Atlanta Considering Amendment to Clean Air Act
Down in Atlanta a proposed amendment to the county's Clean Indoor Air Ordinance would place more sweeping restrictions on where smokers can light up at. Of course, if more people turned to the smokeless e cig, perhaps there would be no need to have the debate at all.
If passed, the amendment would ban smoking at free-standing bars, adult-entertainment establishments and outdoor venues. The latter would include parks and playgrounds, entrances and exits to buildings, outdoor entertainment areas, and outdoor service lines (like those at an ATM). Additionally, area hotels would have to cut their smoking rooms back from 25 percent of the total rooms to just 10 percent.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Office of the Surgeon General, exposure to secondhand smoke leads to serious health risks:
? Nonsmokers who inhale secondhand smoke have a 25 percent to 30 percent higher risk of developing heart disease and a 20 percent to 30 percent higher risk of developing lung cancer. If more smokers would quit or switch to aforementioned smoke-free e cig, this would be far less of an issue.
? Breathing secondhand smoke for even a short time can have instantaneous negative effects on the cardiovascular system and interferes with the normal functioning of the heart, blood and vascular systems. As a result, the risk of heart attack then increases.
? Concentrations of many carcinogens and toxic chemicals are even higher in secondhand smoke than they are in that inhaled by actual smokers.
Proponents of the changes to the ordinance argue that anyone who is interested in bettering public health should be on the side of it. They say that, if passed, it would cut back on the amount of smoking in public and would therefore protect many nonsmokers from inhaling unwanted smoke from cigarettes. Unlike with the electronic cigarette, traditional cigarettes are full of all sorts of deadly chemicals beyond just nicotine and tobacco.
As a result, a whole host of public health hazards are passed on. Dealing with said hazards costs money; money that gets factored into public health care budgets and health insurance premiums. These costs are then shouldered by smokers and nonsmokers alike. Area residents will have to fight hard for the revision to the ordinance if they no longer want to be burdened by those costs.
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