Professor Luke Clancy chairman of the
Office For Tobacco Control and member of the Institute For A Tobacco
Free Society headed up the study claiming therein that he had no
conflict of interest in respect of the work ! That such a flawed and
biased study can be published by The Irish Medical Journal makes one
wonder if the medical world has now ditched an impartial scientific
approach to research in favour of superstition and biased fanaticism in
relation to tobacco and smoking
The study
conducted in 38 selected pubs in Dublin involved a visit prior to the
smoking ban and a visit to the same pubs a year later on the same day.
Each visit lasted at least three hours and the number of customers,
staff, and smokers were noted on arrival, on the hour and on departure.
According to the study they found an increase of 11% in the number of
customers after the ban was introduced and bizarrely a reduction of
almost 9% in the amount of staff.
The
study which fails to even note basics such as weather conditions
concludes that it's work, "clearly demonstrates that a total
workplace-smoking ban is good for public health and the hospitality
industry" But what about the 600 hundred plus bars throughout Ireland
that have closed ? What about the thousands of staff who have lost their
jobs ? What about the tens of thousands of people in Ireland who no
longer visit their local pubs like they once did ? The study completely
ignores this as these facts would clearly get in the way of the intended
conclusion the researchers set out to achieve.
Professor Luke Clancy is chairman of
Ash and Director General of The Research Institute For A Tobacco Free
Society. He is one of the authors of the study which states :
The Authors
declare that they have no conflict of interest in respect of this work"
This is
hardly the case in respect of Professor Clancy who has never been shy
about his anti smoking stance. The Tobacco Free Society web site makes
no attempt to hide his bias as regards the smoking ban :
"He hopes
that RIFTFS will make a significant contribution to Tobacco Control by
providing the evidence base to underpin the Irish Governments Policy on
the creation of a Tobacco Free Society. His advocacy work continues,
including a very successful 2nd term as Chairman of Ash Ireland when he
was identified as a staunch supporter of the Workplace Ban"
The
only conclusion that can be drawn from this study is that funds would be
better spent on genuine health research than what amounts to nothing
more than a pub crawl by anti smoking zealots ! Assuming two and
possibly more people were involved in each visit to the 38 pubs on two
occasions that is a total of 456 man hours. It is nothing short of a
disgrace that much needed resources and finances are being used to fund
visits to pubs by anti smoking fanatics to draw up reports to further
their own cause and distort the real impact of the smoking ban.
The study is completely self serving
and an exercise in frivolity. Were it presented by a medical student it
would receive a rebuke from tutors for it's lack of impartiality,
unscientific methodology and unfounded hysteric conclusions. The lesson
for all from this study is that people need to beware of hysterical
unscientific anti smoking propaganda masquerading as medical research.
