Why Go Smoke Free?

IMPROVE HEALTH

• Secondhand smoke is the third leading preventable cause of death, with tobacco being number one. For every eight smokers that die from tobacco use, one nonsmoker will also die from exposure to secondhand smoke (Circulation, 1991)
• Secondhand smoke exposure is associated with 24% more hospitalizations and 43% more lost school days (9th World Conference on Tobacco or Health, 1994)

ELIMINATE EXPOSURE

• Smoke-filled rooms can have up to six times the air pollution as a busy highway (Centers for Disease Control, 1993)
• Nonsmoking sections do not eliminate a nonsmoker’s exposure to secondhand smoke because the smoke knows no boundaries (Health Consequences of Involuntary Smoking, 1986)
• Science has not demonstrated any “safe level” of secondhand smoke exposure (American’s for Nonsmoker’s Rights, 1996)
• Ventilation systems in buildings are designed to recirculate air, not to filter it. For this reason, they are often responsible for bringing polluted air from smoking areas into designated “smoke free” areas. (www.fammed.unc.edu)

ECONOMIC BENEFITS

• The costs of healthcare, increased fire insurance, damage to property, absenteeism, and lost productivity average as much as $4,600 for each smoker per year (Weiss, Seattle University)
• The costs of healthcare, increased fire insurance, damage to property, absenteeism, and lost productivity average as much as $4,600 for each smoker per year  (Weiss, Seattle University)
• According to the National Fire Protection Association, direct property damage caused by smoking-related fires cost $391 million between 1993 and 1996
• Annual healthcare costs directly caused by smoking are $1.92 billion in North Carolina alone (tobaccofreekids.org)

INCREASES PRODUCTIVITY

• Workers who take four 10-minute work breaks to smoke actually work one month less per year than workers who don’t take smoking breaks (Action on Smoking and Health, 1994)
• Smoking-attributable productivity losses is estimated to be $2.82 billion in NC (tobaccofreekids.org)

ENCOURAGES SMOKERS TO QUIT

• Workplace smoking bans reduce consumption in smokers by an average of 4 to 5 cigarettes per day (10th World Conference on Tobacco and Health, Beijing, 1997)
• In the year after a smoking ban was instituted at the Harvard School of Health, 27% of the smokers there quit, and in smoke free hospitals, 36% of employees who quit smoking attribute their decision to the hospital’s adoption of a smoke free policy (Archives of Internal Medicine, 1991)