Ford limits where workers can smoke -oh brother

STLToday.com ^ | 11/04/2003 | Todd C. Frankel

[SheLion]

The Ford auto plant in Hazelwood started this week to restrict where its 2,500 workers can smoke on the job, ending the decades-long practice of allowing workers to light up almost anywhere.

The change was prompted by pressure from state officials and anti-smoking groups, who claimed the Ford policy violated Missouri's Clean Indoor Air law.

[Ditter]

So glad to hear the spots in your lungs were not cancer. I stayed too long in a casino in Reno a few years ago, breathing heavy smoke, & developed one of those places inside my nostril. It took a while to heal but finally it did. Some of us are VERY sensative to tobacco smoke. Glad you are off the cancer sticks. Congrats!

[Carolinamom]

I'm curious about how that woman who works in a paper mill could smell anything other than the sulfurous smell of the papermaking process?

[cavtrooper21]

4 1/2 months...

[ARA]

It's been a year and two months for me ... can't stand the smell.. but I did not become a NAZI... I tell people to move or get out of their way... Good Luck.. it does get easier

[cavtrooper21]

I try very hard not to be, except in my own house...
of course you can't tell Shelion that.. I'm her favorite . . . I think the term she used was "jackal". There are days and there are days, but I guess that's true when you're recovering from any addiction. BTW HI SHELION!!! STAYIN" WARM!!!! (can't send you any firewood or propane, but hows about a bottle of brandy, for "medicinal" purposes)

[SheLion]

Honestly, you do come off as an addicted champion of bad and unhealthy habits, though, even though you may be a very sweet person.

This has nothing to do with me. I am just fighting for the rights of the business owners.

[SheLion]

.........you come 'round me and smoke, I'm gonna come 'round you and fart.

ooohhhhhh SEXY! You pick your nose too?

[SheLion]

though I must admit I do have a positive bias towards Limestone, Mainers. :-)

Sorry to disappoint you, but I don't live in Limestone, and I am not a Mainer. I am a transplant. Originally from Ohio.

[SheLion]

BTW HI SHELION!!! STAYIN" WARM!!!! (can't send you any firewood or propane, but hows about a bottle of brandy, for "medicinal" purposes)

I have plenty of firewood and propane, thanks. And sorry. I don't drink.

[Xenalyte]

SHE DID????????? HOW DO YOU KNOW THAT???

Says so in the story (and is conveniently red and underlined in the original):

"I was tickled pink that they did it," said Judd, who was laid off from Chrysler over the summer.

[SheLion]

Says so in the story (and is conveniently red and underlined in the original):

Ah! Thanks! I felt you knew from first hand. Thanks again!

[HamiltonJay]

Jeez, seems simply from a safety and product quality perspective that the plant should have been a little more restrictive of where people smoke, than simply anywhere paint and or fuel is not present.

[jimt]

It's the virulent anti-smokers who offer no accommodation, don't respect us as free and thinking individuals and don't want any bar anywhere to allow a whiff of tobacco that deserve the contempt of real conservatives.

Bingo !

[SheLion]

Jeez, seems simply from a safety and product quality perspective that the plant should have been a little more restrictive of where people smoke, than simply anywhere paint and or fuel is not present.

I can't believe that either. I used to work at Packard Electric making wire harnesses for vehicles. We had a break room in the back by the rest rooms where we ate our lunch and took our smoke breaks. We could only have a beverage at our stations. Never any smoking in our area! And that was years ago!

[Xenalyte]

Actually, it was Mears who first asserted Ms. Judd's layoff. I was just following up on his behalf. (Mears, are you a guy? If not, my bad. :)

[SheLion]

Actually, it was Mears who first asserted Ms. Judd's layoff. I was just following up on his behalf. (Mears, are you a guy? If not, my bad. :)

Sometimes, I am multi-tasking, and miss a post or two. Thanks for keeping me straight. :)

[Quix]

MANY weeks ago in a thread far away on FR

http://www.freerepublic.com/perl/post?id=1016581%2C63

I noted that I had written an expert in my network. He finally received my message having left his work email it was addressed to earlier. His reply follows:

Qx

---

I am now ... for Tobacco Prevention and Control at the Hawaii Community Foundation (HCF). Very briefly, the HCF administers the Hawaii Prevention and Control Trust Fund, which receives 12.5% of the funds Hawaii receives each year from the Master Settlement Agreement (MSA) with the big 4 tobacco companies. As Hawaii receives around $35-40 million from the MSA each year, the Tobacco Prevention and Control Trust Fund gets approximately $4-5 million each year. While this is a lot, the CDC recommendation for Hawaii for a comprehensive tobacco control program, based on successful programs in other states, is between $10 and 23 million a year. So the Trust Fund gets about half of the CDC minimum, but this a tremendous improvement of what funds were available previously. My new responsibilities are to translate the strategic directions and funding recommendations made by the Trust Fund 11 person Advisory Board into actual programs.


As for the continued controversy regarding the health effects of second hand smoke (SHS), this continues to be an area where there is a continued, conscious effort to discredit and deny what we really do know. For a long time the tobacco industry has worked to confuse the issue and to continue to challenge the science.

Because up until recently the technology didn't exist to clinically measure any effect of exposure to SHS, most of the early data regarding the health effects of SHS were based on epidemiological studies comparing the onset of disease in people living with smokers with those that did not. The tobacco industry did a very good job in convincing many people that this was simply "juke science."

However, even Philip Morris is now, on their website, is saying the public should be guided by public health officials regarding exposure to SHS (recently they also finally conceded that smoking itself causes serious illness.) I have cut and pasted the language from the PM website below, and you can go to

http://www.pmusa.com/health_issues/secondhand_smoke.asp

as the source.


There are also at least two studies I am aware of that have now clinically demonstrated cardiac output changes as a result of exposure to only 30 minutes of exposure to SHS. I have included links to one of these studies in this email, and have also attached a PDF file that speaks to this.


Link to the summary of July 2001 JAMA article regarding the "Acute Effects of Passive Smoking on the Coronary Circulation in Healthy Young Adults."

http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/short/286/4/436


Another excellent site with numerous links to SHS exposure studies, and documents about what the tobacco industry knew, when they knew, and how they continue to try to confuse the issue is the Americans for Nonsmokers' Rights website at www.no-smoke.org. Click on the "second hand smoke" page.


Another abstract from the Tobacco Control Journal documents how much higher the levels of exposure to SHS is in bars;

http://tc.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/abstract/12/3/333.

The article is entitled "Exposure to secondhand smoke and excess lung cancer mortality risk among workers in the "5 B's": bars, bowling alleys, billiard halls, betting establishments, and bingo parlours; by M Siegel and M Skeer; Boston University School of Public Health, Social and Behavioral Sciences Department, Boston, Massachusetts, USA.


Stanton Glantz's site about second hand smoke and restaurants also has a number of excellent links:

http://www.tobaccoscam.ucsf.edu/resource/resource_health.cfm

including a powerpoint presentation on the sharp decrease of heart attacks when Helena, MT went smoke-free, followed by an increase back to the previous level once the smoke-free ordinance was suspended;

http://www.tobaccoscam.ucsf.edu/pdf/chicago_final_rps.ppt

(this can take awhile to download and open).


I will stop here so as to not overwhelm this email with information. I am happy to provide additional information if you would like -- there really is a tremendous amount of information that documents that exposure to SHS is indeed harmful. However, in spite of this information, those that simply don't want to believe that their smoking can harm others continue to try and discredit this info.

Aloha,
C

---

Information from the Philip Morris website:


Cigarette Smoking and Disease in Smokers


Philip Morris USA agrees with the overwhelming medical and scientific consensus that cigarette smoking causes lung cancer, heart disease, emphysema and other serious diseases in smokers. Smokers are far more likely to develop serious diseases, like lung cancer, than non-smokers. There is no safe cigarette.

Secondhand Smoke

Secondhand smoke, also known as environmental tobacco smoke or ETS, is a combination of the smoke coming from the lit end of a cigarette plus the smoke exhaled by a person smoking.


Public health officials have concluded that secondhand smoke from cigarettes causes disease, including lung cancer and heart disease, in non-smoking adults, as well as causes conditions in children such as asthma, respiratory infections, cough, wheeze, otitis media (middle ear infection) and Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. In addition, public health officials have concluded that secondhand smoke can exacerbate adult asthma and cause eye, throat and nasal irritation.


Philip Morris USA believes that the public should be guided by the conclusions of public health officials regarding the health effects of secondhand smoke in deciding whether to be in places where secondhand smoke is present, or if they are smokers, when and where to smoke around others. Particular care should be exercised where children are concerned, and adults should avoid smoking around them.


We also believe that the conclusions of public health officials concerning environmental tobacco smoke are sufficient to warrant measures that regulate smoking in public places. We also believe that where smoking is permitted, the government should require the posting of warning notices that communicate public health officials' conclusions that secondhand smoke causes disease in non-smokers.

---

[Quix]

OOOOPS, the older FR thread is at:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1016581/posts

Older thread posters . . . welllllllllllll, finally . . .

above in this thread is the long promised response from my Hawaiian friend.

[CSM]

"In other words, I`m your worst enemy. I know the issue from both angles."

This is the mistake made with regards to this issue. It is not about the smoker's right to smoke, nor is it about a non-smoker's rights to "breath smoke free air". It is about the property owner's rights. When will we stop infringing upon their rights, just for someone else's convenience?

[CSM]

"Seems to me that Rossie was probably in the UAW, knew she had an existing condition, yet over the course of eight years on the line failed to come to an accommodation with her union "brothers/sisters" and finally had to turn to the law."

That is the funny thing. Working on the line she comes into contact with thousands of contaminants in the air that could aggravate her asthma. There is no way that the smoke could be found to be the cause. In fact, the concentration of smoke in these plants is so low, that the smokers are not affecting the "new car" smell. You can walk by a person smoking and not realise it until you see them smoking, you end up being very surprised.

She was just looking for something to gripe about, she will pay the price (not that I support that).