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County fires up anti-smoking efforts

Tuesday, November 17, 2009
(Updated Wednesday, November 18 - 5:36 am)
By Gerald Witt
Staff Writer

GREENSBORO — As the county asks smokers to quit for a day this week, bars and restaurants are learning how they’ll be forced to ban it in 2010.

“And for those who will be talking about quitting and look at it, this is your chance to say 'I’m just going to do it,’” said Mary Gillett , coordinator of Tobacco Use Prevention Coalition of Guilford County .

The county observes the 33rd Great American Smokeout on Thursday  and will ask smokers to try quitting for one day.

Later, the heavy artillery in getting people to quit smoking will arrive.

The statewide smoking ban will take effect Jan. 2  for bars and restaurants, and the health department is working to communicate this to the establishments.

The ban has one bartender at New York Pizza on Tate Street curious about how business could change.

“Especially during the day,” said Misty Marshall , who has worked behind the bar for about 18 months but has served libations for 12 years.

“Beer and cigarettes go hand-in-hand,” she said.

Usually that means a drink in one hand and a smoke in the other.

“I’m a nonsmoker, so it will be great, but it will hurt worse if I’m not making money,” she said.

She views the law as either a potential boon or bane.

“I hate to go home smelling of cigarette smoke,” Marshall said, “but I’ve done this for so long, I’ve become accustomed to it.”

If smokers don’t quit Thursday, they’ll have another day to plan for when the statewide ban takes effect.

“We would love to have everybody know that there’s a toll-free quit line, and it will pair somebody up with a qualified quit coach,” Gillett said.

The county will provide its own coaching for the bars and restaurants with questions about the new law.

The health department last week mailed information about the rule to Guilford County bars and restaurants.

“This law will be self-enforcing,” Gillett said, adding that the packets include signs reminding people not to smoke.

If an establishment is reported in violation more than three times, the health department could levy a fine of $200 a day .

Otherwise, the law has some details to know.

For example, it will take much more work than an establishment simply becoming a private club to be able to accept smokers.

“They need to take a look a that law and look at the definition of a private club,” Gillett said. “There are a couple of exemptions.”

Country clubs, cigar bars and nonprofit private clubs such as a fraternal lodge will be excluded from the ban. Regular bars would have to submit to the law.

“They would have a lot of difficulty changing their business plan in order to step around it,” Gillett said.
 

Contact Gerald Witt at 373-7008 or gerald.witt@news-record.com

Accompanying Photos

File photo (News & Record)

RESOURCES ON SMOKING

FOR THE PUBLIC

* becomeanex.com : Web site with information to help you quit smoking.

* (800) 784-8669: A smoking cessation hot line that pairs smokers who hope to quit with a coach.

FOR RESTAURANTS AND BARS

* smokefree.nc.gov: Has fact sheets, frequently asked questions and more.

* 641-6000 : Mary Gillett’s office, coordinator of Tobacco Use Prevention Coalition of Guilford County

Comments

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harleyrider1978

November 17, 2009 - 6:18 am EST

SECOND HAND SMOKE IS A JOKE. Ask the anti-tobacco folks to tell you what truly is in second hand smoke...when it burns from the coal its oxygenated and everything is burned and turned into water vapor..................thats right water..........you ever burned leaves in the fall...know how the heavy smoke bellows off.......thats the organic material releasing the moisture in the leaves the greener the leaves/organic material the more smoke thats made......thats why second hand smoke is classified as a class 3 irritant by osha and epa as of 2006........after that time EPA decided to change the listing of shs as a carcinogen for political reasons.......because it contained a trace amount of 6 chemicals so small even sophisticated scientific equipment can hardly detect it ........they didnt however use the normal dose makes the poison computation when they made this political decision. However osha still maintains shs/ets as an irritant only and maintains the dose makes the poison position.......as osha is in charge of indoor air quality its decisions are based on science not political agendas as epa's is. We can see this is true after a federal judge threw out the epa's study on shs as junk science......... Wednesday, March 12, 2008 British Medical Journal & WHO conclude secondhand smoke "health hazard" claims are greatly exaggerated The BMJ published report at:

http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/326/7398/1057

concludes that "The results do not support a causal relation between environmental tobacco smoke and tobacco related mortality. The association between exposure to environmental tobacco smoke and coronary heart disease and lung cancer are considerably weaker than generally believed." What makes this study so significant is that it took place over a 39 year period, and studied the results of non-smokers who lived with smokers.....

meaning these non-smokers were exposed to secondhand smoke up to 24 hours per day; 365 days per year for 39 years. And there was still no relation between environmental tobacco smoke and tobacco related mortality. In light of the damage to business, jobs, and the economy from smoking bans the BMJ report should be revisited by lawmakers as a reference tool and justification to repeal the now unnecessary and very damaging smoking ban laws. Also significant is the World Health Organization (WHO) study:

Passive smoking doesn't cause cancer-official By Victoria Macdonald, Health Correspondent " The results are consistent with their being no additional risk for a person living or working with a smoker and could be consistent with passive smoke having a protective effect against lung cancer. The summary, seen by The Telegraph, also states: 'There was no association between lung cancer risk and ETS exposure during childhood.' " And if lawmakers need additional real world data to further highlight the need to eliminate these onerous and arbitrary laws, air quality testing by Johns Hopkins University proves that secondhand smoke is up to 25,000 times SAFER than occupational (OSHA) workplace regulations.

The Chemistry of Secondary Smoke About 94% of secondary smoke is composed of water vapor and ordinary air with a slight excess of carbon dioxide. Another 3 % is carbon monoxide. The last 3 % contains the rest of the 4,000 or so chemicals supposedly to be found in smoke… but found, obviously, in very small quantities if at all.This is because most of the assumed chemicals have never actually been found in secondhand smoke. (1989 Report of the Surgeon General p. 80). Most of these chemicals can only be found in quantities measured in nanograms, picograms and femtograms. Many cannot even be detected in these amounts: their presence is simply theorized rather than measured. To bring those quantities into a real world perspective, take a saltshaker and shake out a few grains of salt. A single grain of that salt will weigh in the ballpark of 100 million picograms! (Allen Blackman. Chemistry Magazine 10/08/01). - (Excerpted from "Dissecting Antismokers' Brains" with permission of the author.)

The Myth of the Smoking Ban ‘Miracle’ Restrictions on smoking around the world are claimed to have had a dramatic effect on heart attack rates. It's not true. http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/7451/

As for secondhand smoke in the air, OSHA has stated outright that: "Field studies of environmental tobacco smoke indicate that under normal conditions, the components in tobacco smoke are diluted below existing Permissible Exposure Levels (PELS.) as referenced in the Air Contaminant Standard (29 CFR 1910.1000)...It would be very rare to find a workplace with so much smoking that any individual PEL would be exceeded." -Letter From Greg Watchman, Acting Sec'y, OSHA, To Leroy J Pletten, PHD, July 8, 1997
-harleyrider1978

nemrac

November 18, 2009 - 12:56 am EST

harleyrider1978
u are a joke. do you mind if i smoke?? no do you mind if i fart
tim

Tristar500

November 17, 2009 - 9:11 am EST

The way Harley Rider1978 puts it second hand smoke is a GOOD thing! Maybe I could hire some smokers to come stay at my house so I too could benefit from those nasty cigarettes?

Give me a break!

The people have spoken, a vote was taken and on January 2nd we can all breath deeper and safer.

I'll also be one of the first to report anybody smoking to the health department.

Panacea

November 17, 2009 - 9:14 am EST

harleyrider, your rant is full of BS. Nothing burns and turns into water vapor. There are always solid particles. If there is poison in a cigarette before it burns, the poison is still there in the smoke as it burns.

The medical community accepts the evidence regarding the dangers of second hand smoking.

Even without that, it is a dirty, smell habit. I've been to more than one restaurant with good food and not gone back because the smoking drove me away.

I think bar and restaurant owners will repeat the experiences in New York, California and Washington DC when they implemented their smoking bans: business will go up. Non smokers outnumber smokers. Non smokers will be more inclined to visit establishments they would previously have avoided once the smoke clears.

Lord Trigo

November 17, 2009 - 4:33 pm EST

I'm a musician and biggest reason I get for people not coming to see us is "It's too smoky." People may still love rock n' roll, but an increasing number of them don't want to "die before (they) get old," as the Who put it.

CADDMAN

November 17, 2009 - 4:52 pm EST

Maybe is because your band SUCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :)

Lord Trigo

November 18, 2009 - 2:57 am EST

I suppose that's possible lol. But it's not just my band, though. Truth be told, there's a lot of people who want to see live music but don't want to put up with the smoke, which is another reason why some bands are starting to request non-smoking shows.

Lord Trigo

November 17, 2009 - 4:43 pm EST

Oh, and furthermore a lot of bands have begun requesting "no smoking" at their shows. Seems that the smoke screws up their vocal cords (I can testify to the truth of that).

harleyrider1978

November 17, 2009 - 9:32 am EST

Our you afraid to admit shs/ets is 94% water vapor and normal air.......go check it out and deny it.....I will be laughing all the while....second hand smoke is a joke and all the propaganda thats been pumped about it....of over 200 studies on shsonly 16 showed any positive result and those couldnt break the 3.0 confidence interval required by the courts to be used as evidence....the mountain of shs studies show shs/ets wont harm anyone....the epa study was tossed as junk science not only by a federal judge but by a congressional oversite committee led by henry waxman......You have bought a line of trash science from the govmnt and the health groups....namely the american cancer society..backdoor prohibition aimed at instituting socialism in america....dont be a fool...its all a lie,a healthscare where none exists.

Panacea

November 17, 2009 - 12:27 pm EST

Yes, well crazy people tend to laugh a lot, so knock yourself out.

I'm a nurse. I take care of people with smoking related illnesses: lung cancer, asthma, heart disease. I am all too familiar with the real effects of second hand smoke: babies who have respiratory distress because mom and dad won't quit smoking around them.

You want to kill yourself with cigarettes, fine. Do it at home.

harleyrider1978

November 17, 2009 - 1:04 pm EST

Your not a nurse your a victims advocate.......posting sob storys for smoke free....dont worry as soon as the libs and some rino reps get voted out of raleigh this ban is history......Virginia just elected a govenor that hates the smoking ban....lets see what happens.

Panacea

November 17, 2009 - 7:25 pm EST

Nothing will happen. The ban will have to be overturned by the General Assembly.

Tristar500

November 17, 2009 - 8:51 pm EST

If you really want to be taken seriously at least learn how to spell! Seriously, it's hard to give your childish rants any merit at all given your faint grasp of the written English word.

Lord Trigo

November 17, 2009 - 4:38 pm EST

If smoke is 94% water vapor, why do more people more people die of smoke inhalation in fires than from the flames themselves? Seems like being in a fire would be just like being in a nice warm sauna then. You're going to have to come up with better junk science to defend your questionable "right" to be an inconsiderate asshat.

ChadinGSO

November 17, 2009 - 9:40 am EST

If the bars around here aren't private clubs then why do I have to sign in as a member or guest everytime I go to some of them?

Gerald Witt

November 17, 2009 - 10:06 am EST

The private clubs being discussed as exempt from the law are nonprofit private clubs such as Moose and Elks lodges, not your neighborhood bar.

ChadinGSO

November 19, 2009 - 12:30 pm EST

private is private...you cant choose which private clubs can and cant..thats BS..if you choose to work in a bar that is a private club with smoking that is your choice. Im surprised the class action lawyers havn't jumped on this one yet..or maybe they have...hmmm

generalsn

November 17, 2009 - 9:40 am EST

These smoking bans will probably go down in history as one of the greatest marketing scams ever by having drug companies using tax exempt political action committees calling themselves "charities".
Here's the beginning of the latest ban movement in the USA.

www.rwjf.org/pr/product.jsp?ia=143&id=14912

Here are the instructions from Johnson and Johnsons' (makers of cessation products) RWJ Foundation for their tax exempt political action committees. (charities?) Note on page seven the "inside-out" provision, banning smoking on patios AFTER business owners spend thousands to build them for their smoking customers, clearly showing that they have ABSOLUTLY NO CONCERN for local issues or businesses.
Also note on the last page, they are instructed to keep returning every year until ALL exemptions, are gone.

www.no-smoke.org/pdf/CIA_Fundamentals.pdf

bigwill

November 17, 2009 - 10:14 am EST

Harleyrider and his/her lame posts. Everytime this issue comes up you always post your one sided so called facts. Every post you have ever posted on here has been contradicted and proven otherwise. If you are that stupid that you don't think that smoke period is bad, then you need to be posting comments about mental health issues and not lung issues. I guess we will sit you in an enclosed room of smoke and see how long you last. I guarantee you would not survive. Get real, grow up, and no one wants to smell your trash can self while they are eating.

harleyrider1978

November 17, 2009 - 10:48 am EST

bigwilly you wanna be the anti that comes up and disproves second hand smoke is 94% water vapor and air....come on big boy......do it.I will sit back and laugh......200 studies and the mountains of studies say shs wont harm anyone.just as OSHA states...

bigwill

November 17, 2009 - 12:23 pm EST

This is from your same BMJ website that you got your lame info from earlier. Anyone can go back and forth all day long and find a bunch of so called facts. Obviously it is pointless to try to reason with someone who has no common sense ability. This article explains how the air quality in places that allow smoking are far worse than expected. Try not to only read what you want to beleive to support your cause. There is more substantial evidence supporting second smoke as being harmful than your one article claiming otherwise. A lake is 100% water, but that doesn't mean its healthy for you to drink from it.

http://tobaccocontrol.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/17/3/159?grp=1

bigwill

November 17, 2009 - 12:36 pm EST

Oh by the way, why don't you try using more up to date articles instead of ones posted from the 1980s or 1990s. Maybe try to find a more updated comment from the Surgeon General, like this one from 2006 and not your old water vapor story from the 1989.

The health effects of secondhand smoke exposure are more pervasive than we previously thought,� said Surgeon General Carmona, vice admiral of the U.S. Public Health Service. �The scientific evidence is now indisputable: secondhand smoke is not a mere annoyance. It is a serious health hazard that can lead to disease and premature death in children and nonsmoking adults.� Secondhand smoke contains more than 50 cancer-causing chemicals, and is itself a known human carcinogen. Nonsmokers who are exposed to secondhand smoke inhale many of the same toxins as smokers. Even brief exposure to secondhand smoke has immediate adverse effects on the cardiovascular system and increases risk for heart disease and lung cancer, the report says. In addition, the report notes that because the bodies of infants and children are still developing, they are especially vulnerable to the poisons in secondhand smoke.

harleyrider1978

November 17, 2009 - 12:50 pm EST

I can see the acs tossing up the headline second hand smoke will kill you its 94% water vapor......thatd really fly......and Im laughing all the way..........Now surgeon general carmonas 2006 report is a rehash of the 1992 epa study that was thrown out by a federal judge right there in north carolina.........he said after 4 years it was junk science and he was further confirmed when the congress had hearings on it and made a committee to research it.
they came back from an independent body and confirmed what judge osteen had said..epa study is junk science and mr anti-tobacco henry waxman was in charge of it.......bwahhha..then surgeon general carmona was asked to name just one death to shs/ets.....his answer was ' I cant name any,and all my ficticious shs deaths were computer generated,after those statements at a congressional hearing mr carmona decided to retire to private life........

harleyrider1978

November 17, 2009 - 12:54 pm EST

so sorry big willy....but 94% water vapor is gonna get the entire second hand smoke claims laughed right out into the lake........you ever heard of '' DOSE MAKES THE POISON.........thats what epidemiology goes by and welll

here I will just show you how asenine it is to even think shs is gonna harm ya or anyone......

Outdoor bans are even crazier than indoor bans. The chemical make-up of shs is nearly 94% water vapor and A SLIGHT AMOUNT OF CARBON DIOXIDE with about 3% being carbon monoxide AND 3% CONTAINING THOSE SUPPOSED KILLER CARCENOGENS.........

n-nitrosomines which you hear so much about is actually arsenic..what they dont tell you is that the measurements they took match the naturally occuring arsenic in the air outside everywhere.
they measured levels at 0-29 picograms....which is totally safe...the amount has to be 5 million times that to be harmful to humans........you see how they switched it. Trying to blame shs for what is actually a natural thing. The levels of other things in shs if they can be measured at all are millions if not billions of times smaller than the amounts needed to harm anyone......just remember this second hand smoke is a joke within nano seconds from the burn it turns into WATER VAPOR.....Even the exhaled smoke is loaded down with water vapor...osha has said nothing in shs/ets is going to harm you or anyone else.....what shs will do is irritate those with weak immune responces.......thats why shs is classified as a class 3 IRRITANT BY OSHA AND THE EPA.....Remember this a prohibition movement must rely on scare tactics and big money in order to succeed to the level of getting legislation....These outdoor regulations are even crazier than the first claims made for indoor bans.......lets do the silly math if one cig lets off 29 pico grams.We will use the high side of their measurement........and it takes 5 million picograms then thats 5 million divided by 29 = IN CIGARETTES SMOKED AT ONE TIME IN A SEALED ROOM.........172,414 CIGS SMOKED SIMULTANEOUSLY..........DIVIDE THAT BY 20 TO GET PACKS.........8620 PACKS ALL TOGETHER AT THE SAME TIME...........SECOND HAND SMOKE IS A JOKE........and this same thing applies to anything they claim in shs/ets.........dont be fooled

Of course the idea of "thousands of chemicals" can itself sound spooky. Perhaps it would help to note that coffee contains over 1000 chemicals, 19 of which are known to be rat carcinogens.
-"Rodent Carcinogens: Setting Priorities" Gold Et Al., Science, 258: 261-65 (1992)

There. Feel better?

As for secondhand smoke in the air, OSHA has stated outright that:

"Field studies of environmental tobacco smoke indicate that under normal conditions, the components in tobacco smoke are diluted below existing Permissible Exposure Levels (PELS.) as referenced in the Air Contaminant Standard (29 CFR 1910.1000)...It would be very rare to find a workplace with so much smoking that any individual PEL would be exceeded."
-Letter From Greg Watchman, Acting Sec'y, OSHA, To Leroy J Pletten, PHD, July 8, 1997

Indeed it would.

Independent health researchers have done the chemistry and the math to prove how very very rare that would be.

As you're about to see in a moment.

In 1999, comments were solicited by the government from an independent Public and Health Policy Research group, Littlewood & Fennel of Austin, Tx, on the subject of secondhand smoke.

Using EPA figures on the emissions per cigarette of everything measurable in secondhand smoke, they compared them to OSHA's PELs.

The following excerpt and chart are directly from their report and their Washington testimony:

CALCULATING THE NON-EXISTENT RISKS OF ETS

"We have taken the substances for which measurements have actually been obtained--very few, of course, because it's difficult to even find these chemicals in diffuse and diluted ETS.

"We posit a sealed, unventilated enclosure that is 20 feet square with a 9 foot ceiling clearance.

"Taking the figures for ETS yields per cigarette directly from the EPA, we calculated the number of cigarettes that would be required to reach the lowest published "danger" threshold for each of these substances. The results are actually quite amusing. In fact, it is difficult to imagine a situation where these threshold limits could be realized.

"Our chart (Table 1) illustrates each of these substances, but let me report some notable examples.

"For Benzo[a]pyrene, 222,000 cigarettes would be required to reach the lowest published "danger" threshold.

"For Acetone, 118,000 cigarettes would be required.

"Toluene would require 50,000 packs of simultaneously smoldering cigarettes.

"At the lower end of the scale-- in the case of Acetaldehyde or Hydrazine, more than 14,000 smokers would need to light up simultaneously in our little room to reach the threshold at which they might begin to pose a danger.

"For Hydroquinone, "only" 1250 cigarettes are required. Perhaps we could post a notice limiting this 20-foot square room to 300 rather tightly-packed people smoking no more than 62 packs per hour?

"Of course the moment we introduce real world factors to the room -- a door, an open window or two, or a healthy level of mechanical air exchange (remember, the room we've been talking about is sealed) achieving these levels becomes even more implausible.

"It becomes increasingly clear to us that ETS is a political, rather than scientific, scapegoat."

harleyrider1978

November 17, 2009 - 1:23 pm EST

ya I read about their supposed air quality monitoring testing fiasco.........heres what they did. They tried using outdoor air quality testing standards on indoor facilities as a way to make an even more extreme headline.....
rest assured it was for the headline......osha is in charge of indoor air quality and epa has outdoor,both are two diferent environments..what epa standards are for testing is to set those same meters the nazis used only outside and take air samples over weeks and months then do an equation to average out so called pollution....now the smoke free wacks did this inside facilities with no ventilation whatsoever. EPA would call this placing the monitor right on top of a smoke stack............which they dont do as they have to concider disipation of air particles..now when you toss in ventilation which epa has to use in its equation you get quite diferent readings than the stupid 30 minute time frame the smoke free folks did.....point still is this particulate matter doesnt cause disease......it will cause irritation......and as long as epa maintains outdoor air monitoring factories are allowed to operate as long as their emissions are below what epa calls safe for humans...thats where oshas pel's come in......dose makes the posion.....and trying to fabricate science with outdoor air quality standards isnt science its propaganda.

bigwill

November 18, 2009 - 9:48 am EST

OSHA has nothing to do with consumers only employers and safety for their employees. OSHA regulations are based on an 8 hour continuos work shift. OSHA standards are also a minimum standard, basically just enough to get by with operating a business. Quit trying to spread your cause with out dated propaganda, misconstrude, and missing facts. I see that you lack any sort of intelect that there is and I guess just keep sitting at home smoking your cigarette. I will be thinking of you while you are trying to figure out how to strap your oxygen tank onto your harley.

Lakeshia

November 17, 2009 - 10:48 am EST

What kind of ignorant doofus would suck smoke into their respiratory system? Cigarette users are nothing more than foul smelling druggies with bad breath who lack common sense, will power, and personal discipline - there is little difference between tobacco farmers and Latin American growers of the plant (coca) from which cocaine is derived - both cater to human weaknesses and make significant contributions to ill health and early deaths - cigarette sellers and marketers are actutally nothing more than drug pushers - every time I see someone using one of those personal portable oxygen tanks with the little plastic tubes running up their nose I approach them ever so quietly & politely ask them if they have a cigarette I can bum - having a smoking section in a restaurant makes about as much sense as having a urinating section in a swimming pool -

roses1

November 18, 2009 - 4:00 am EST

You say we are ignorant as I am sure you have done many an ignorat things> It is the food recalls that has been so rampant for the last two years we better be worried about more than smoking!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

harleyrider1978

November 17, 2009 - 10:50 am EST

urinating in a swimming pool is actually a very bad comparison as pool water gets filtered constantly but the witer onyl gets cjange 1 time a year yet its kept clean with chemicals.....second hand smoke even in an unveltilated room sealed off still isnt going to harm you....but the air is actually filtered thousands of times per hour....next

Lakeshia

November 17, 2009 - 11:12 am EST

D minus.
Please rewrite all your posts using correct spelling, proper punctuation, and cohesive sentence structure.

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