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Physician: Evidence clear on secondhand smoke's consequences

MANITOWOC — When state Rep. Ted Zigmunt, D-Francis Creek, campaigned last fall, he wasn't in favor of a smoking ban in all Wisconsin workplaces, unless bars and taverns were exempted.

He's changed his mind.

"Since taking office, I've been swarmed with constituent requests that there be a full smoking ban," said the first-term assemblyman.

However, Zigmunt and three other state elected officials attending a Friday legislative breakfast at Holy Family Memorial Medical Center all prefer a smoking ban not be part of Gov. Jim Doyle's budget.

State sen. Joe Leibham, R-Sheboygan, said "purely political concerns" prompted Doyle's inclusion of a smoking ban in his fiscal document. Attempts to pass one last year as a regular bill were unsuccessful.

"It is a good policy issue that deserves to be debated" as separate legislation Leibham said.

It was a concern shared by state Rep. Garey Bies, R-Sister Bay, who bought a restaurant six years ago and made it smoke free before opening the doors to his first customers.

Calling himself a "recovering smoker," Bies said he was "pretty much supportive" of a universal workplace smoking ban.

But State Rep. Bob Ziegelbauer, D-Manitowoc, said he disagreed with the smoking ban as proposed.

"I believe private business owners should be able to decide for themselves about use of a legal product on their property," Ziegelbauer told the audience at the event hosted by the Door, Kewaunee, Manitowoc and Sheboygan County Tobacco Control programs.

He said he was concerned about "demonizing smokers," including a proposed additional increase in the cigarette tax that Ziegelbauer believes would impact low-income individuals disproportionately.

Ziegelbauer said deliberation about making the use of tobacco products illegal might be appropriate.

Leibham said he was open-minded to discussion of phasing in a ban to lessen the impact "on those businesses that feel they could be devastated."

He said he was "disappointed" that many members of the public don't believe in restaurant owners having the right to allow smoking, and customers exercising their freedom to patronize or stay away from the business.

Dr. Mary Youssef, a cardiologist at HFM, said the negative impacts of secondhand smoke are well documented, with the debate over about potential consequences.

Youssef said secondhand smoke causes 3,400 lung cancer deaths annually.

"Food service workers have a 50 percent greater risk than the general public of dying from lung cancer because of exposure in their work environment," Youssef said.

She cited a 2006 U.S. Surgeon General's report saying separate smoking sections in dining establishments "just don't cut it … the most sophisticated ventilation systems cannot completely eliminate secondhand smoke."

Youssef said a study in Helena, Mont., showed heart attacks fell by 40 percent during the six months an indoor smoking ban was in effect, but the rate rose after the ban was lifted.

Alex Salm, co-owner of al corso with her husband David Salm, said her employees are pleased their restaurant is smoke free.

She said her husband has insisted smoking also not be allowed in the restaurant's outdoor patio area, so as to not interfere with indoor patrons' enjoyment of their food. The couple has opened a smoke-free bar in Chilton.

The Wisconsin Restaurant Association has indicated support for a smoking ban while the Tavern League of Wisconsin is opposed.

Liz Sanger, a local policy specialist with the advocacy group Smoke Free Wisconsin, expressed confidence a statewide universal workplace smoking ban was only a matter of time.

"We know the more educated the public is about smoke free, the more smoothly the transition will go" when the law is inevitably enacted Sanger said.

She urged ban supporters to write letters to newspaper editors and lobby their legislators.

"We're on the trek to join 25 other states in going smoke free … including Minnesota, Iowa, and Illinois," Sanger said.