Clearing The Air

UPDATED: Somebody sent me a link to a "new study" from California about secondhand smoke.

It was titled "State of California says Second-Hand smoke makes women and children...." smell like smoke.

I love this line from the "study"

".....New findings in the Cal-EPA report, Part B, include: a "causal link" between secondhand smoke exposure and pre-term delivery........"

It reminds me of all their other "studies" which have the phrases:

"It is estimated..."
"We believe.."
"Studies suggest...."
"Officials speculate...."
"Possible link....."

The one I'd like to see from the smoking ban activists is "We've been paid by the Nicoderm people to say secondhand smoke is harmful....." at least it would be honest. Perhaps the only honest phrase provided by any of these groups.

And I'm sure we can all agree babies that smell of smoke is a good enough reason to ban smoking in privately owned bars.

UPDATE: It should be noted that the source of this study and the recommendation to the California Air Resources Board to list environmental tobacco smoke as hazardous, comes from UCLA John Froines Phd. UCLA has received millions of dollars from the Nicoderm people, special interest funding which makes any study they cite highly suspect to say the least.

As a side note, the test results below come directly from UCLA papers (bottom page 3, item 2), they find nicotine results, just as the City of St. Louis Park Environmental Health Department did, ranging from 0.01 - 5 ug / cu. M. The OSHA permissible exposure limit is 0.5 mg / cu. M.

California Air Resources Board (CARB) test results .00000001 - .000005 g / cu. M.

OSHA acceptable .0005 g / cu. M.

In other words CARB test results are 50,000 -100 times lower (safer than) OSHA requirements.

posted by marcus aurelius @ 11:32 PM