Shocking News: Smoking Police Exaggerate Claims

Who could have ever expected this?

I'm stunned that mamby-pamby finger-waggers would ever have the audacity to lie to the public.

Next thing you know, we'll find out Al Gore is full of hot air.

Oh wait, we already knew that.

For decades, the industry-funded Tobacco Institute denied the harmful consequences of smoking and did a great disservice to public health. Today, however, it's anti-smoking advocates spreading the disinformation - overstating certain risks. But - because such deception undermines the credibility of all public-health work - they're being called on it by one of their own.

A startling study by Dr. Michael Siegel of Boston University's School of Public Health is pointing the finger at the well-intentioned likes of Action on Smoking and Health, the politically powerful Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids and New York City's Department of Health.

In a study published this week in the journal Epidemiologic Perspectives & Innovations, Siegel warns that these groups are wildly inflating the health risks of exposure to second-hand smoke. In doing so, they tarnish the very credibility that the public-health community must have in order to save lives.

Siegel is no friend of Big Tobacco - he's a vocal opponent of smoking and a supporter of smoke-free workplace rules. Indeed, it was his place as a leading member of the tobacco-control community that compelled him to publish his findings that some groups are harming the movement's credibility by overstating the dangers of short-term exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS).

Read the rest.

I certainly don't recommend anyone take up smoking, but you should always beware of alarmist studies based on dubious science.

Michael Bloomberg, take note.