I have to confess that when I smoked (which was a very long time ago), driving along with a cigarette was something I used to enjoy. Not that I had any young children at that time, and that is the factor that’s causing some for argue for a ban on smoking in cars. The Scottish government has today said it’s not persuaded, but this is the argument for a ban…
Dr Neil Dewhurst, president of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh (RCPE), says: “Passive smoking exposure levels in children have fallen by 40% in Scotland since the introduction of smoke-free legislation, but exposure levels in children of smokers remain high and demand further legislative action.
“We fully endorse today’s report which calls for an extension of smoke-free legislation throughout the UK in order to include public areas frequented by children and in cars.
“The evidence is compelling. Passive smoking exposure significantly increases the risk of a range of diseases in children.”
Is it ever acceptable to light up with others in the car? Or is this whole debate another example of anti-smoking campaigners trying to micro-manage people’s lives?
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BBC World Have Your Say 
Lighting up in the car amongst adults is one thing. An adult has the ability to ask you not to smoke or to get out of the car if they don’t like it.
A child cannot.
We know that secondary/passive smoke is dangerous and there is no reason to expose children to it during a car ride.
If a parent must smoke, do so outside – away from children.
I actually think it’s on par with a form of child abuse when I see parents – in 2010 – subjecting their children to second-hand smoke.
Perhaps smoking in cars can be banned when there are minor children present, as they cannot speak up to protect themselves. An adult can decide whether to ride in a car with a smoker or not. It’s hard for me to believe that this is necessary, most smokers I know don’t smoke around children and are are very courteous.
I agree with Patti. I quit smoking over 25 years ago, but I think if you respect others when you smoke, then you should be able to smoke in you car.
Well, there is lots of legislation protecting children–is smoking any different? A car with a person smoking is certainly a very enclosed and unpleasant environment.
And…a second thought: I wonder how many accidents are caused by smokers fiddling with lighters or dropping their cigarettes? Cell phone use is now banned in many places…I bet juggling the paraphernalia of smoking while trying to drive is just as distracting.
(Written as the husband of a driving smoker–so probably risking a lot to post this!)
I have a very personal and emotional view on this topic. My father used to smoke very badly when I was little, and my extreme intolerance for parents who smoke when their kids are around derives from that time. Wherever we were, my father smoked. At some point I started getting up at 5.45am in order to have my breakfast before my father had gotten up and smoked in the kitchen. In the car it was even worse, as there was no way I could have avoided the smoke and smell… I think it is a really good idea to impose this ban!!! I personally would also start a blame and shame campaign targeting pregnant women who smoke, as this is one of the worst things you can do to your child!
I am not a smoker, and I feel terrible being in a room full of smoke. However, one must draw a line somewhere regarding the sanctity of home-life, privacy and freedom against the perceived benefits of certain action or inaction as dictated by authorities.
Is the ban going to be against smoking in cars? Smoking in cars when there are no passengers? Smoking in cars with closed windows? Smoking in cars with opened windows? and so on.
If it is against smoking in car in general, even with the windows being opened, one could legitimately ask shouldn’t one ban smoking in public in general? If the ban is against smoking in cars with windows closed only, then bow about banning smoking in houses where all the windows are closed as well?
This is highly intrusive into the private lives of people.
a big yes, for certain the smoking ban has been a huge huge success, we can now go out for a drink or a meal, banning smoking in cars is a logical move, besides the safety aspect, it seems illogical to ban hand held phones but allow a hand held lighted cigarrete, also the people especially children are being poisoned in an enclosed area, this ban needs doing soon, also i believe a ban on smoking in town centres would be a good idea.
More nanny state. Yet these same people have no problem turning around, and telling at their kids or making phone calls while they drive or applying makeup as they drive. Smoking is not a distraction. This is simply nanny staters trying to go further down the road to ban something they don’t like, cigarettes. If it’s limited to smoking with children in the car, then I can understand more of an argument for it, as I don’t know why people would smoke around their kids, but if they want to be stupid, then they should be able to. Are we to ban people from feeding their kids red meat? It’s bad for people. What about all the parents who have obese children? Should the parents be forbidden from allowing their kids be obese? Obesity in a person is FAR worse than any potential harm from second hand smoke.
I didn’t smoke in the car or in the house while raising my daughter for exactly that reason. After she was on her on own I still didn’t smoke in the house but it did become a regular part of my driving routine – when I was alone.
I finally quit 3 months ago after 40 some years and it has taken that long to get the smell out of my car.
Congrats on giving up! It seems you were a very responsible smoking dad anyway… But it’s good to hear you gave up anyway.
And it will save you a lot of money too!
I do not drive but do smoke and get enormous pleasure from it. I have told my GP if I get lung cancer I want to be allowed to die.
I never smoke in other people’s cars, on public transport etc. Banning smoking in cars seems pointless as like mobile phones people will still do it and who will stop them?
In the South East of The UK tobacco sales have increased as people are staying at home to drink and smoke. If they have children they will also be exposed. The only answer is to make tobacco illegal!
Thanks to our new high speed train service in the South East I can now do a day trip to Brussels and bring back enough tobacco to last me many months. This I did last week and saved £250.00p overall including the cost of the trip. This is legal.
When you smok you’re doing a drug (nicotine). You’re also exposing others around you to that drug. Which means you’re endangering your health AND their health.
So yes, IMO it should be banned. If you want to do a drug and risk killing yourself, that’s one thing, But you don’t have the right to endanger others.
why is the present ban on smoking in lorries and vans not enforced?
As a former smoker, I object! This isn’t really about smoking in a car, if it were reasons sited would include that smoking while driving is distracting for the driver, since the driver has to look away from the road, even for an instant to take a poof, to light up, or fish the cigarette out of the pack. It would also be sited that smoking while driving is dangerous for others on the road since the driver has to take one hand off the wheel to smoke. The driver does not have full control of the car while in the act of smoking. Those are the reasons given to me by a car insurance company as to why they charge smokers more for insurance than non-smokers.
Let’s get real, the give away is the government is hiding behind children to force smokers to conform to a standard the government deems acceptable. If it really were about the children, as they claim, then why not just take children away from smokers altogether? Afterall, children are exposed to cigarette smoke in the home and elsewhere. Really, sometimes government can be so transparent.
If there is a child or children in the car then yes, it should be against the law.
I would really prefer a ban on cars –
especially anything that emits diesel fumes.
I am not a realist, just a cyclist.
It’s a known fact for many years now that ‘passive’ smoking causes cancer ( Just stand/ live/ work next to a smoker to get cancer ! ) – so not sure what the fuss is about. Non-smokers will say smoking should NOT be allowed anywhere – and it should be taxed to the hilt ! Smokers will say ‘its a free world and if I want to kill myself then I should be allowed to do so’… blah blah blah…
But there lies the crux !..
I gave up smoking over 20 years ago but If a smoker is near me then I will cringe at having to breathe in the disgusting dirty junk thats being expelled from the INSIDE OF THEIR BODIES into My air-space! Their lungs don’t even want this cr*p so why should I have to suffer it – ? – and I am just a passer-by !!
= So, it’s totally understandable that all those vulnerable people like children etc, who can’t get away and have to live with smokers full time and who don’t stand a chance, should be protected.
– I would say though, that if smokers want to smoke in their own car then they should – but perhaps only when no children are present ?
If they pass any ‘Bills’ on this it would be Good BUT a bit daft as well ! – How do you control smokers smoking infront of their children in their own HOMES then ??
shouw me ONE CONCLUSIVE STUDY in a peer reviewed journal that shows without any doubt that passive some causes cancer.
there is plenty of evidence that it affects respiartory problems/diseases , blood pressure etc, BUT cancer NO.
@jens
According to the US National Cancer Institite, “Some research suggests that secondhand smoke may increase the risk of breast cancer, nasal sinus cavity cancer, and nasopharyngeal cancer in adults, and leukemia, lymphoma, and brain tumors in children. Additional research is needed to learn whether a link exists between secondhand smoke exposure and these cancers.”
http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/Tobacco/ETS
Certainly not conclusive, but highly suggestive.
Why is any amount of alcohol and driving permitted? Would you allow someone to tie an arm behind their back and drive? One drop of booze affects your abilities, even if you are below the legal limit. What causes more deaths? Deaths related to alcohol and driving, or second hand smoke?
Why are parents allowed to have two drinks and drive their kids? Does that alcohol make their driving abilities better or worse?
I do not disagree with the concept of protecting children in this way but i strongly disagree with such private space regulations. My own experience (as a social smoker) is that the etiquette of smoking has radically changed in recent years. I do not know many people who would actually even smoke around children in general, let alone in a confined space. But Government, get out of my car. If smoking is sooo dangerous why doesnt the govt grow a pair and make it illegal.
Smoking has become socially unacceptable and the best known discouragement is “shunning” so I say “yes”, ban it and it makes it more unacceptable. You can’t stop it but you can set it up as a dangerous, unhealthy habit that costs society a lot of $$$, directly and indirectly in terms of cancer treatment. And, like cell phone use it contributes to “distracted driving”. PS. I used to be a smoker.
A smokers freedom to smoke in his own car is entirely up to him, to suggest banning smoking in ones own car is rediculas.
i agrae it is vury rediculas
If the smoker is single and non-smokers will never enter into his car, I say go for it. Smoke yourself into oblivion. That is, unless the driver distraction argument is made.
My very first memory of flying was a trans-Atlantic flight my family took when I was 4 years olf. All I remember about that long flight was being deathly ill the entire time, literally throwing up.
Then many years later, I got into an elevator (lift) in which I smelled exactly the same revolting odor that made me throw up on that flight. Guess what? It was cigarette smke, evidently from the same brand. In that closed environment, it made me flash back to the flight.
Moral of the story being, I have zero sympathy for smokers. Even boozers don’t quite invade other people’s space as much as smokers can and do.
I think smoking in the car is a fantastic idea. Think of it this way. These parents are ignorant and have little or no basic protectiveness for their offspring. Not even the same care that say an alligator would have for it’s young. Speaking from an evolutionary perspective, it is helping to eliminate their genes.
Lets forget the fact that smoking will slowly kill Ur lungs and effect people around you in the same way……………….but
Does smoking while driving not make it multitasking while driving,,,,,,,,(okie that is a little dramatic) but it is still a distraction………..what if the cigarette slips and falls and the driver is distracted………And if you have a passenger(of any kind) then its an absolute nono.
Not worth the risk.
Help us help you.
So please lets ban it.
Cars cause far worse pollution than the smoking does, why not ban the cars? When I lived in London, just from walking on the streets I would get black soot on the inside of my nose because the air was so filthy. Yet the nanny staters want to ban smoking but not the actual problem.
I’ll bet that the smoke you inhale while sitting in a car is far more intense, i.e. dense, than the exhaust you are inhaling from your own and other cars. Measured in, say, particulates per liter.
Bert, there are more toxins in exaust fumes than any cigarette.
One has to take a hand off the steering wheel in order to smoke and may lose control of the vehicle is a childish argument.The same can be said of gear changing,rear view adjusment,blowing your nose or fiddling with radio.Perhaps we should all be made to drive automatics.To ban smoking in private cars is a ban on civil liberties.I don’t want to breath your secondhand smoke;but here you are,take a lung full of my exaust fumes! Total nonsense.
Smoking in the car should be banned. Subjecting passengers to second-hand smoke is simply not on. Passive smoking could lead to cancer or other respiratory health problems. If one wants to impair one’s own health by smoking that is a problem in itself but subjecting others to carcinogens should be strictly prohibited. People who want to smoke should go to designated areas. They should not endanger the lives of others as numerous studies have shown that passive smoking leads to cancer or respiratory problems. So smokers show some consideration to your fellow human beings!
@ Tracy!
I agree with the herd culling perspective in this modern day with all the up to date info we have. It should be a no-brainer for most parents.
I wish my parents would have had the scientific knowledge that we have today. After my father died when I was eleven ( 40 years ago), my mother eventually quit smoking. But 12 years of growing up with 2 chain smokers really screwed up my lungs and have been and will continue to be a detriment to my health. They did improve in my later teens as I became active in sports and worked at my overall health trough training. But it doesn’t take much to end up with a respiratory infection. Luckily I live in the dry desert and that helps allot.
Parents around the world! You don’t need a law to keep you from being stupid!
Don’t smoke in a car with kids in it. Simple. Leave the rest of the population alone. The cars and the gas they run on cause more pain, juvenile asthma, death and environmental problems than the smokers who drive some of them. They can’t smoke in the park or in a bar or restaurant, at least let them have a drag on a drug that increases mental focus and decreases psychotic reactions to stress.
Anything that distracts a driver whilst driving is a problem. The fact that this week alone I have nearly been rammed by 3 people who were smoking and had only one hand on the wheel at the time doesn’t colour my perception. Intoxication or distraction has the same effect. Of course these days it is everyone’s right to do what they feel when they feel despite it impacting on others, many times fatally. But that is the nature of the selfish attitude exhibited these days. Whether you are texting, rebuilding your cd collection, eating, drinking, reading the newspaper, building your model of the Cutty Sark or smoking it takes your attention of the road. Fine if you want to wrap yourself around a pole in a single person RTC, but not when you wipe out some poor unfortunate who just wanted to get to where they were going.
Yes, I think smoking in cars should be banned. If you go by yourself with no company you decide not to drive in optimal conditions of safety risking your own personal safety and also the safety of other people outside your car. That should be enough to be considered.
Smoking inside your stationary vehicle is probably like smoking inside your own property: your own business. It might be a driving hazard if you smoke while driving, or eat and drink while driving, or play the flute while driving.
I’m all for a ban on addictive-drugs-in-cancer-sticks, and if that’s what people think is best for the nation’s health, then go ahead and do it. But this approach of finding peculiar excuses for banning smoking in certain circumstances just looks silly.
since studies show that left-handed people are better at multi-tasking, perhaps we should only allow left-handers to smoke and drive.
I am all for banning smoking in cars, whether or not there is a passenger. People fling their butts out the window which have caused wildfires where I am from.
Anything else I toss out my window is considered rubbish/littering and subject to fines, but cigarettes aren’t treated the same.
Besides, I get caught up in traffic jams quite often where I am forced to breathe the smoke of the person ahead of me. Cigars and pipes are far worse than this, though.
And in the city I live I am quite often exposed to marijuana when driving in the city. This is not only illegal for OWI reasons, but it would be easier to enforce the drug possession laws if all smoking was banned in cars, for what that’s worth–whether or not marijuana should be considered illegal or not.
I despise the fact that I have to experience a contact high or respiratory problems when driving. Whether or not my windows are up or down, their smoke still reaches my lungs.
I quit driving due to back problems. Walking past cars with all their exhaust sometimes makes me sick. Drivers are in no position to get high and mighty with smokers. This is a complete waste of time.
There are certain roads in Los Angeles that forbid smoking because of the fire danger inherent from a carelessly flicked butt.
Though I’ve quit smoking, I once absent-mindedly lit a cigarette on Mulholland Drive (a road with signs along the way warning against smoking). The nasty looks I got from a fellow motorist was enough to remind me to put it out … probably also saved me from getting a traffic ticket.
–Louisviile, Kentucky, US.
I think it is good for health to ban the smoking, when other people are also in car.
Like many others I think it is very wrong to smoke in a car that is carrying children.
The idea of banning smoking in cars however is totally wrong. The freedom of choice is being taken away on almost a daily basis now!
We know that banning the use of mobile telephones whilst driving has not stopped many from doing so. We know that speeding still continues despite millions of speed cameras littering our roads. We also know what the governments real aims are………a rise in income through the collection of fines!
So why do the government not simply pass a law that forbids smoking while children are in the car? Because the average smoker is aware of the danger to his/her children and does not do it. By bringing in a blanket ban for ALL smokers the income raised through fines will be much, much bigger!
They should also ban talking in cars, it distracts the driver. Maybe even thinking about non driving related issues as well. so if you’re thinking ab out banning smoking while driving a car, you are distracted from your purpose of driving, hence you should be banned from having those thoughts.
I definitely support the ban of smoking in a car whether there are children in it or not. Today, many countries have ban answering or making phone calls while driving due to lack of concentration it causes to the driver. Also, smoking while driving is as good as answering a phone call while driving.
As a non smoker, it is and will be an act of inconsideration for someone in a car to smoke with othr people who might not like smoking. Cars that bring out alot of smoke are being banned from the road, then why should a person be smoking in a car on the road.
Moreover, smoking in a car leads to environment and air pollution. For this to be check-mated and stopped, severe sanctions will and must be implemented so any body found smoking in a car will be fined and severely dealt with.
If we cannot trust parents to ensure there is no smoking in their cars when children are there then we have a much bigger worry with these same parents than their children passive smoking! For heavens sake get the government and big brother out of peoples lives, we need much less legislation and more accepting of peoples responsibility. For those that want to control other peoples lives I suggest they go to China!!
Lee from Hungerford and Prague
Yes; for the sake of our safety, and that of the others inside and outside the car.
I’m a strong supporter of indoor smoking bans, but banning it in cars seems a bit intrusive. Even if there are children in the car, just require the window to be open. If someone wants to smoke in a private environment like that, why not let them?
(I do wish people who smoke in their cars wouldn’t litter so much, though. Drive down pretty much any major city street here in the USA and you’ll see what I mean.)
Why smoke in the first place, the packet is written ” Smoking is harmful to your Health” and yet one lights a cigar to finish him/her self.
i dont see the reason why puffing in the car should be cease if not stop…. especially public service vehicles in kenya you find one ligjting a cigarrete and pufs so easily not unles and until the angry passengers intervene and he smothers the cig. away……… shame on those who smoke…
we have had enough enviromental degradation and pollution and cigarrete smoke is part of this i better comment.
STOP! STOP! SMOKING IS HARMFUL TO YOUR HEALTH.
@ John
Alcohol is bad for your health. fried foods are bad for your health. red meat is bad for your health, candy is bad for your health, unwashed vegetables are bad for your health. Should we ban those things as well?
No way. What stupid thing to propose.
The next thing it would be that you are not allow to smoke in your own house? Or you will not able to listen music in the car
I know the smoking and passive smoke is bad and I believe that cigarette is one of the worst drug.
But it is legal and therefore you should be able to smoke in your own car whenever you like.
I smoke, however since the mother of my child was pregnant I stop smoking in the house and in the car as well. But time to time, especially if stuck in queue I open the window and have a fag in my car and keep all windows open to change the air.
Anyway I think that the point is that if it is my car I can do what I want if not danger for other people.
I don’t think that a smoking driver is worst than a non smoking one, and nicotine also help the concentration and help keeping away, isn’t .
Of course if you have kids or other people in the car is would be better to not smoke but this is for me obvious.
Every non-driving activity distracts drivers. And while I think there are ample reasons to ban smoking everywhere, I wouldn’t single it out as particularly common cause of traffic casualties (at least not any more dangerous than sipping morning coffee or ogling cute pedestrians).
g
It isn’t easy for me to say if banning smoking in cars is good or bad. When there are children in the car, OF COURSE you don’t smoke! But not everyone has children.So I can’t see why a person alone in a car shouldn’t be allowed to smoke?! Banning it all together seems to be an easy way for the British government to make lots of money.
About the environmental degradation, sorry, my sister tells me the same thing. But I don’t drive a car, I’ve hardly ever taken a airplane in my life. I walk a lot, I have a bike and for long distances, I use public transport.
The effects of smoking on human health are serious and in many cases, deadly. The ingredients in cigarettes affect everything from the internal functioning of organs to the efficiency of the body’s immune system. The effects of cigarette smoking are destructive and widespread.
A study by the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) found more than 20,000 chest infections, 120,000 bouts of middle ear disease and 200 cases of meningitis in youngsters are also thought to be linked to the effects of second-hand smoke.
And 40 babies die from sudden infant death syndrome every year caused by passive smoking.
Usman
How can you know for certain that passive smoking caused those deaths of the babies? It would be called “sudden infant death syndrome” if they knew what caused it. I’m sure many, many more babies die from being dropped, in car accidents, etc than from any possible harm from passive smoking. Should babies be kept indoors then given that the air outdoors is far worse than any amount of second hand smoke?
@Christian
Fortunately in this country if you see someone fling a butt out the window you can report that driver and they will be issued a fine as it is taken seriously here in fire prone Australia. I would take a step further though and suggest if you smoke anywhere it will affect anyone else, especially those who have no interest in smoking, it should be banned. I live like a hermit in my home because my neighbours have built an outdoor area in the back of their property with seating etc etc, every 5 mins I do not joke, I can hear their side door open and close as one then the other comes out to smoke right outside my main living area and I cannot open a window lest their filthy habit blows into and stinks out my house. I cannot ventilate it either so I have to keep all openings shut. But hey… they have “freedom” to do what they like and impose themsleves on others and in this selfish world, it is everyone’s God given right to annoy others.
I’m surprised that the Scottish govt. has doubts about the ban. Doesn’t Scotland have the highest drug abuse rate in the U.K.?
We need to stop this disgraceful tactic of tyrannical people using children as the method of taking away civil liberties
I am reminded of the famous quote from Goering – all you have to do is substitute children for patriotism and you have it in a nutshell
This is not worthy of airtime. The pope is on the ropes, and as the real story of cold, sadistic cover-ups emerge, we talk about smoking in cars. Smoking helped me get over sexual assault by a clergyman and I gave up religion, not smoking. Never smoked in a car with kids in it, common sense.
“200 cases of meningitis in youngsters are also thought to be linked to the effects of second-hand smoke.”
And i though you need to have at least a viral or bacterial infection….
I don’t know how you could enforce a ban on smoking with children in the car.
But I think a massive media campaign to educate people about the dangers would be a good idea.
Teach elementary school kids about it and they will drive their parents and their friends parents nuts until the parents clean up their act.
Teach potential parents about it while they are in pregnancy and birthing classes in order to try and prevent it.
At least cigarette butts are degradable, unlike all those bottles and cans you see on the sides of roads.
This is silly. Sure, if there are kids or non-smokers at risk then maybe, but to completely outlaw something you do in private in your own vehicle is a little big-brother-ish. It may be a gross addiction but we have to respect the rights of those who choose to smoke, us non smokers are not the only people on this planet. We need to accommodate everyone to equal degree.
I fear this debate is futile, since there are way too many wild and unsustantiated claims about passive smoking being made. in fact there is not a single study that proves beyond a doubt that passive smoking causes cancer, simply because such a study would be unethical. instead multiple studies rely on the meta-analysis of multiple studies and then extrapoloit the results, which is a very unreliable, if not even unscientific way of tackling this problem. Stay with in the facts that can be shown, like elevated blood pressure, severity of asthmatic attacks, vasoc constriction, etc. if you go past the ability of science to prove something conclusivly you simply turn your believe into a religion.
Absolutely. I’ll be one of the happiest if it is made obligatory.
It’s very difficult to be in a car with a smoker if you don’t smoke. I feel sorry for children who must ride in a car with a smoker. I think parents shouldn’t smoke when the children are present in the car and these days, most don’t do it. However, I feel this is just the government infringing on our personal lives again, a bit more than they should. “Big Brother” is running rampant. What’s next?
meningitis caused by second hand smoke? This is why I don’t believe anything people say about second hand smoke anymore.. Smoking is bad for the smoker, it smells bad to nonsmokers, but when you start saying it starts causing things like meningitis, you know that people are making things up.
It seems to me in reading through some of these posts that people who were forced to intake second-hand smoke as children are the ones who support this ban. That being said, if an adult is uncaring enough to smoke around their children, these children will learn the courtesy not to do so when they have children.
I don’t want my right to smoke banned in my car! I am VERY considerate about where and whom I smoke around, so leave me alone!
There are really two things here. Certain people are very antismoking, and would like to see smoking as banned as much as possible, but wonder where they would make up the missing tax revenues.
Fact: Smoking is bad for the smoker. It can cause cancer. Not guaranteed to, but it can cause cancer, heart disease, etc..
Second Hand smoke: Not proven to cause harm. Does it smell bad? Yes. Does it make your clothes smell bad? Yes. But is that reason enough to ban it? I don’t like the smell of seafood, tomatoes, etc. Should those things be banned as well indoors? If I smell fish, I begin to vomit. It’s that bad. But what do I do? I avoid places that have seafood.
I have a question for the people who want smoking tobe completely banned, where do you think the revenues will be made up from?
The reason smoking is banned in public places is because you have no say over who else may be in the bar/office/restaurant with you. Smoking should only be banned from public transportation and taxis (which I believe it already is, for the most part), not private vehicles where you have a choice about whether to be there. If they ban smoking in cars, what’s to stop them from banning smoking in the home? I’m not a smoker myself but I think if others choose to smoke it’s their business and their right, as long as it isn’t in a public place.
How about I propose we ban non-smokers, since their extremism is affecting my rights!?
You got my vote!
Of course not. I don’t smoke, don’t care much for people who do. But it is a car after-all, a car that spews out cancerous pollution! Ironic to ban the smoking inside, rather then the smoke coming out of the tailpipe. Not just effecting our children, but our entire choking planet.
We should be more cautious, with these half-baked laws, which are not morally commensurate with so much of what we do, and excuse every day.
I was one of those kids in the back seat with chain smoking parents. I am not wondering IF I’ll get cancer, but WHEN.
This makes me very angry as an adult with children of my own–I don’t understand how my parents could have done this…
I think a ban would absolutely be good for drivers with children under 18 in the car. It is illegal for children to smoke, so why should they smoke passively?
Even if it isn;t absolutely enforceable, it is a step in the right direction.
Carmel,
your reaction is absolutly irrational. You can not conclude that you WILL get cancer, because you were exposed to smokeing as a child. There is simply no study that links the one to the other. you may be predisposed to athma and other issues, but cancer is just one of those wild claims that cannot be substantiated.
Laws aside. Odiferously speaking, people who smoke in their cars just stink.
So do people who chomp on garlic and/or drink alot or after an evening of drinking. Have bad bo from lack of bathing. I could go on. People who live with dogs. People with cats who do not keep their area clean,cat neutered and the male sprays them. Talk about an odor. there are alot of them. Smoking is but one. Yet, I understand. As a former smoker, I never liked the smell on me either and never smoked in enclosed places. Go figure.
My father died from lung cancer as a result of smoking. He was a closet smoker so I was never exposed to his second hand smoke. I am very against smoking or being around smokers but I think it is wrong to not allow them an outlet for smoking.
Smokers should respect children and others who do not want to be exposed to second hand smoke and not smoke around them, especially children for they do not have the knowledge to say stop!
Salem Oregon
i have an aunt diagnosed with lung cancer. She NEVER smoked. No one in her house did, either. Husband, 3 children, two of whom are fine, the oldest died of cancer, also. Did not smoke, either. He was 45 when he died in 2003.
@ Lisa
Bars are for adults. Kids don’t go to bars. They are going there to do unhealthy activities, like drink alcohol, eat greasy foods, and have unsafe sex. If they don’t like smoke, they can choose not to enter. I love certain places in Germany, where over the bar doors it says it’s a smoker’s club, and nonsmokers should keep out and go somewhere else. Why can’t societies all be free like that? Vote with your feet?
I don’t eat meat, so guess what I avoid? steakhouses. I don’t need them to be banned so that I don’t go to them.
If you don’t like the idea of your state telling you what risks you can expose your children to then look up the laws – I don’t care what state you’re in – pertaining to the powers of it’s Childrens Services Agency or Department.
Don’t kid yourself. We keep and raise our children because the state allows us to.
I think that the tobacco companies ought to be under relentless attacks from every quarter, they sought to essentially be driven out of business.
Here in the US, tobacco is responsible for some 450,000 deaths each year, and that is far more than Osama Bin Laden is responsible for, adds up to far more than Stalin killed in Communist Russia, far more than Pol Pot killed in Cambodia, adds up to far more than the Chinese Communists killed, on and on.
Let’s get our priorities straightened out.
@ Carmel
So then what next? tell parents they can’t smoke at home either?
Something tells me you’re the type who would say “don’ tyou dare tell me what I can or cannot do in my bedroom” yet logically you would ban what people do in their homes that you don’t like, like smoking?
My grandmother was a smoker, and neither my mom or my uncle, who are not smokers, ever had any lung problems, nor lung cancer, and are quite old.
Smokers are essentially committing a very slow and long term suicide and I am appalled that they argue for their own deaths.
Tobacco ads are very effective in creating addicts wishing for their own deaths!
Tom, on the subject of slow suicides, to quote my own family history, my chain-smoking father lived a healthy (apart from a bit of a cough), active life till 90. My mother who had never touched a cigarette had no cough, but lived out the last horrific years of her life (only in her 70s) as a non-person, with senile dementia. Anything is better than that, I’d rather die with my brain intact and if something else gives out, either because of smoking or otherwise, I’ll take that chance, it’s my life.
Why does everyone in the world think that they must create legislation to ban every behavior that they do not agree with…
For all the people that complain about intrusive the government has become, I’m always surprised how many of them are willing to resort to using government to regulate behavior that they personally do not agree with. They are all hypocrites
TW in Texas.
I believe that it should be illegal to smoke inside a car carrying children! they are too young to make the choice for themselves, a baby can’t ask a parent to put out the cigarette. if an adult is alone in a vehicle that they own, that’s another issue. they can smoke themselves silly if they don’t impose it on anyone else!
Thank you. I agree. I do not/did not smoke around my children, grandchildren nor my husband. Never in the car because I could not stand it. I quit going to smoking areas because of the smell. After a while i quit without trying. I was down to one in the morning and one in the evening. We have no smoking at work. You have to go out doors away from the building. Get real!!!! It is Cleveland, Ohio. A couple of weeks ago we had blzzard conditions and people still went out to smoke. I don’t think you nor anyone else has the right to tell you what to do with or with in your property. Home. Car. Under the house. None of you business. My dad smoked pipes and I loved the smell. My mom never smoked and one other sister(there are 5 of us) and I are the only ones who did. She quit over 10 yrs ago. Our children do not smoke. 5 adults 2 in school. Still you do not tell me what to do with what is mine. For the record, smoking ang texting, dialing, etc., is not the same thing. My daughter and I have almost been in major accidents because someone wanted to text or talk on a phone. They were on the entrance ramp to I-90 going under 20 mphs both times. Going into on coming traffic traveling at 60+ miles an hour.
Here we go again, roll out the health fascists, accuse anyone who smokes ANYWHERE of the ultimate in anti-social behaviour, second only to terrorists.
I smoke, it’s bad for me, but so are a lot of things, ultimately it’s my decision.
I accept the ban on smoking in enclosed public places, bars, restaurants, public transport etc. but the minute they try to turn the screws on people’s own homes, and their cars are an extension of that private space, and most stupid of all, in the open air, I hope there will be a massive backlash. OK, so I can’t have a fag inside a bar, but I can at least sit outside and enjoy one or ten with a few beers, if they try to ban that too, I, and many others like me will probably never spend another penny or eurocent at a bar or restaurant – great news that for flagging economies.
For the record I drive, as little as possible, as I loathe cars and everything about them but they are a necessity for shopping where I live. I don’t actually smoke while driving precisely because of the concentration issue. If I did and had adult passengers, what’s wrong with opening all the windows? I do not smoke in other people’s cars unless they are smoking too, so precisely who am I causing such grievous bodily harm? .
BTW those of you complaining about people chucking cigarette butts out of the window, (an anti-social habit I agree) try blaming the anti-smoking lobby for persuading car manufacturers not to fit ashtrays any longer.
@ jens ….. ” in fact there is not a single study that proves beyond a doubt that passive smoking causes cancer, simply because such a study would be unethical….”
Sorry jens I beg to disagree – there’s plenty of evidence out there that supports ‘passive’ or second-hand smoking, causes cancer amongst other things – just tap the words into your browser and you’ll get loads of information…
That’s one of the main reasons why we have a widespread lockdown on smokers on transport, restuarants, community areas etc,etc…
Even Wikipedia have a section on it where they say under their ” Long Term Effects” heading …
” There is ample scientific evidence that secondhand smoke causes many of the same diseases as direct smoking, including cardiovascular diseases, lung cancer, and respiratory diseases.[2][3][4] These diseases include:…”
…They even go on to say that ‘third-hand’ smoking (which I have never heard of !) also also causes the same illness !
Cabe UK,
You say it yourself EVIDENCE, which is not prove……when will you layman scientist understand the difference. I don’t get a paper published based on evidence. I give you that there is prove that secondhand smoke causes cardiovascular and respiratory disease, but unless somebody forces a large group of non-somkers to inhale second hand smoke for X hours a day and y period there will be no prove. I smoke occasionally a cigar, but i am fully supportive of smoking bans in restaurants and public transport etc. What i cannot stand is the hysteria about somebody smoking in the upon, in his car, or home (both of which i do not do). And please do not quote wikipedia as a science source, because it is not.
@ Tom D Ford
So could be said of anyone who drinks more than moderately, or eats red meat, or fried foods.
If you drank 6 drinks a night and 8 tynelols a day, you’d need a new liver within a week or two. Does Lung cancer get caused that quickly?
Aside from health and moral reasonings, smoking in cars is dangerous. I’ve known a handful of people who’ve been in rather dangerous car wrecks due to smoking. A few things can happen: you take your eyes off the road to search for your lighter, or (in the older days when cars came equipped with lighters) pushing the lighter in or getting it out, accidentally dropping a lit cigarette… making you swerve into oncoming traffic or off the road. It’s that reason that I’d support a ban on having a driver smoke in cars, even though I’m a smoker and would find smoking while driving a hard habit to quit. Some cities have outlawed eating in the car for similar reasons, and now we have banned cell phones in many states- it makes sense to do our part to keep drivers focused on driving.
So smoking now amounts to child abuse does it?
My grandparents smoked like chimneys and only one of the three sisters (not my Mum) even started smoking and none of them ever had cancer or any other smoking-related disease.
My father smoked like a chimney until he was well into his eighties, only stopped when he fell off a ladder and broke a couple of ribs and the cough hurt too much!
I didn’t smoke until I was seventeen, had nothing to do with my parents, it was a trip to Germany that did it (but that’s another story).
Both my husband and I smoked when our son (now 20) was young, but never in his bedroom, and shock horror I smoked throughout my pregnancy without any ill effects on him or myself.
Why can’t people just live and let live?
Who is going to police all of this banning? Pretty soon you will only be able to go home and stare at the wall so you don’t offend anyone. I don’t smoke but if people want to smoke in their cars they should be able to, its their car. All the smokers I know do not smoke around children anyway. Many of them choose not to smoke in their cars either. Why do we need another law?
Smoking in a car distracts the driver and creates multiple hazards on the road. Not only are children in the car affected, people in the surrounding area are affected as smokers seldom keep their windows closed, even in very hot or very cold weather. Not to mention cigarette smokers have as little respect for the environment as they do for their own bodies and throw their lit butts out of the car, causing unsightly roadside litter, not to mention brushfires. Kill yourselves somewhere else, smokers.
Unfortunately I smoke, and as I am dealing with being the ONLY caregiver for my Mother with Alzheimer’s Disease, I am currently unable to quit that ADDICTION! However I ONLY smoke when I am alone in my vehicle. I do not smoke when my Mom is in the car! We DO NOT NEED PC people telling us how to live!!!
Dr CJ, how I sympathise, that is the worst thing in the world and I’m sure your Mum wouldn’t object anyway.
The idea is a good one but for public transport like taxis, not private transport. I’m a smoker and own a car, i also have kids but i will never smoke in the presence of my kids, if they are in the car i wont smoke if they are in the same room with me i would leave the room and go outside the house. we as adults need to be responsible.
Trinidad
How, EXACTLY, could that be banned, anyway?
In the first edition of the show, one of the guests from Africa asked the woman if she rolls down her window when she smokes, and said if she does, the smoke goes out the window and impacts other people. The amount of smoke that she exhales out the window is miniscule compared to the far more dangerous automobile exhaust that the car emits. Why not ban cars with his logic?
Yes it should be banned. In a vehicle there are people who cannot get away. Who are forced to sit in the car and smell your smoke. These people are your children, spouse, employees, colleagues.
Imagine a van carrying workers to the work site. The driver is smoking. It’s not like the workers can get out and tell the boss, “it’s OK, I’ll take the bus”, and then arrive 2 hours late because they’re waiting for the bus.
Dainel, pray why is any adult FORCED to sit in someone else’s car?
If your by yourself it’s no big deal. If there is another person is automatically illegal unless that person is smoking also.
If a person wants to smoke, while alon in thier car….no problem. To give the government control such an action is a short step from mandating any other part of our life. If,someone else however, particularly a child, is in the car then heavy fines should be paid by the offender!
I don’t think smoking should be banned in cars. If people want to smoke in their cars they should be allowed to. If public transport companies wish to allow smoking, they should be allowed to as long as they provide areas in equal size for people who don’t want to breathe in smoke.
If doctors can prove that children have been harmed by their parents smoking, their parents should be prosecuted and the children should be given to non smokers.
The smoking ban in indoor public places in the UK is obeyed, so I don’t expect smokers to rebel if smoking is banned in cars.
Saying smoking in cars distracts the driver is like saying you should have to ban manual transmissions becuase you have to tak eyour hand off the wheel to shift the car. Are we going to mandate that all cars be automatics? Are we going to ban vanity mirrors?
This is simply antismoking zealotry.
My shift knob never fell off and lit my pants on fire.
I wonder what benefit one derives from smoking anyway apart from the harmful effects it has on our health. No one in my family smokes. Not to my knowledge, so it’s kind of strange to me seeing others cleave to smoking as if it saves them from something. Tobacco should be declared illegal.
Alcohol, sugar, corn starch syrup and salt should be illegal. Fatty red meat and fast food should be illegal. as we ban more and more things, each citizen will need a personal police person follow them to make sure that all bans are strictly enforced.
When I was a young, slip of a thing I used to drive a motorbike so I am neither for nor against smoking in cars – – “If it’s your car then do what you want as long as it hurts nothing else” is a good maxim to live by…
But – an interesting observation about *why* this law should come about is to consider that ‘society’ around the world is shrinking… We not only squat on every available space we own but we also overspill onto other people’s *space* without truly realising it… so in a way, our world is going to be inundated with more and more social laws that incroach into our own space as a form of damage limitation?
Say in 50 – 100 years time, our world will literally be one Global type of village where everything is monitored and where *Big Brother* is just like another parent figure… Computers, social networking, world banking, electronic id checks are all simple things happening now without us bothering about… and ultimately *them* telling *us* what / not to do etc, will be a reality soon anyway so we may as well get used to it ???? 😦
This is silly. We have enough laws abridging our individual and interpersonal behavior, and few, if any, of them are valid. Gov’ts have removed personal choice and responsibility from the equation.
I live in the city that is home to the RJ Reynolds Tobacco Co. and even here things have gotten out of control. Smoking in reastaurants is now prohibited. The gov’t has taken away the business owners’ private property rights, as well as my right to choose either a restaurant that prohibits or permits smoking.
Let me be clear of one thing, though: I HATE TOBACCO.
If you detest tobacco smoke, then go nowehere it is permitted. If you hate Chinese food, then don’t eat at Chinese restaurants. One wouldn’t ask the gov’t to force the owner of a Chinese restaurant to start serving tacos. Just go to a cantina.
Cigarettes are vile. My mother was a chain-smoker who couldn’t care less about my and my sister’s pleas that she not smoke around us. This was in the 1980s. We begged her, because having been “scared straight” by information available, we legitimately feared that we would develop cancer. She would smoke in the car, with windows up, while we rode along. I now have breathing and allergy problems as a result.
But there’s a distinction to be made. YES, parents who smoke in the car with children should be punished. Indeed, parents who smoke AT ALL around children should be punished for child endangerment.
Simply smoking in one’s car, however, should never be a crime. No individual choice that has no impact on the lives of others should ever be criminalized.
Someone made reference to smoking potentially causing a wreck due to the driver being distracted. This is an argument for laws that enhance punishment IN THE EVENT of such an accident. IF a driver is found to have caused a wreck because of distraction by smoking (or texting, or talking on the phone, etc.), then the penalty should be significantly more severe than if that weren’t the case. But pre-emptive laws are ALWAYS wrong. Gov’t should never limit the rights of the virtuous in order to restrict the peccant (or the rights of the many to restrict the few).
If this ban passes, theres gonna be a lot of angry people on the streets. But hey, every state needs the money and with the 40 million smokers in the US, there will be a nice steady flow of income on these tickets, I get it…
As a physicist and mathematician, in an open area one would have to stand one meter away from someone smoking about one-hundred thousand cigarettes to obtain the effect of smoking one whole cigarette. Though, I admit that the second hand smoke effect is amplified considerably in the sealed cabin of a car.
But people who promote such shabby hearsay data should realize that it puts them in danger of promoting fraud — doubly injuring what is otherwise a well-intentioned message for a noble cause.
Take care!
–Louisviile, Kentucky, US.
Anyone who forces their child to breathe their second hand smoke, especially in cars, should be prosecuted for child abuse. There is no sound argument against its extremely detrimental effects on the human respiratory system. If you want to kill yourself slowly, perfect, just do not force your innocent child with a full life ahead of him/her to do the same. I still enjoy the occasional cigarette, but, I would expect nothing less than a sound thrashing if I chose to smoke around my child or anyones else’s child.
More than quarter of century ago since i raised concern to my friend who’s newly born baby was forced to inhale smoke at home while the dad had a fag .If an immigrant doctor qualifed abroad can earn more than 330000 per year for working hard ,yet millions of hardworking families have to make end with meagre income.Time to give up more of their income back to the poor’s tax burden.This is a pathetic side show from so called doctors who are not public health officals.I was a well qualfied air pollution specialist more than 28 years ago and knew the cancerous effect on human health of passive smoking specialiy to children.
@Linda from Italy
“Here we go again, roll out the health fascists, accuse anyone who smokes ANYWHERE of the ultimate in anti-social behaviour, second only to terrorists.”
Interesting comparison! I’d be interested in knowing how many deaths in the UK (or Italy) are caused by passive smoking vs deaths caused by terrorism.
I wonder if we can even take it further (it is Friday after all) and conclude that smoking is the slower version of a suicide bomber: smokers kill themselves and all those around them … over time. I can see it now: Surgeon General warning on the front, and MI5 warning on the back.
if cars are not designated smoking zones,then those in them can in fact reach a smoking zone faster than those who just walk to the zone.
Reading some of these replies makes me sick to my stomach!
Forget the question in hand and just listen to the intolerant, fascist views of some of these puppets of authority replying here.
Have you really become so accustomed to control that you are prepared to do the dirty work of “Big Brother” without question?
Oh how proud Hitler and Stalin would have been of you lot!
If we’re going to legislate parental smoking behavior to save the children from an unproven risk for most healthy children, no matter how much the anti-tobacco lobby wants you to believe otherwise, we would have to review many behaviors which carry real risks that we allow our children to be subjected to and legislate them in the same way, such as taking the child outside during smog alerts, driving in poor weather and visibility conditions, driving in a car with worn tires or other mechanical problems, caring for our child while we are afflicted with an infectious disease, allowing them to eat junk food, letting them go out in the sun without sunscreen, allowing them to cross the street before a reasonable age… the list is long and endless. Why should it be any different when it comes to smokers to the point that we have to violate their parental authority and privacy right into their private space?
Let parents raise their children and the government look after fixing the roads to make them safer for everyone. Otherwise let’s hand our children over to them to raise them in incubators up until their age of majority.
@Cyzane – By your logic, the gov’t should not intervene if a man rapes or savagely beats his child. There is as much evidence to support the ill effects of tobacco smoke as there is supporting those of child battery.
Jens – I’m not quoting Wikipedia as a scientific source, I’m quoting it as a source of ‘common knowledge’… in fact passive smoking is such common knowledge that the global encyclopedia has got it on its site!…
I’m not the one hysterical about it! If smokers want to smoke themselves to death and freak out at every single criticism directed at them then go ahead… just don’t include me in your illusion.
Smoking should be banned everywhere.
The proposal of smoking ban in cars would be a more sensible and appreciable deed indeed than it is for public places like hotels, restaurants etc.