Description
This article is from the Smokers FAQ,
by jdawson@netcom.com (Joe Dawson) with numerous contributions by
others.
03 Hasn't the EPA determined that secondhand smoke (SHS) is killing innocent people? Why on earth would they lie about something like that?
A: Since the 1960s most doctors and public health organizations have
believed smoking to be a primary cause of lung cancer and pre-mature
heart disease. Acting on this belief they urged everyone to give up smoking.
It didn't work: people kept on smoking anyway.
In the early 1970s radical Antismoking groups like ASH and GASP began
increasing pressure on mainstream health groups like the American Lung
and Heart Associations . Such groups had previously avoided efforts for
widespread smoking bans as too authoritarian and lacking scientific basis.
By the late 70s however, they realized that the public health goal of
reducing smoking was stuck: a new approach was needed.. While smokers
resisted pressure to quit for their own health, a campaign promoting
peer and family pressures through fear of SHS might be more effective.
Early propaganda studies involved such bizarre situations as burning 10
cigarettes in a 6.7m^3 chamber (i.e. a closed and sealed "walk-in closet").
The extreme optic and respiratory irritation of "nonsmokers exposed to
smoke" was then publicized. More recent studies have looked for almost
invisible increases in lung cancer risk among nonsmokers who live or work
closely with smokers for 30, 40, or more years. The results of these studies
are rarely statistically significant, and don't address casual exposures in
public places. No effort is made to examine the effects of better
ventilation in offices or restaurants in order to establish safe levels of
SHS exposure. Research is directed almost solely toward producing political
pressure for total bans.
Why is this? Because the most effective way of reducing smoking in
America is thought to be segregating smokers, turning them into social
"lepers", and ultimately convincing even smokers themselves that they are
killing their children and co-workers. Therefore, research studies designed
to "find" such effects are the ones that get funded.
In 1992 the EPA came out with a highly publicized "official" report claiming
a small but significant excess risk of lung cancer in those exposed to SHS on
an intense daily basis for periods of 40 or more years. They declared that
SHS was a human carcinogen (that's what a "Class A" carcinogen is:
Class A has nothing to do with any relative "degree" of carcinogenicity).
That finding was based on the results of 11 studies which had found almost
no scientifically significant evidence to support such a conclusion. The EPA
derived the conclusion only by changing their normal guidelines and standards.
(for example, they lowered the standard 95% significance level to 90%.)
On the basis of this report, thousands of businesses and offices throughout
the United States banned smoking in the 1990s .
In 1998 the EPA report was finally declared invalid in a federal court and its
conclusions were thrown out, though with much less publicity.
~~From: the-cat@dog.com ~~
(Quote from Appeals Court Ruling Striking Down EPA Report.)
"In this case, EPA publicly committed to a conclusion before research had
begun.... EPA disregarded information and made findings on selective
information; did not disseminate significant epidemiologic information;
deviated from its Risk Assessment Guidelines; failed to disclose important
findings and reasoning; and left significant questions without answers.
EPA's conduct left substantial holes in the administrative record. While
so doing, EPA produced limited evidence, then claimed the weight of
the Agency's research evidence demonstrated ETS causes cancer."
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