Dr Siegel, thanks for the astute analysis.
It's also important to note that there was a similar "study" in Bowling Green over a year ago with results announced in the Toledo Blade proclaiming how that ban reduced heart attack rates in the Bowling Green vicinity by 45% as compared to only a paltry 26% reduction over the same time period in Kent, OH, a town with similar demographics but no ban. It's notable that the reduction observed in Kent was as large as this new Pueblo claim, but without the imposition of an oppressive ban.
There is a copy of the Blade article on the ASH website. And the original press release on the Ohio Tobacco Use Prevention and Control Foundation site, stand-ohio.org.
The Bowling Green "study" certainly didn't get national headlines a year ago. One has to wonder why didn't the anti-smokers push such astounding results? From my observations, these type of announcements from the anti-smoker propaganda machine of "new" study results always seem to be carefully timed around some significant event or events. And now these new Pueblo "study" press releases hit the main stream media as they are about to put bans in Washington D.C. and Chicago to a vote. Those would be two nice trophy cities on the anti-smokers' wall of accomplishments. The anti-smokers' tactics have all appearances of trying to sway legislation by these attention-grabbing, Chicken Little "the sky is falling" announcements. They certainly warrant some critical thinking applied.
Frank-
Thanks for pointing out the Bowling Green study, which I had not been aware of until recently. The finding of a 26% reduction in heart attacks in Kent, Ohio demonstrates how careful one has to be in this type of analysis. One could easily have concluded that the LACK of a ban in Kent resulted in a 26% decline in heart attacks. More pointedly, what it demonstrates is that in small geographic regions, one must adequately take into account secular trends in heart attacks. Here is an example where the secular trend in heart attacks, at least in that time frame, was a 26% decline. Is it possible that the observed 27% decline in heart attacks in Pueblo was simply a reflection of a secular trend that would have occurred anyway (in the absence of the smoking ban?) Possibly, or possibly not, but the only way to be able to judge this intelligently is to have a sufficient baseline period to establish what the underlying secular trend was. And I'm afraid that an 18-month period is just not going to do that.
One particular note that always needs to be emphasized despite of and in addition to all the statistical juggling with these numbers: The refusal of the researchers to separate out the effects on nonsmokers as opposed to smokers completely and totally invalidates the major use of Helena, Bowling Green, Falls River, Pueblo and any other such studies produced to support smoking bans on the basis of a threat to nonsmokers' health.
Such use constitutes nothing less than a blatant lie by those who parade it in front of the media, even IF their basic numbers were accurate and meaningful. The studies deliberately did not analyze such an effect and they should not be publicly presented as if they had.
Michael J. McFadden
Author of "Dissecting Antismokers' Brains"
http://pasan.TheTruthIsALie.com
http://kuneman.smokersclub.com/
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