Blowing smoke: British American Tobacco's air filtration scheme

From the very first sentence of this paper its weakness is clear.
That first sentence states that "The health benefits of smoke-free public
places are well proved." and cites three references. The first is a paper
that measured air particulates and showed nothing at all about health
benefits. The second has been heavily criticized since its publication
with even the author of the study admitting that the criticisms were well-
based.

Finally, the third reference is based on a self-selected survey pool
very likely to have been biased in favor of a smoking ban and whose makeup
had a majority of smokers, not nonsmokers. It also relied heavily on
subjective interpretations that would likely be colored by the
aforementioned bias and upon small changes in a clinical measurement
notorious for susceptibility to subject enthusiasm and effort.

While I have little doubt that British American Tobacco (BAT) or any
other tobacco company would feel free to distort science in their own
favor, it's a sad thing when those supposedly acting in the interest of
true science seem to do the same.

The second sentence is little better: of course the tobacco industry
would seek to support public doubt about the adverse health effects of
secondary smoke just as those leading the fight against smoking would seek
to create public belief and fear of those effects. I use the words
"support" and "create" carefully here: until the 1980s there was virtually
no public belief that normal levels of exposure to secondary smoke would
have adverse health consequences. It was not until thousands of tailored
studies, press releases, and expensive TV productions inundated the public
with a campaign deliberately designed to spread fear that the public view
began to shift. Fear of the deadliness of secondary tobacco smoke truly
has been "created," while doubts about that deadliness needed no creation.

The third sentence merely notes that the tobacco industry has
promoted ventilation, air filtration, and separation as alternatives to
bans while the fourth simply states, again without any reference or
evidence, that such alternatives are inadequate.

The fifth sentence is political rather than analytical: it calls on a
political body to make a particular political decision.

With that as a beginning, the rest of "Blowing Smoke..." should not
be seen as a great surprise.

The next few paragraphs note that an earlier UK charter did not ban
smoking and that it was therefore supported by BAT and criticized by ban
supporters.

The one paragraph that attempts to give details of some actual
science states that an outdoor 24 hour air is actually a "workers"
standard for workplace air and implies that pub workers are exposed to
“full occupancy” smoking conditions 24 hours a day. It goes on to note
that separate areas do not completely prevent some portion of smoke from
entering nonsmoking areas but fails to offer any evidence such portions
pose any realistic degree of threat. Obviously designs incorporating
significant degrees of airflow from nonsmoking areas into smoking areas
would greatly reduce such exposure but such considerations seem to be
completely ignored in this paper.

Instead the authors concentrate on a 1990’s BAT project that focused
on a particular 1990 brand of air filter that was fairly ineffective.
They mention that a year 2000 technology for tables might be an
improvement, but dismiss it with a reference based on a 45 year old
textbook about industrial fumes and the simple unsupported claim that the
"only" way to achieve air "safe to breathe" is with a total ban (i.e.
absolute isolation of the "source" from the "worker").

The conclusion of the main body of the article lists four summary
points:

1) “Ventilation and filtration are ineffective at removing ETS.”
(Actually, this conclusion seems to be based almost entirely upon the
aforementioned BAT tests and upon one of the author's own previous studies
done on a Friday night in a peak occupancy Canadian bar.)

2) “Despite this knowledge BAT promoted these technologies to the
hospitality industry.” (Actually, all the body of this paper illustrated
was that BAT knew one particular brand of a 1990 air filter was only 34%
effective.)

3) (shortened) BAT promoted ventilation and filtration to fight
smoking bans and for marketing purposes. (This point seems completely
true.)

4) “A total ban on public smoking is the only way to protect all
employees from environmental tobacco smoke.” (Actually this point was
pulled out of clear blue air and has no support at all from the contents
of the paper... unless one wants to count the single reference to the 45
year old textbook on industrial fumes.)

The paper concludes with a criticism of partial bans, stating that
such things as separating smokers, increasing ventilation, or increasing
air filtration "do nothing to reduce the risk of lung cancer among
employees." This conclusion fits well with opening paragraph: it forces
one to conclude that tobacco smoke, alone among "pollutants" that workers
are faced with in many occupations, is immune to ordinary laws of physics
and enjoys the magical property of maintaining its full level of danger no
matter what level of dilution, ventilation, separation, or filtration
might be applied.

In sum, this paper would have been better suited for another BMJ....
the British MAGICAL Journal.

Competing interests:
I am a member of several Free Choice organizations, and have written a book titled "Dissecting Antismokers' Brains."