Dying by Breathing
Smoking on campus has always been a problem. Not only are students spending more money on cigarettes, but also contributing to pollution, which is affecting fellow student’s, staff’s, and professor’s health. The damaging effects of chemicals released into the air by smoking cigarettes have caused many work places to become smoke free (also known as SFW). Smoking is also banned on all or most “forms of public transport, in cinemas, theaters, and concert halls; in many shopping centers; and increasingly often in restaurants” (Dominello). Therefore, since college campuses are public places smoking should be prohibited, or limited to designated areas.
An estimated twenty Oregonian kids start smoking everyday (Hennessee). These Oregonians, who may be students, are spending more money on cigarettes every year. This money can be spent in wiser ways, such as school supplies, living accommodations, etc. As CollegeSnap.com, a website that provides advice and information to college students, claims, “…quitting smoking is the easiest way to cut costs [of college expenses]” (Smoking cigarettes burning a hole in your pocket?). Reducing the availability of cigarettes and restrictions on public smoking can cut college expenses, as the following research proposes:
...[E]stimates indicate that college students are quite sensitive to the price of cigarettes, with an average estimated price elasticity[*] of smoking participation of *-0.66 and an overall average estimated price elasticity of cigarette smoking of
-1.43. In addition, relatively stringent restrictions on smoking in public places are found to reduce smoking participation rates among college students, while the quantity of cigarettes consumed by smokers is lowered by any restrictions on public smoking... (Chaloupka, Wechsler)
That is to say that restrictions on smoking on campus will reduce smoking among college students.
Not only is smoking costly to smoking students, but also maintenance crews and nonsmoking students also partly finance the maintenance. Many smokers trash the sidewalks and walkways with their cigarette butts. The maintenance required to clean smoker’s debris is affecting the budget (Weis, Miller). Accommodations of smokers, such as public ashtrays, which are coming partly from student funds, are going to waste because smokers rarely use them or are not using them at all. With specified areas for smoking, maintenance would be covered in less total area, which would lower expenses paid for by the school and its students. The following excerpt supports this idea:
Maintenance crews spend a great deal of time cleaning up the litter caused by cigarette butts on campus grounds. As one campus grounds supervisor commented: “The smoking debris has been extensive, and the litter associated with smoking and the issue of secondhand smoke in common campus areas promoted the need for a change in the campus smoking policy.” (Smoking: The Price Colleges Pay)
Again, designated smoking areas would reduce the costs of maintenance on college campuses.
These specified smoking areas would also reduce second hand smoke inhaled by non-smokers. College campus covers a large area, so second hand smoke may not affect the public as much as perceived, but the toxins that smokers release into the air by smoking cigarettes affect the environment. The legal smoking age is eighteen, as Henry Wechsler, a PhD and director of the HSPH College Alcohol study points out, “College students are the youngest legal group for the tobacco industry to target” (McGreevey). Students, being intelligent and responsible adults, should know that smoking has no positive long-term effect. Although smoking is a person’s own decision, it is not his or her decision to shorten the lives of others by smoking in public places. They must take into consideration the many people who choose to stay smoke free.
Numerous researches have been done regarding the effects that smoking have on the public, environment, and work place. Research studies by Simon Chapman and Amanda Dominello, who are with the Department of Public Health and Community Medicine, and several other researchers, have shown that smoke free work places have caused a two percent annual reduction of cigarette consumption in the United States. This proves that if work places were universally smoke-free, the number of cigarettes forgone annually would decrease (Dominello). Since the results of these researches have been positive, perhaps campuses that went smoke free would have the same outcome.
Second hand smoke is known to be more harmful than the inhaled smoke, and smokers get both as a consequence. It is known to cause eye irritation, headaches, nausea, and dizziness. Researchers from Sydney’s Public Health Unit in Australia stated:
No-smoking areas may provide some reduction in the level of exposure of individuals to environmental tobacco smoke. However, the reduction may be marginal or trivial… Today's research that non-smoking areas do not protect the public from second-hand smoke is a significant finding. It adds to the argument that smoking should be banned in public places. (Non smoking areas ‘do not work’)
That is, the public is not protected from second hand smoke even in non-smoking areas, so smoking should be banned in public places.
Researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health have done research on college campus smoking. Their finding suggests “colleges and universities can reduce smoking among students…by making dormitories smoke-free and improving smoking cessation programs” (Smoking on College Campus). The following excerpt is from www.no-smoking.org:
…Studies found that students entering college as non-smokers are 40 percent less likely to take up smoking when they live in smoke-free dorms, but only 27 percent of colleges prohibit smoking in dorms. In addition, more than 40 percent of colleges do not offer smoking cessation programs to help students who want to quit, and the programs that are offered are inadequate. More than 40 percent of health directors reported that their school did not offer smoking cessation programs. (Smoking on College Campus)
Namely, smoke free buildings help keep non-smokers smoke free.
A survey by Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) also concluded that U.S. college students strongly support tobacco control policies to reduce smoking on college campuses. Many of the students surveyed favored policies that ranged from banning smoking in all dormitories and other college buildings, to prohibiting the advertising or sale of tobacco products on campus. Both smokers and non-smokers favored making all college buildings smoke-free, and ad free from tobacco companies and their sponsorship of campus activities and events. (College Students Support Smoking Restrictions) This shows that students, both smokers and nonsmokers, favored smoke free buildings and the rejection the idea of tobacco ads on campus.
Although many people, mainly non-smokers, want to ban smoking in public places, smokers do have rights, known as Smoker’s Rights. The Smoker’s Rights declaration consists of twenty-eight articles, of which the following is taken from article ten:
[Smokers have] [t]he [r]ight to be accused of being responsible for harming others with [their] tobacco smoke by state and institutions only after…unquestionable evidence has proven beyond any reasonable doubt that second-hand smoke is harmful to third parties. (Smoker’s Right Declaration)
If smokers want to comply with these rights, all smokers would be accused of being responsible for harming others. Two-thirds of cigarette smoke, of which there are four thousand different chemicals, more than fifty are known as “Class A carcinogens” (cancer causing), is not inhaled by the smoker, rather it is released into the air. (Poison in the Air) This second hand smoke that consists of an addicting substance called nicotine (a colorless, poisonous alkaloid used as an insecticide) can be found in a nonsmoker’s blood for “up to forty hours after exposure” (Poison in the Air). Although nicotine is extremely addictive, there are other methods of calming nicotine cravings besides smoking. These methods include chewing nicotine gum, and/or wearing nicotine patches (Smoking Should Be Prohibited in Public Places). Both of these methods have been proven to be very effective quitting tools for smokers.
It is astonishing to find that so many researches have had the same results: smoking does not have any positive outcome, smoking is harmful to the public and the environment, students favor smoke free buildings, second hand smoke kills, nicotine is extremely addictive, yet the smoking of cigarettes is still allowed on college campuses, and public places.
* Price elasticity measures the proportional change in quantity with respect to a proportional change in price.
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Works Cited
Chaloupka, Frank J., & Wechsler, Henry. “Price, Tobacco Control Policies and Smoking Among Young Adults.” Journal of Health Economics. February 1995. 29 February 2004. <http://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/5012.html>.
Dominello, Amanda. “The Impact of Smoke-Free Workplaces on Declining Cigarette Consumption in Australia and the United States.” American Journal of Public Health. July 1999; Vol. 89, No.7. 1018-23.
Hennessee, Matt. “Black History Month and black smoking.” The Oregonian. 23 February 2004. 29 February 2004. <http://www.oregonlive.com/search/index.ssf?/base/editorial/1077368105308610.xml?oregonian?edgc>.
McGreevey, Sue. “College Students Support Smoking Restrictions.” Massachusetts General Hospital. 16 September 2003. 2 February 2004. Boston. <http://www.mgh.harvard.edu/news/releases/091603smoking.htm>.
“Non smoking areas ‘do not work.’” BBC News. 24 February 2004. 29 February 2004. < http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/3507985.stm>.
“Poison in the Air.” 3 March 2004. <http://www.smokingsucks.nfld.net/2nd_hand_smoke/poison_air.html>.
Rinswongkawang, Woradej. “Smoking Should Be Prohibited in Public Places.” TOPICs Online Magazine. 5 March 2004. < http://www.topics-mag.com/edition7/smoking-no.htm>.
“Smoker’s Right Declaration.” 3 March 2004. <http://www.smokingparadise.net/Info/SRD.html>.
“Smoking cigarettes burning a hole in your pocket?: Save Money on Cigarettes.” 16 October 2003. 10 February 2004. <http://www.collegesnap.com/collegelifestyle/article.php?articleid=21>.
“Smoking on College Campus.” Newswire. Washington. 22 March 2001. 27 January 2004. <http://www.no-smoking.org/march01/03-26-01-3.html>.
“Smoking: The Price Colleges Pay.” Tobacco Technical Assistance Consortium. 1 February 2004. < http://www.ttac.org/college/facts/costs.html>.
Weis, William L. & Miller, Bruce W. The Smoke Free Work Place. New York: Prometheus Books, 1985.
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