BCT Editorial – 1/11/07

This page was last updated on June 22, 2007.

A ban too far?; Editorial; Beaver County Times; January 11, 2007.

Below is a detailed critique of the subject editorial.

“The Geisinger Health System is taking its ban on smoking to extremes - people’s cars and trucks.

“The health system, which has 11,500 employees in eastern and central Pennsylvania, has extended its smoking ban to include sidewalks and parking lots. The Associated Press reported smoking shelters will be removed, and employees no longer will able to step outside to smoke.

“That’s become standard stuff at many health-related institutions.

“However, Geisinger officials aren’t stopping there. By November, they intend to extend the ban to the inside of vehicles that are on their property.

“Obviously, Geisinger doesn’t want its employees and patients sneaking off to their cars and trucks to smoke and is doing so for medical reasons. As the system’s president and chief executive officer noted in a news release, smoking and tobacco use are ‘the nation’s greatest avoidable cause of death, disability and disease.’

“But what about visitors who are coming and going? Where does Geisinger’s right to ban smoking end and where does the right of smokers to light up in the privacy of their private property begin?

[RWC] Earth to the Times. The visitor vehicles are on the private property of Geisinger. When you’re on my property, you must follow my rules. Why is this so hard for Times editorial authors to understand?

Is the Times going to champion a government mandate that property owners must allow visitors on their property to smoke in their vehicles?

Finally, there is no such thing as either smoker or non-smoker rights.

“It’s a question that needs to be answered.”