After Smoking Ban—

Pollutants Drop 76 Percent In Bars And Restaurants

HARTFORD (AP) — A new study on the air quality of bars and restaurants after the state’s smoking ban took effect has reached a predictable conclusion — the air is cleaner after cigarettes were prohibited.

Researchers concede the findings are not a surprise, but added that the study is helpful in showing the effects of smoking bans.

“This is real-world data. We went out to actual places where people are working and playing,” said Mark Travers, a research affiliate at Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo, N.Y., which conducted the air survey.

The survey shows that airborne particles released by large numbers of burning cigarettes dropped 76 percent within weeks after the ban that began April 1, The Hartford Courant reported.

Researchers took air samples at seven Hartford bars and restaurants that allowed smoking before the ban. Data was collected before the prohibition on March 25 and after on April 23.

The establishments tested included Bourbon Street North, Black-Eyed Sally’s, Coach’s Sports Bar & Grille, On the Rocks, McKinnon’s Irish Pub, The Half Door, and The Spigot Cafe.

Two other restaurants that had nonsmoking policies in place before April 1 — the Sheraton Hartford Hotel bar and restaurant in East Hartford and the Wood-n-Tap Bar and Grill in Hartford — also were included for purposes of comparison.

The tiny particles that were measured are deeply inhaled into the lungs and can cause health problems. Travers noted that they also are a marker for the roughly 4,000 hazardous chemicals emitted by smoldering cigarettes.

Travers said the only surprise in the study was that the first preban readings were lower than in other cities that were evaluated.

The reason, Travers said, was that the Hartford establishments are larger and have higher ceilings than many of the bars and restaurants tested elsewhere in the country. As a result, a greater volume of air diluted a comparable amount of smoke, he said.

The lower baseline average, he said, led to a slightly lower decline in postban measures, compared with some other cities. The 76 percent drop in Hartford compares with an 82 percent reduction in a study of seven cities that have enacted smoking bans. A before-and-after study in Delaware found a 90 percent drop.

The EPA has set 65 micrograms per cubic meter as the 24-hour limit for exposure to these particles. The Hartford study found that the average level of such indoor pollution before the ban was 104 micrograms per cubic meter. After the ban, the average level dropped to 25.