Another lie about smoking exposed
Tuesday, April 13, 2010 A few weeks ago is was argued that smoking in cars is 23 times more toxic than in other enclosed areas such as the pub. More than one anti-tobacco campaigner used it as an excuse to ban smoking in cars. Surprise, surprise, it's not true.
"In a subsequent exhaustive search of the relevant literature, we failed to locate any scientific source for this comparison," writes Ross MacKenzie, School of Public Health, University of Sydney, Australia.
"Given that the issue of banning smoking in cars is gaining traction internationally, use of this media-friendly tobacco control 'fact' presents potential problems of credibility."
The 23 times estimate has evolved from being a brief quotation in a US newspaper to entering the academic mainstream in 1998 when a Tobacco Control editorial closely copied the previous quote. Both the newspaper report and the editorial were then cited in an issue of Nicotine and Tobacco Research.
"The biggest danger of inaccurately interpreting research on smoking in cars for the sake of a snappy media sound bite is to lose favour with an overwhelmingly supportive public and to provide ammunition for opponents of tobacco control," the authors said.
Full story HERE.
Reader Comments (16)
Interesting. I see also that Panorama is going to be claiming tonight that "Between 500 to 1,000 children a year end up in hospital because they are exposed to their parents' smoking" (ref the Alder Hey story). Glue ear appears to be the latest stick to beat us with. Sigh.
When you consider the toxins in car exhaust as well it's obvious to even the least scientifical mind that it is complete twaddle.
Yes they the (anti tobacco zelots) are strongly contributing to undermining public confidence in science.
Especially medical science.
Question to any doctor who thinks prohibitionary measures are a good idea .here's my backlash.
Imagine I am wearing a propellor head cap ,the propellor spinning round whilst playing a small ditty.
My question.
Why do more children get Asthma when less adults smoke.
Why aren,t less people dying when less people smoke.
None of the anti smokers logic adds up ,does it.
It's the Boy Who Cried Wolf syndrom. How many people now shrug their shoulders these days when another 'pandemic' is said to be upon us, after the fiasco and wasted funds on the Swine Flu?
This sort of thing has been going on, however, for years. This year, this is the way you should bring up your baby and toddler and this is what you should feed them on. Next year, that will be totally wrong and in fact, harmful to your children.
Same old, same old. One so called scientific report says one thing, so we are all expected to take it as gospel; then another report says the opposite and that is now gospel.
The only difference with the anti smoking and anti drinking lot is that any reports that don't support their thinking are buried and rarely see the light of day!
Corruption becoming even more corrupt and the fact that our politicians keep falling for it is what is really scarey!
Snap!
http://velvetgloveironfist.blogspot.com/2010/04/junk-from-canada-and-surprising.html
It seems in wooden basset even the pigeons suffer from second hand smoke
http://www.swindonadvertiser.co.uk/news/8092804.Smokers_banished_from_shelter_while_bird_nests/
The smoking ban has forced millions to stay at home
for a drink and smoke,no wonder the kids are getting
more exposure than they did before July 07.
The way I see it is all the anti smoking quangos that employ 'highly qualified' graduates/experts/professors etc on massive salaries, cant afford to let the anti smoking bullshit of words stop, whether it be true or false.
Otherwise they could not justify their jobs or salaries and most importantly their payback votes at election time and of course the expounding of the brainwashing tool that keeps it all ticking over nicely.
I think that the silence of the three main parties on the Smoking issue is very telling when its Omerta on the S word in each of their manifestos.
Specky -
Re:
"When you consider the toxins in car exhaust as well it's obvious to even the least scientifical mind that it is complete twaddle."
You would THINK it'd be obvious, wouldn't you ?
And yet - following the lead of those inspiring nutjobs over in the Sunshine State - HR departments up and down the land are STILL banning smoking in car parks, whether inside one's car or outside.
What jolly times we live in !
Let's just pray that Prime Minister Dave doesn't spoil things by going all 'sensible' on us...................
Lyn -
"Same old, same old."
Funny you should say that !
Only a couple of days ago, I was playing a Seventies jazz-rock album by the great Dick Heckstall-Smith (and friends). One track is entitled 'The Same Old Thing', and it includes the following lyric:
"There's no Crown of Thorns for a King -
No-one to put your faith in."
Don't you find it rather dispiriting to consider how FEW people there are to admire or TRUST these days in our Public Life - in Science, Academia, the Arts, Business, the Church, or Politics ?
Smoking aside, why, for example, am I STILL having to endure all this dreary babble by some drearily-uninformed babbler on Radio 4 about 'carbon emissions' ?
P-L-E-A-S-E..................!
And politicians wonder why there's so much corrosive cynicism in our society.
When (it seems) the most widely-admired 'role model' among the Uneducated Young is probably some footballer of indeterminate origin with a bottle-blonde girlfriend - if not the bottle-blonde girlfriend herself - I'm distinctly underwhelmed by the prospects for our beautiful country.
This rotten parliament have been well and truly infiltrated by lobbyists and pressure groups.
The silent majority are unrepresented.
I'm sure that is the true root of the problem.
Our prime minister is not Gordon Brown though i'd rather he wasn't.
No the real political leader in parliament is Mandelson.
He is the EU stooge ,he is there to keep an eye on them.
He is there to make sure they comply with Brussels.
What was the Norwegian word for it.
Oh yes I remember,
Quisling.
UKIP for me, I don't care if they only get a few seats ,it's a start and will fire a shot across the bows of the rotten hulk that is our parliament.
I think you're right, Specky.
Makes good mathematical sense, too:
The greater the number of Sensible People voting for/joining UKIP, the proportionately less significant the number of 'Weirdos' to whom Simon alludes.
Not that the Big Three are exactly Weirdo-free.
Just Smoke-free...................
“The biggest danger of inaccurately interpreting research on smoking in cars for the sake of a snappy media sound bite is to lose favour with an overwhelmingly supportive public and to provide ammunition for opponents of tobacco control."
Rather late to the party, and missing the point a bit here, aren't they? Because, quite apart from the loss of credibility which “science” has suffered over successive years through over-use and target-based manipulation of data, if the real science was all that was ever reported, the surprisingly low risk from active smoking and the very negligible risk from passive smoking wouldn’t in the first place have resulted in the “public” he talks about being so “overwhelmingly supportive.”
On a recent TV promotional walkabout of some factory workers by darling Dave & crew, a worker in the background asked him what was he going to do about the immigration problem.
I nearly spluttered with laughter when poor Dave mumbled something in a nervous fashion, one would think he was being asked his views on the Smoking Ban or something unmentionable like that, I'm sure I even saw his hands shake, before he put his head down and did a runner for the exit quicker than a puff of smoke.
And that was the end of the interview, bless him.
He means well.
"a snappy media sound bite ........"
Er, such as
"an overwhelmingly supportive public ", for example, Ross ?
Still, who are WE to challenge the assumptions behind an idea which is 'gaining traction internationally' ?
Strewth, Cobber - you ARE getting sophisticated Down Under: first Chemistry, and now Physics !
Gotta have 'traction'.
It's what keeps the Bandwagon on the road.
Unlike all those slippery FACTS..............
"He means well."
Trouble is, Ann, he sometimes has difficulties remembering his script (and his camera mark).
And possibly his 'motivation' (it's a HUGE problem with students of The Method).
It's high time they recruited some REAL actors into Politics: these amateurs are hopelessly unconvincing, don't you find ?
Martin V - "Don't you find it rather dispiriting to consider how FEW people there are to admire or TRUST these days in our Public Life - in Science, Academia, the Arts, Business, the Church, or Politics ?"
I find it extremely dispiriting!
My one pleasure is my smoking and if that is restrained any further then I can't see that there is much else worth living for! I do not want to be an automatom or android of this, or any other governments making, I want to be ME, and to be left alone to enjoy the one pleasure I still have, just!