Tobacco
Información -
Transcripción
Address by Mr. Micheál Martin T.D. Minister for Health and Children at the opening of the Seminar: hazards of Environmental Tobacco Smoke - Identifying and Protecting Those at Risk
12 February 2002
Ladies and Gentlemen
One of the oddities about being a Government Minister is that you hear a lot of amputated radio items!
Because you spend so much of your time going from one event or meeting
to another, you hear the beginning of an item about the MMR vaccine,
but you can’t wait for the end of it. Or you tune in to get the final
minute of something about a war crimes trial, but you're not sure
who’s in the dock.
I heard a bit of an item a few days ago. Some famous art collector was
talking. And she said, if you own paintings, you have to shift them
around. Move them from wall to wall. Because, if you leave a painting
in one place - she said - ´It’ll go into the wall.´
I think she meant that you stop noticing it, the more you get used to
it. It ceases to have an impact. It stops meaning anything.
And it struck me at the time – that’s what has happened with the
tobacco products issue. All of us know that smoking is one of the most
unhealthy things a human being can do. But we’re so used to the fact,
it’s almost ´gone into the wall. It’s ironic that, the more information
we have, the harder we have to work to get it to mean something to
smokers and potential smokers. For centuries, individuals believed that
smoking was bad for health. Then, in the twentieth century, as
cigarette smoking became almost standard,
the evidence started to accumulate: smoking causes cancer. Smoking
kills. And the tobacco industry began to work overtime to hide that
information.
In 1986, the International Agency for Research on Cancer classified
tobacco smoke as a human carcinogen. That bit of data was one of a
blizzard of such information, all adding up to the knowledge that the
smoking of tobacco products poses a real and significant threat to the
health of the smoker and a real and significant threat to the health of
the non-smoker, particularly to young children and infants. In spite
of the most recklessly cynical misinformation campaign ever conducted,
the risk to health of the smoking habit is now clearly established.
In spite of a sophisticated and sadly successful approach to addicting
people to cigarettes, millions of smokers have grimly accepted the threat to their health and - each year, every year - try to quit. There’s the beginning of a realization that smoking will take years off your life. And if it doesn’t take years off your life, it’ll
take life out of your years, because it causes so many acute and
chronic diseases. But let us never, ever, underestimate the capacity of
the human animal to deceive itself. Once addicted to nicotine, a smoker
who hasn’t made the decision to quit will defend smoking with any
argument that’s handy. They’ll talk about the ´anti-smoking lobby´ as
just being ´politically correct.´ First of all, the ´anti-smoking
lobby´ isn’t a lobby. Never has been. It’s just a majority of people.
People who like to breathe clean air and live without crippling
preventable diseases. That’s a mile away from a ´lobby´ that’s just
´politically correct.´
Smoking isn’t an addiction with just one victim at a time. Non-smokers
exposed to environmental tobacco smoke absorb the toxic compounds of
tobacco just as smokers do. The greater the exposure, the greater the
level of these toxins in the body. Being able to breathe clean air,
free from harmful irritating tobacco smoke is a serious health issue
for everyone. And I want to stress that word, ´serious.´
One of the most lethal arguments used to promote smoking (and drinking,
and drugs like ecstasy) is that anybody who points out the health
dangers is a killjoy. I say it’s a lethal argument, because all of us like to be liked. Nobody likes a killjoy.
So the temptation is to back off from an unpopular stance. We mustn’t
do it. We really, really mustn’t do it. We must have the courage to be killjoys,
when what is in question is an addiction that kills and maims not only
the addict but the people around the addict. And that’s what tobacco
products constitute. An addiction that maims and kills. All the time.
Adding up over two decades of evidence, the scientific community now
agrees that there is no safe level of exposure to second hand smoke.
There is an international scientific consensus that environmental
tobacco smoke kills and that passive smoking is a cause of disease in
otherwise healthy non-smokers. Tobacco smoke contributes to a noxious
environment, causes eye irritation, sore throat, cough, and headache.
It is a reasonable expectation on the part of the public that they
should not be exposed to such a toxic combination whether in their
workplace or in public areas and facilities. A European Commission
research study found that over 80% of Europeans over 15 years of age
are exposed to environmental tobacco smoke and inhale the equivalent of
one or more actively smoked cigarettes per day. Exposure to
environmental tobacco smoke is a public health hazard
that is entirely preventable.
For children, the situation is disturbing. Children are particularly at
risk from passive smoking. As children grow, exposure to environmental
tobacco smoke significantly reduces their lung capacity and exercise
tolerance. Involuntary exposure of children to tobacco smoke has been
identified as a cause of respiratory disease, middle ear disease,
asthma attacks and is a significant factor in sudden infant death
syndrome (SIDS). Children are powerless to control their exposure to
tobacco smoke and yet because of their age are most adversely affected
by exposure to this toxic combination. Children’s exposure is mainly
from adults smoking in places where children live, play or visit with
adults. Acute and chronic respiratory health effects on children have
been demonstrated in homes with smokers and even in homes with
occasional smokers. The WHO estimate that about 700 million children or
almost half the world’s children breathe air polluted by tobacco smoke.
There is a need to eliminate environmental tobacco smoke totally from
children’s surroundings. As legislators, administrators, health service
deliverers and carers we have a duty to ensure that our young people
and future generations grow up in a healthy smoke-free environment. The
global tobacco industry knows that environmental tobacco smoke is a
significant health hazard. But it keeps trying to distract us from that truth. The tobacco industry deliberately misrepresents
the harm of passive smoking, tries to discredit scientific findings and
to confuse the public. The health threat from environmental tobacco
smoke can not be linked with legal or ethical arguments used by the
tobacco industry about the right to smoke. Non-smokers exposed to
second hand smoke have no choice and hence the term popularly used
passive smoking.
. In conclusion, Ladies and Gentlemen, the reality of environmental
tobacco smoke is stark
Passive smoking is a cause of disease in healthy non-smokers. The
evidence is in and we will act on it. We will prevent it ´going into
the wall´; becoming invisible because of familiarity.
I now declare this seminar open and wish it every success.