Practical problems associated with assessing the impact of outdoor smoking on outdoor air quality: An Edinburgh study

Abstract

Smoking in the United Kingdom is now banned in public places, subject to certain exempt situations. The last country to introduce the ban being England on the 1st July 2007. People who smoke now congregate outside premises either sitting at tables or standing while smoking their cigarettes. Previous studies have concluded that measured outdoor pollutants are proportional to and correlated with smoker count and not with motor vehicle traffic. This paper reports on a case study conducted in Edinburgh and identifies lessons learnt from this and earlier studies. The authors having conducted this field work suggest that this is not necessarily the case and they have concluded that further work is required to establish a more robust methodology.