I can choose to patronize a “gun free” restaurant, the owner cannot make it safe. I know it’s unsafe when I enter, if there’s a problem I don’t believe I have any recourse with the restaurant. I choose not to patronize “gun free” businesses. In the case of hospitals, medical offices, etc., in most of the country if not all these places are legally “gun free zones”. You cannot protect yourself and they cannot protect you and if something happens you have no recourse. You cannot simply go down the street to the next medical center where you will find a firearms welcome sign. I’m for abolishing gun free zones or as they have here “Weapons free Zones”, I guess they’re afraid I’d bring my hammer but if I did we’d all be more safe.
I think government imposed/declared gun free zones are simply un-Constitutional. Like you, I avoid private entities that declare them, but I still think the property owners have the right to do with their property as they see fit, and their patrons or visitors can exercise their right of association as they see fit.
In gun free zones in places like hospitals where there is a security force that is armed, their rules must be written in a way to allow at least some guns. They would also have to define who could and could not have a gun...security, police, and governmental agents, I suppose, would be the limits of it. Sometimes, though, when they write those rules up, there are holes in the write-up.