{"id":477,"date":"2008-12-09T12:17:51","date_gmt":"2008-12-09T17:17:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.davehitt.com\/blog2\/smoking-bans-cause-heart-attacks\/"},"modified":"2009-01-07T13:54:28","modified_gmt":"2009-01-07T18:54:28","slug":"smoking-bans-cause-heart-attacks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.davehitt.com\/blog2\/smoking-bans-cause-heart-attacks\/","title":{"rendered":"Smoking Bans Cause Heart Attacks"},"content":{"rendered":"

(This article is also available as an episode<\/a> of the Quick Hitts Podcast, with a bit more commentary.)<\/em><\/p>\n

It started with the Helena fraud.\u00c2\u00a0 The city of Helena, Colorado, instituted a smoking ban, and then rescinded it six months later.\u00c2\u00a0 Two “researchers” claimed that during while the ban was in place heart attack admissions dropped by 60%, and then rose again when the ban was lifted.<\/p>\n

The study, published in the British Medical Journal, wasn’t just inaccurate, it was intentionally fraudulent.\u00c2\u00a0 There was a small dip in admissions for heart attacks, but only for the first three months of the ban, when it was being widely ignored by businesses and casinos.\u00c2\u00a0 The study’s authors manipulated the numbers, which were based on a laughably small sample size, to make it appear the effect lasted for six months.\u00c2\u00a0 You can read the details of the fraud here<\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 Although the study has been thoroughly debunked, anti-smoker groups still cite it as if it were valid.<\/p>\n

This fraud has inspired similar frauds whenever a ban is put in place.\u00c2\u00a0 If a city, state or country bans smoking everywhere and the number of heart attacks stay the same or go up a bit, it’s ignored.\u00c2\u00a0 If they drop at all it is cited, not as normal statistical variation, but as proof that bans reduce heart attacks.<\/p>\n

The nannies claim that Scotland’s ban resulted in a 17% decrease in heart attacks.\u00c2\u00a0 The study was limited to ten months before the ban and ten months after \u00e2\u20ac\u201c with the time frame cherry picked to provide the most convincing numbers.\u00c2\u00a0 It was published in the New England Journal of Medicine where it was, of course, peer reviewed.
\nBut now the truth has come out.<\/p>\n

In the first year of the ban the drop was really 7.2%, not the 17% claimed.\u00c2\u00a0 The year before the ban it was 10%, so the ban caused a 3% decrease in the trend.\u00c2\u00a0 And the year after that the number of heart attacks rose to 7.8%, the first rise in a decade.\u00c2\u00a0 This not only completely erased the decease, it was a complete reversal of the trend.\u00c2\u00a0 Since the nicotine nannies always claim any decrease in heart attacks is the direct result of bans, using their logic we must also conclude that the 7.8% increase was also a direct result of the ban.\u00c2\u00a0 Therefore, we have proof that smoking bans cause heart attacks! <\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

This is, of course, ridiculous.\u00c2\u00a0 All we’re seeing is the kind of normal variation that happens from year to year with any common ailment.\u00c2\u00a0 But why should we be held to a higher standard than the nicotine nannies with letters after their names, the anti-smoker organizations who quote their numbers, and the peer-reviewed journals are willing to publish nonsense as long as it’s politically correct nonsense?<\/p>\n

Most of this information comes from Dr. Michael Siegel, who is a tobacco control advocate<\/em>.\u00c2\u00a0 He likes <\/em>smoking bans.\u00c2\u00a0 But he’s also disgusted with the junk science and dishonesty that pervades every anti-smoking organization.\u00c2\u00a0 He’s been calling them out on it for years, and as a result is now a pariah in the movement.<\/p>\n

He has announced<\/a> he’ll donate $200 to any anti-smoker organization that admits the mistake.\u00c2\u00a0 (He does a good breakdown of the original report’s inaccuracies here<\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 You’ll find more information, including a time line, on the site Velvet Glove Iorn Fist<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

I’d like to propose my own bet.\u00c2\u00a0 I’ll bet one fine cigar, or if you don’t smoke, the beverage of your choice, that not only will no organization apologize, but that one of them will refer to the fraudulent study as proof that bans are beneficial.<\/p>\n

Rather than ship cigars or beer or coffee, let’s simplify things and just make it a ten dollar bet.\u00c2\u00a0 Here are the specifics:<\/p>\n