Environmental Tobacco Smoke Falls Well Within Safe Limit
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James Repace says that "Smoke-free buildings are the only remedy.
Secondhand smoke cannot be controlled by ventilation, air cleaning, or
spatial separation of smokers from nonsmokers." and that it would take
a "tornado-force wind" to clear smoke from a bar - a notion that even
the most ardent anti-smoker should realise is bunk if for no other
reasons than a) respiratory illness went UP in airplane passengers and
workers after smoking was prohibited because the ventilation was also
removed and b) ventilation works just fine in labs using the most toxic
chemicals we can think of.
The truth, however, is that SHS in a
bar poses no health risk. The anti-smoking group American Cancer
Society conducted an air quality test and found (surprise, surprise)
that environmental tobacco smoke (ETS/SHS) is up to 25,000 times safer
than the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA)
regulations for clean air. Despite the number going 'up to' 25,000, the
lowest is went was 500 times safer - so at no point was a room found
with ETS that was even CLOSE to breaking the safe limit point.
The
test was conducted using nicotine, because - and this may come as a
surprise to you non-smokers - nicotine is the ONLY unique chemical
since the chemicals in cigarettes are also found in the air and other
places, so testing for them would yield misleading results as the test
would also pick up chemicals already present in the air. Or, in other
words, a smoke-free room has all the chemicals in cigarette smoke
anyway, bar nicotine - although you'll get that from a healthy lunch of
potato with tomato. Oops!
Now, for all of you thinking that
there is simply so much in the smoke, here's the truth: of the tests
conducted, the highest amount was 940 nanograms/cu.M - a nanogram being
0.000000001 of a gram (or, in other words, fuck all). The OSHA says the
safe limit for a full-time worker (40 hours per week, 8 hours a day) is
0.5mg/cu.M. So, to work it out, the results must be compared with the
OSHA permissible exposure limits (PEL). To do this, we divide the safe
level (0.5mg) by the ACS result of 20 nanograms, which is 0.00002 of a
mg. The result of 0.5/0.00002 is 25,000, thus meaning ETS is 25,000
times safer than OSHA regulations. The ACS have an upper reading of 940
nanograms, using the same calculation of 0.5mg divided by 0.000940 we
are left with 532. These results mean that ETS is safe by OSHA
regulations, by anywhere between 532 and 25,000 times. In short: the
ACS data indicates that tobacco smoke does not constitute a hazard to
the health of those exposed to smoke, and a government ban on smoking
in enclosed places is unjustified.
Further to the above, a
letter from Greg Watchman, Acting Assistant Secretary of the OSHA, to
Leroy J Pletten, PHD on July 8th 1997 read as follows:
“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."
Some people believe that a room without smoke is a
room with clean air, but this is not the case – air contains less
visible pollutants, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, radon and chemical
carcinogens. Good air cleaners are capable of making the air in a
building cleaner than the air outside, which is polluted with exhaust
fumes. Tobacco smoke particles have been measured at about 1 micron –
good systems can remove everything down to .30 of a micron. In fact,
tests have shown the air in a smoking venue with a good air-cleaning
system to be cleaner than the air in a non-smoking venue without one.
So, in view of all this, can someone remind me why the bans are necessary?