To: ‘freust@post-dispatch.com’; ‘letters@post-dispatch.com’
Subject: Letter to the Editor
St. Louis Post-Dispatch Editor:
A Post-Dispatch article published last week reported that a new nationwide study, commissioned by the CDC and funded by the pharmaceutical company Pfizer, had found that smoking bans don’t hurt the bottom line of bars and restaurants. As an Regional Director of Buckeye Liquor Permit Holders Association, I’ve watched friends lose their bars and some their homes, under a 2006 statewide smoking ban so I question the objectivity of this study.
First, in announcing the advent of this study in a 2011 press release, CDC Director Thomas Frieden? laid it down as established truth that smoke-free policies “don’t hurt business”? and promised to use this yet-to be-conducted study to counter the perception that smoking bans “might negatively affect restaurant and bar business”.
At the time, Dr. Michael Siegel of the Boston University School of Public Health questioned “how objective the research process can be if the agency conducting the study has already drawn a conclusion.” Imagine the pressure on these researchers to arrange and interpret the data to support the claim their boss had already made about their future findings!
Furthermore, this study was funded by Pfizer, the pharmaceutical giant that makes Chantix. Pfizer stands to profit when smokers can no longer light up in their favorite establishments due to smoking bans.
And the study was conducted by RTI International.? In a 2010 interview, RTI CEO Franchetti-Haynes admitted “…alcoholism and smoking are all health issues in which behavioral interventions can go a long way toward reducing their impact and lowering total healthcare costs.” Sounds like that might introduce a bias?
With a pre-announced conclusion, smoking cessation product funding, and execution by a research company friendly to “behavioral interventions” for the sake of health, any hope for an objective, independent economic study was doomed from the start.
Bar owners already suffering under bans simply want a truly open-minded, independent economic investigation of smoking bans before more of these destructive laws are passed. This new CDC/Pfizer/RTI smoking ban study just can’t be trusted.
Pam Parker
Grove City, OH
