. Therefore, the state does have the right to force him to ban smoking on his premises unless his employees can be isolated from it somehow, which seems impractical to the point of absolute infeasibility.
I know that in my state, or at least local to SF, if the owner has no employees, or the workers own the place, they can have smoking in the bar if they want to.
Darth Wong wrote:Actually, no. A business owner has employees, and worker protection laws include the right to refuse exposure to toxic substances without penalty. Therefore, the state does have the right to force him to ban smoking on his premises unless his employees can be isolated from it somehow, which seems impractical to the point of absolute infeasibility.
I know that in my state, or at least local to SF, if the owner has no employees, or the workers own the place, they can have smoking in the bar if they want to.
That would make sense; if the workers voluntarily expose themselves to it and are obviously not being coerced, then there's no problem. However, the traditional business owner with employees cannot simply shield himself behind the "it's private property" excuse.
"It's not evil for God to do it. Or for someone to do it at God's command."- Jonathan Boyd on baby-killing
"you guys are fascinated with the use of those "rules of logic" to the extent that you don't really want to discussus anything."- GC
"I do not believe Russian Roulette is a stupid act" - Embracer of Darkness
"Viagra commercials appear to save lives" - tharkûn on US health care.
I'd want a public smoking ban in restaurants. It stinks up the place, and from my experiences, the people in the smoking section are wierd. Perhaps they can replace it with a "whiny baby section" or something.
RedImperator wrote: If secondhand smoke was so dangerous that removing it from the environment produces a 60% drop in heart attacks, bartenders all over the country would be dropping dead.
I *think* what they are suggesting is that non-smokers with a high risk of heart attacks are having some of these attacks triggered by a recent exposure to second-hand smoke.
