I had a low-level asthma attack the other day - and haven't had one in probably half a year - because of all the smoke just sitting at outdoor cafes in Paris. It's really disgusting how smokers have turned any communal outdoor activity in this town, a cafe, a restaurant, into one huge cesspool of smoke. My actions at the restaurant are not stopping smokers from eating, their actions at the restaurant are in fact stopping me. How is this not impinging on my freedom to enjoy whatever public accommodation I choose?
More from TIME, I guess:
As if the growing number of smoking bans in restaurants, airplanes and other public places isn't sending a strong enough message, researchers now have the first biological data confirming the health hazards of secondhand smoke.
Scientists led by Dr. Ronald Crystal at Weill Cornell Medical College documented changes in genetic activity among nonsmokers triggered by exposure to secondhand cigarette smoke. Public-health bans on smoking have been fueled by strong population-based data that links exposure to secondhand cigarette smoke and a higher incidence of lung diseases such as emphysema and even lung cancer, but do not establish a biological cause for the correlation. Now, for the first time, researchers can point to one possible cause: the passive recipient's genes are actually being affected.
