City Council Considers Smoking Ban Outside Hospitals

I am not a smoker myself, but I just think about all the freedoms this state and city take away from the individual.

I don't like secondhand smoke myself, especially before entering a hospital, but I really hope they don't fine people for smoking outside.

Sure it would be great if people took the time to realize that if they smoke 2 feet from an entrance that they are sharing their smoke with others, and that's when you assertively tell them to inhale further away from the entrance.

Just another law in New York.

Smoking is stupid. but who gives a shit if it's outside the doorway.

they should ban smoking outside the womb/grave.

Politicians cause cancer; ban them too. They definitely irritate the nostrils anyway.

I get cancer just listening to these whiny jerks pontificating about second-hand smoke. Smoke wherever you want, fuck 'em all.

Strangely enough my uncle believed he became stricken with throat cancer due to the fact that he delivered to bars where people were smoking. I found it hard to believe because most of his deliveries were in the morning and early afternoon when there were very few people in the bars.

If the second hand smoke issue was real then there would be very few bartenders alive over the age of thirty.

I'm not saying smoking is good for you, but it appears not to be as bad as some people make it out to be. Especially second hand smoke.

Smokers are inconsiderate litterbugs anyway. I can always tell where a gathering area for smokers outside office buildings are. Even if they have butt cans, urns and other receptacles, you'll see butts absolutely everywhere. I've seen people actually stand by an ashtray and drop their butts on the ground anyway. And if I had a penny for every time I saw a lit butt sailing from the window of a moving car...

If this is a problem, hospitals should create their own bans. Why does the government need to get involved?

Wow, where will all the nurses smoke? I worked at a major cancer hospital once and it was incredible to see so many co-workers outside smoking. If you're going in for treatment you don't want to have to walk through that.

I guess you worked at MSK too then..

Every time someone says "there ought to be a law" there probably oughtn't.

But, there should be common sense. Since that rarely exists, we create laws.

if you don't like smoking, then don't smoke. nobody wants to hear you bitch about smokers in order to inflate your own sense of decency. the puritanical anti-smoking sentiment has reached a hysteria not seen since the good ol' witch hunting days.

I think most people are fine with smoking in reasonable places. I was never bothered by smoking in bars, because when I went to a bar, I knew people would be smoking there. If I didn't want to be around it, I wouldn't go.

When I go to a hospital, though, I shouldn't have to be around it. If hospitals want to have a space for smokers, they should install a canopy away from the entrance.

Same as when I go to Europe - I know people smoke in movie theaters, restaurants, etc., so if I don't feel like being around it, I don't go to places where people smoke. Regardless, comparing the US to Europe in terms of smoking is impossible; in the US, smokers always seem to look sickly and pathetic, huddled under umbrellas when it's raining, trying desperately to get one last drag before going back to work. Further, giving the way our health-system works, my tax dollars and healthcare premiums go to support people who've made the decision to smoke. In England, they would decide that you made the choice to smoke, so if you get sick, the health system will not exhaust itself to care for you.

Yeah, all those people who prefer not to breathe in toxic chemicals are just crazy!

can you "prefer" without telling everyone about it? proselytizing may be fun, but nobody actually cares how self-righteous you feel for not smoking.

I'll shut up about it just as soon as the cigarette smoke stops entering my lungs. My silence for your fresh air, how does that sound?

since you're a clean air freedom fighter, you may want to shut off all electronic devices and get to work on your garden so you're not eating anything delivered by tractor trailer. industrial and commercial air pollutants are much more toxic and prevalent than tobacco smoke.

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/airpollution.html

"Clean air freedom fighter"? Seriously?

Actually, I'm allergic to nicotine. Thanks for playing, time to go home.

allergic? way to pull that one out in the home stretch. i guess we really should legislate based on your personal comfort. cuz, ya know, it's all about you. smooches!

"cuz, ya know, it's all about you. "

How did this thread start again?

"nobody wants [aka: "I don't want"] to hear you bitch about smokers in order to inflate your own sense of decency"

oh, hello. **petting on head** now, run along.

Further cementing your status as an asshole..

thanks, i do what i can.

Thank you, hotstepper. I, too, am sick and tired of all the whining about smokers. Manitoba needs to get a life. It's a good thing he/she/it doesn't live in Europe. Everyone smokes everywhere there.

you obviously haven't been to europe lately

Just about every European nation now has a smoking ban. Germany is the main exception.

Hospitals and schools should include clauses in contracts that say employees can be fired for smoking. Even the smell of smoke on clothes, and the resulting dust, can be difficult or damaging for children and sick people.

I work in a building, where they required all smokers to stand at one location outside; of course, they didn't think about the fact that the location is next to the air-take vents!

Smokers are selfish - $100 packs for everyone.

I always wonder about doctors and nurses who smoke. What do they think every time they take care of some sick smoker? I mean they must understand better than I do all the nasty things it does...

That being said, hooray for being able to go into the hospital without a healthy dose of secondhand smoke!

Always pleasant when you must enter a hospital and pass a gaggle of nurses puffing away on butts and a wall of smoke at the entrance. Classy. Also classy at elementary schools.

Mount Sinai recently began enforcing such a policy, I'm not sure the exact distance but it's something around at least 15 feet. There are signs out, and for the most part, people comply. It's been great, running around between the buildings I don't have to inhale a cloud of smoke every time I leave or enter a building. I love it.

a TV station reporter asked, "Why can't you throw butt in garbage can?" the smoke answered, "I will. I didn't think of that."

I guess neither thought that throwing a lit cigarette in a garbage can will most likely start a fire.

You stub it out first, dummy.

You mean like on your forehead? Most smokers would just throw it on the ground and step on it if they were careful. Some don't even do that.

on rainy days smokers will stand directly in front of doors to stay dry -- so not only are they very in the way of folks, I get a massive intake of their smoke too. I like this policy at hospitals eventhough it wont be adhered to.

i'm all for the ban at hospital entrances, no one should be walking through a cloud of smoke to enter a hospital.

if, however, a hospital has a courtyard or some other open area (and really, i don't know the city hospitals well at all to know the answer to this), then i think a small part of it can be for smokers. dealing with security every time you need "some air" while your loved one is in the middle of a six, eight, fourteen hour surgery just adds to the emotional burden.

I agree—I understand that it's a stressful time for smokers. But I was at NY Presbyterian Weill-Cornell the other week and it was just strange, walking through a canyon of smokers, staffers and visitors alike.