Smoking ban puts bad air outside

Smoking bans have made the air healthier in bars and restaurants, but may have made the air just outside the establishments more hazardous, University of Georgia researchers have found.
Nonsmoking diners and imbibers sitting in outdoor patios or sidewalk seating areas connected to the bars or restaurants are picking up doses of secondhand smoke, the scientists found.
In fact, nonsmokers who volunteered to sit in the outdoor seating areas had levels of a tobacco byproduct in their bodies up to 162 percent higher than when they first sat down, said Luke Naeher, a professor in the university's environmental health science department.Collaborating with researchers in the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Northeast Health District, Mr. Naeher and other UGA researchers measured levels of a substance called cotinine.
Mr. Naeher's research team assigned 20 nonsmoking volunteers to spend six evening hours in one of three outdoor areas for the study -- outside a downtown Athens bar, outside a restaurant near downtown or outside UGA's main library."We're looking at real-world settings," Mr. Naeher said.
After six hours, the volunteers gave a saliva sample, which the researchers tested for cotinine, a nicotine byproduct often used as an indicator of tobacco exposure.
Volunteers who hung out where smokers gather outside a restaurant saw their cotinine levels more than double. Nonsmokers outside a bar had their cotinine increase by even more, up to 162 percent.
The study is published in this month's issue of the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene .
Previous studies have shown that restaurant and bar smoking bans reduce the incidence of heart attacks and respiratory illness among people inside the establishments.
But researchers don't know the health impacts of outdoor secondhand smoke."The question is, is it an environment that warrants concern or further study?" Mr. Naeher said. "The answer is, we don't know yet."
The researchers aren't quite ready to declare outdoor cafes a new health hazard for those that may inhale secondhand smoke there -- including children, restaurant and bar workers, and pregnant women and their unborn children.
"We feel like it's something we need to be taking a look at," said Lou Kudon, one of the authors of the study. Mr. Kudon is program manager for the Athens-based Northeast Health District, which includes Clarke and nine other area counties.
Next, researchers will measure levels of a carcinogen called NNAL in nonsmokers who spend time in outdoor places where people smoke.

Cigarette packages to feature graphic images

Turkey will start warning smokers with both written and pictorial cautions on cigarette packages in 2010.The chairman of the Turkish Tobacco & Alcohol Market Regulation Board (TAPDK), Mehmet Küçük, said on Sunday that the board would start warning smokers with both written statements and pictures as of Jan. 1, 2010. “In addition to the current written warnings, there will be 14 pictures on cigarette and other tobacco product packages,” Küçük told the Anatolia news agency. Küçük said the board would try to draw attention to the harms of cigarettes with this method.
There are 180 different types of cigarette packages in Turkey. All these packages will be changed to include the new visual warning system.
Tobacco companies will switch over to the new packaging at designated intervals. Cigarette packages produced through Dec. 31, which include only written warnings, can be put on the market through June 30, 2010. Both visual and written warnings must cover 65 percent of the cigarette packages, according to the new regulations. One year after the switch, by Jan. 1, 2011, every cigarette package on shelves in Turkey must have the pictorial warning.
Visual warning on cigarette packages is a system already in place in countries including the UK, Belgium, Romania, Brazil, Thailand and Singapore. The European Union has 42 sample pictures for visual warnings on tobacco products. Turkey will choose 14 of these pictures for domestic use. Research indicates that visual warnings are effective in 20 percent of cases of people who want to quit smoking.
Turkey banned smoking in workplaces and malls in May 2008. It gave restaurants, bars and cafés extra time to comply with the new smoking ban. The expanded smoking ban went into effect across Turkey on June 19. Under it, it is illegal to smoke in coffeehouses, cafeterias, pubs, clubs, restaurants and taxis, and advertising or promoting tobacco products or the names and brands of tobacco-producing companies is prohibited, as well.
Turkey became the seventh country in Europe to ban smoking in all enclosed public places.