How to save the world? A global journey into making our lives better…

Recent legislations in Europe, USA and Canada prevent people from smoking in public places, which makes it possible for the first time to actually see on a wide scale what the effect of second hand smoke can be on health…

And the numbers are there: one year after passing smoking bans, communities in North America and Europe had 17% fewer heart attacks compared to communities without smoking restrictions, and the number of heart attacks kept decreasing with time, to reach 36% (or 47% in some studies). This surprising fact was initially published in Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association, in a meta-analysis of 13 different studies.

It has always been of public knowledge that smoking kills. However it has always been difficult to just evaluate the real exposure to second hand smoke during a lifetime. The numbers above come to the surprise of many organisations and institutions: everyone expected the decrease to be less significant.

Beside improving health and life expectancy of non-smokers, those legislations also have the added benefit of decreasing the global healthcare bill. I believe this is great news to everyone.

Sources:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8267523.stm

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE59E3WZ20091015