In New York City, a so-called public health ordinance is being considered that would vastly increase the number of deaths from secondhand smoke. Secondhand tobacco smoke causes thousands of deaths every year from cancer, heart disease, and respiratory illnesses, attacks the immune system, and lowers resistance to many air borne diseases. Tobacco smoke carries carcinogens - cancer causing chemicals, and particulate matter, including radioactive particulate matter. For additional information, please see testimony by James Repace . This ordinance is akin to pouring raw sewage into a swimming pool, then telling people not to worry because the city ordinance has required a special filter that gets rid of SOME of the sewage.
Smokers can still smoke - outside, and in private.
But their death dealing pollution should not be permitted in any restaurant or other workplace. The tobacco industry, which has created an addictive product that kills one out of every two users, has lied to their consumers and to the public in general about tobacco. Now the tobacco industry is seeking the right to trample on the civil rights of everyone, by discriminating against those who choose NOT to smoke. The tobacco industry wants to force everyone to smoke - even if it is only secondhand. This is not only an unhealthy ordinance proposed, but one that is so immoral and unconscionable, it must have been written by the tobacco industry itself.