Helena, Montana, leads the way

“I really hate saying this, but I do feel soooo much better since I quit. (I hate saying it as it means all the people who nagged me so relentlessly were right).”

“Those nags may have saved your life, or at least extended it some.”

“Oh I know, but I just hate to admit it. But the thing is the desire to quit can only come from within. No amount of nagging will persuade you to give it up if you still want to smoke.”

“Having quit, this is true. But the nagging certainly helped me, and I gave credit to the co-worker who made the statement that started the ball rolling. And she was not so much trying to get me to stop as to get me to refrain from smoking the room up.”

“I hate to say this (because I enjoy smoke free public places), but I question that research. Why would someone from the University of California have to use Helena, MT for their study? Smoking in public buildings has been banned in California for several years and I hardly get any second hand smoke anywhere...even outside in public. Why not use data from California for a convincing study?

(FYI. I never believe ANY study or poll reported in a newspaper, magazine, or on TV unless I know how they sampled, sample size, and what was acutally measured, and which hypothesis test they used.)”

“Can you say "cherry picking"?”

“Lies, damn lies and statistics”

“Being from Montana myself, I have the answer.

Most of the restaurants and bars serve beef, the smokers stayed home in droves since they couldn't smoke there thereby reducing their blood cholesterol levels. The other, non-smoking patrons, encouraged by the fact that there were no smokers around, ordered the broiled fish instead, lower in saturated fats, thereby lowering their cholesterol levels as well. The result was that there were fewer heart attacks.

It all makes sense to me!”

“aero - I rest my case!

Another famous study concluded:
Eating ice cream a the beach causes people to drown.

The study showed that the number of beach drownings was highly correlated to ice cream sales. One place banned selling ice cream at the beach because they assumed a "cause and effect." In reality, both increased drownings and increased ice cream sales were positively correlated to temperature. On hot days more people went to the beach, therefore more drowned, and more bought ice cream.”

“I really enjoy the smoking ban in restauraunts in Maine. Previously, I just wouldn't go to a place that allowed smoking. Now, when I go out of state, I ask if they are a non smoking restauraunt. I believe having a smoking and non smoking section is alot like a peeing and non peeing section of a pool.

I got agree with Phil, when it comes to "studies". What were the control factors? How were the questions asked? Who was asked? By Whom?..... I'd like to credit Helana with stopping the heart attacks by this, and probably it helped. But I suspect there is more to it than meets the eye.

Yes, I'd like to see a "study" on how Maine has fared since the ban. Of course 50% of the population is overweight, so how does that factor in?”

“I would offer that studying Helena's heart attacks for the next 4 years (records of the previous 4 years were used as the control), now that the smoking ban has been rescinded (I think I read that in the article?), would add some valuable information. Maybe not proof that it was the 2nd hand smoke, but evidence that there may be a connection.

When I see this kind of report, my reaction isn't that, due to questionable data or methodology, the conclusions are useless and should be ignored; but that it could actually be accurate and probably deserves more study.”

“Could it be that the heart attack risk is lowered because smokers moved away in droves?

Or that non-smokers didn't get their blood pressure up trying to deal with all the smoke?”