"We don't have to apologize for our particular bias." - Robert Shepard, co-author of the Helena study

Understanding
The Numbers

Studies

Smoking Bans
And Businesses

Odds and Ends

   

The Helena Study Chart

The Original Chart

This is slide eleven of the PowerPoint presentation Sargent and Shepard used during their April, 2003 press conference. The black circles represent the time the ban was in place.

Notice the similar dip in heart attacks in 1998. This was ignored by the researchers.

Their entire PowerPoint presentation is available here (pdf).

.

The Obvious Fraud

Here we've removed the lines for clarity and highlighted the data that represents the ban. The yellow area is the first three months of the ban. The red area is the last three months.

Fact: The dip only occurs during the first three months of the ban, not the length of the ban, as claimed.

This is their own data, their own chart, and their fraud is obvious.

Many thanks to Michael McFadden who first pointed this out.

Fact: The Health Department did not enforce the ban for the first two months. They simply passed out warnings to the venues that were ignoring it.

Fact: On April 7, 2003, Sargent and Shepard attended a meeting of the Montana Senate where they heard testimony from business owners that during the first months of the ban it was being ignored by many venues, including three out of the towns five casinios. The minutes from this meeting are available here.

Perhaps only unenforced bans contribute to reducing heart attacks.



 

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