There really shouldn’t be a debate surrounding a smoking ban on hospital property.
On Monday, city council approved 10-3 to include the entire property of the Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre in the city’s smoking bylaw. The hospital’s property has been designated smoke-free since 2004, but before Monday’s vote the hospital could only enforce its smoke-free rules if people were smoking within nine metres of the building’s entrance.
Many are calling the ban extreme and those criticisms are justified.
But blaming hospital administration or city council for being too heavy handed lets the real culprits off the hook.
Who are these real culprits? The smokers. Not all smokers though. Just the smokers who decided the comfort of fellow hospital patients entering and exiting the facility came second to their desire to light up.
Just the smokers who believe their butts are exempt from the litter laws that force pop cans and sandwich bags into garbage cans. Just the smokers who believe, despite rules, they shouldn’t have to inconvenience themselves with a 10-metre walk for a dart.
Had non-smokers with allergies, or asthma patients, not been forced to walk the gauntlet of tobacco smoke at the hospital’s entrance, then perhaps heavy-handed smoking bans could be left alone.
But too many smokers couldn’t respect their peers, so council was forced to include that respect in a municipal bylaw.
