Patients leaving mental health facility to have a smoke.

Comic_and_Gamer_Nerd said :

DrKoresh said :

Comic_and_Gamer_Nerd said :

DrKoresh said :

breda said :

Look out, all you wine qaffers. If they have their way, in ten years you’ll be looking at pictures of cirrosed livers on the label. If you think I’m exaggerating, look at how the cigarette packet thing began – just a small warning label which grew and grew.

The New Puritans are among us, and are delighting in making people suffer in the name of “promoting healthy lifestyles”.

+1! Too true. I can’t stand this wave of moralistic legislation on how people should spend their free time. Makes me want to find the biggest, stinkiest cigar in the world and blow the smoke in their respective faces.

Right, yet here I’m not wishing cancer on anyone, or calling anyone an arsehole. I’m figuratively expressing my resentment towards people who think they have a right to tell me how to live my life. What point are you trying to make? Or are you just quoting words like a parrot?

So if you lit up next to me and my kids and I told you to put it out, would you do as told or blow smoke in my face?

Troll face is off, this is a serious question.

I wouldn’t light up next to you and your kids. I’ve already said that I move away from others when I have a smoke, but that’s doubly true when children are involved. I always make sure to move well away from kids.

The self medication hypothesis is the theory that the very high rates of smoking in schizophrenic patients (who consume 1/4-1/2 of all cigarettes apparently…) is due to improvements in symptoms caused by the nicotine.

The other argument is that the poor self control and insight that are caused by schizophrenic leads to increased susceptibility to addictive drugs.

Then there is the theory that nicotine might promote the development of schizophrenia.

Here’s an article abstract: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/19023823/?i=8&from=nicotine%20self%20medication%20hypothesis%20schizophrenia

1337Hax0r said :

Links please? Please prove this, because I believe it to be crap.

I’ve asked for them as well and they’ve not appeared. I fear they may be wishful thinking, like the people who tell themselves and others that their doctor said it would be worse for them to stop smoking than to keep going.

DrKoresh said :

Comic_and_Gamer_Nerd said :

DrKoresh said :

breda said :

Look out, all you wine qaffers. If they have their way, in ten years you’ll be looking at pictures of cirrosed livers on the label. If you think I’m exaggerating, look at how the cigarette packet thing began – just a small warning label which grew and grew.

The New Puritans are among us, and are delighting in making people suffer in the name of “promoting healthy lifestyles”.

+1! Too true. I can’t stand this wave of moralistic legislation on how people should spend their free time. Makes me want to find the biggest, stinkiest cigar in the world and blow the smoke in their respective faces.

Right, yet here I’m not wishing cancer on anyone, or calling anyone an arsehole. I’m figuratively expressing my resentment towards people who think they have a right to tell me how to live my life. What point are you trying to make? Or are you just quoting words like a parrot?

So if you lit up next to me and my kids and I told you to put it out, would you do as told or blow smoke in my face?

Troll face is off, this is a serious question.

Comic_and_Gamer_Nerd said :

DrKoresh said :

breda said :

Look out, all you wine qaffers. If they have their way, in ten years you’ll be looking at pictures of cirrosed livers on the label. If you think I’m exaggerating, look at how the cigarette packet thing began – just a small warning label which grew and grew.

The New Puritans are among us, and are delighting in making people suffer in the name of “promoting healthy lifestyles”.

+1! Too true. I can’t stand this wave of moralistic legislation on how people should spend their free time. Makes me want to find the biggest, stinkiest cigar in the world and blow the smoke in their respective faces.

Right, yet here I’m not wishing cancer on anyone, or calling anyone an arsehole. I’m figuratively expressing my resentment towards people who think they have a right to tell me how to live my life. What point are you trying to make? Or are you just quoting words like a parrot?

1337Hax0r said :

Want to know a few good reasons why smoking should be banned in mental facilities?
Have you ever seen or had to provide first aid for the burns inflicted on fellow patients by a smoker who has for a mental health condition when something goes bad for them?
Have you had to deal with the fallout from arguments when a mentally ill smoker is asked not to smoke? For example, one asked not to smoke at a meal, or in a meeting room.
Then, worse still, have you seen mental health patients set fire to furniture, bedding, and other patients? Yes, flamable things and mental health patients don’t go well together.
Then there are the idiots who simply use smoking as a way to piss people off, literally blowing smoke in people’s faces or threatening to burn people.

Seriously, yes, screw their so called rights, think about their safety, the safety of others and their rights. Then think about the fact that smoking causes severe medical issues including mental health issues for people.

I thought that at the AMHU at the hospital the staff kept the lighters behind the security screen and would light cigarettes for the patients only when they were outside?
The patients wouldn’t be allowed to keep lighters for goodness sake.

DrKoresh said :

breda said :

Look out, all you wine qaffers. If they have their way, in ten years you’ll be looking at pictures of cirrosed livers on the label. If you think I’m exaggerating, look at how the cigarette packet thing began – just a small warning label which grew and grew.

The New Puritans are among us, and are delighting in making people suffer in the name of “promoting healthy lifestyles”.

+1! Too true. I can’t stand this wave of moralistic legislation on how people should spend their free time. Makes me want to find the biggest, stinkiest cigar in the world and blow the smoke in their respective faces.

Comic_and_Gamer_Nerd said :

Hey, I have this little baggy of crushed asbestos sheeting, I’m going to scatter it in the air next to you. Now it may or may not cause you cancer, but because its a low percentage you actually will develop mesothelioma then I’m gonna call you the wowser asshole if you complain.

Read that and tell me now if you get where I’m coming from?

Wow, going straight from attacking a strawman into a false analogy, are you on scavenger hunt for logical fallacies? I get where you’re coming from, but you’re over-reacting to something you don’t seem to fully understand.

For one thing, I’m not actually standing next to you, blowing smoke into your face. For another, crushed asbestos isn’t remotely similar to 2nd hand smoke; Go to the next James Hardy rally and see how much sympathy you get from an asbestos victim about having to put up with being near a smoker (in an open air space, for Christ’s sake). Finally, I didn’t call anyone an arsehole for complaining about having to breathe in someone else’s smoke, only the people who think they have the right to tell me not to smoke anywhere, and the people who think it’s a great idea to infringe on the freedom’s of the mentally unwell.

You’re being an arsehole, but that’s less to do with your personal habits and more to do with your personality.

DrKoresh said :

Comic_and_Gamer_Nerd said :

Can you link me to your claims second hand smoke is harmless?

No, because he never said that. I don’t think anyone can say that 2nd hand smoke is totally harmless, because it isn’t, but it’s certainly not this silent killer it’s being made out to be. I too have heard bullshit like 2nd hand smoke somehow being worse than 1st hand but only from the gullible people I keep around to make myself feel smart. It’s intellectually dishonest for you to act as though Breda said 2nd hand smoke is harmless, when they didn’t, anywhere. All s/he did was point-out that there is a lot of scaremongering and outright lies that go into this anti-smoking campaign.

Interestingly, we can blame the rise in asthma on taking hygiene to stupid excesses, reducing childrens exposure to everyday irritants which prevents them from building up a tolerance or resistance to them.

Hey, I have this little baggy of crushed asbestos sheeting, I’m going to scatter it in the air next to you. Now it may or may not cause you cancer, but because its a low percentage you actually will develop mesothelioma then I’m gonna call you the wowser asshole if you complain.

Read that and tell me now if you get where I’m coming from?

Talk about kicking a person when they’re down. Who’s business is it of the government to tell a person that they can either receive treatment for their mental illness or smoke? I’m not a smoker, I can’t stand it personally, but I don’t see why this particularly vulnerable subclass of patients should be picked on. Unlike other patients at the hospital, they don’t have freedom of movement to go to the smoko areas.

Masquara said :

Frankly, taking the line that smoking cigarettes is going to aid someone in the middle of a psychotic episode is a nonsense. .

Going through nicotine withdrawal is bad enough if you are well, if you are psychotic it would be a hundred times worse. You are plain cruel.

Comic_and_Gamer_Nerd said :

Can you link me to your claims second hand smoke is harmless?

No, because he never said that. I don’t think anyone can say that 2nd hand smoke is totally harmless, because it isn’t, but it’s certainly not this silent killer it’s being made out to be. I too have heard bullshit like 2nd hand smoke somehow being worse than 1st hand but only from the gullible people I keep around to make myself feel smart. It’s intellectually dishonest for you to act as though Breda said 2nd hand smoke is harmless, when they didn’t, anywhere. All s/he did was point-out that there is a lot of scaremongering and outright lies that go into this anti-smoking campaign.

Interestingly, we can blame the rise in asthma on taking hygiene to stupid excesses, reducing childrens exposure to everyday irritants which prevents them from building up a tolerance or resistance to them.

If health facility buildings have a non-smoking policy, it should apply to everyone. People who don’t think nicotine patches will help, can use those silly nicotine inhaler thinggies. Frankly, taking the line that smoking cigarettes is going to aid someone in the middle of a psychotic episode is a nonsense. They might believe it is so, but it ain’t. The “enabling” approach appears to be informed by an adolescent perception of smoking – a bit edgy etc. People with mental illness can be thoroughly deluded that they are living some “beat poet” type of life on the margins. Hauling the vulnerable mentally ill off that cigarette-company-supported furphy that smoking is cool and bohemian would in fact be a good idea. There’s an economic welfare argument as well: many of these unfortunate people are of course living off welfare. Why should any support be given to a practice that is costing them, what, $11 a packet? $14 a packet? If you want to get well, follow the mainstream policies. If you’re voluntarily committed, make your choice. If it’s involuntary, the health system will help you get off your habit by providing nicotine via non-commercial means, through a prescription.

Silentforce said :

If so, how has smoking benefited them to addresss their illness in the first place?

Nobody here said smoking was beneficial, just quitting (at that time) isn’t.

I assume that the mental health patients we are discussing entered the facility with the habit already in place. If so, how has smoking benefited them to addresss their illness in the first place?

DrKoresh said :

Comic_and_Gamer_Nerd said :

You really are not very bright are you?

Do you know anything about the harm of second hand smoke?

As for dr koresh, I now you have some put of wack beliefs but advocating cancer on others is the worst thing you have ever said.

Thanks, CGN, as an intellectual giant your input has been noted. As an opinionated pos (your favourite word, not mine) it has also been ignored. I never advocated cancer on anyone in this thread, and as a smoker I do my best to limit other people’s exposure to my smoke as much as I can. But when you’re outside you’ve got all the vehicle exhaust, factory smoke and a whole other host of carcinogens that blaming smokers for poor air-quality is like trying to piss on a stove to put out a bushfire.

You really think you’re some kind of genius, don’t you? You’re not as clever as you think you are, my man, because your primary measure of intelligence just seems to be whether or not someone agrees with your opinions.

I do not think I some kind of genius, I know it as a scientific fact. I don’t have opinions, only facts.
I get up in the morning and put my pants on like any other normal person knowing the fact I know all the facts about all the facts and that’s a fact.

In other words, don’t blow smoke in others faces wether inside a house or standing next to a bus. Not only is it harmful to others, it also makes you a asshole.

breda said :

“Do you know anything about the harm of second hand smoke?”

Look, I’ve deliberately avoided this topic because it is a whole other issue. But, if you want to go 15 rounds on the junk science that underlies the second (and now, we have third!) hand smoke thing, feel free.

Anti-smoking fanatics have no shame. They even produce “studies” which “show” that inhaling vastly diluted cigarette smoke is worse than being a smoker!

The old folks who are now filling our nursing homes grew up in an era where the majority of people smoked. If they didn’t smoke themselves, they did it by proxy in every home, workplace, shop, cinema etc. Yet, they didn’t get asthma at modern rates (not even close) and are living longer than people ever have before.

I’m not suggesting that smoking is good for you. What I am saying is that the ideological Puritans who seem to have slimed their way into positions of power have not the slightest hesitation in using junk science and outright cruelty to impose their views on the community, especially those who are vulnerable.

I challenge these do-gooder, straightening, callous creeps to explain how inflicting even more suffering on a very distressed person (who will light up the minute they get out of there) is anything other than sanctioned sadism.

Can you link me to your claims second hand smoke is harmless?

1337Hax0r said :

bloodnut said :

There have been studies done that show smoking actually aids schizophrenic patients as the nicotine acts as a mild anti-depressant which has a therapeutic effect on their condition.

Links please? Please prove this, because I believe it to be crap.

There may not be solid evidence for this, and I think it’s a misdescription of what a lot of treating clinicians believe explains the extremely high smoking rates among people with psychotic illnesses. Nicotine is a mild stimulant: the antipsychotic medications are mostly quite sedating. The belief is that people smoke, and smoke a lot, to offset the sedating effects of the medication, i.e. makes them feel a bit more energetic.

Saying it is therepeutic is a longer bow to draw – offsetting the antipsychotic medication may be a bad thing. The negative effect on physical health is obviously enormous, for very high rates of very heavy smoking. But try telling that to the person with a psychotic illness, especially if their illness is treatment-resistant and they lack insight, and for whom smoking may be one of their few pleasures (that society will allow them).

IP

Signs instructed smokers to smoke away from the (automatic) doors. They didn’t.
Smoke entered through the door, and the whole ‘socialisation spine’ stank of smoke.
The entrance to this smoking area was immediately adjacent to the dining area. Patients (and visitors) who didn’t want to breath smoke while eating had to move elsewhere to eat.

So now the patients are to blame for the crappy design of the ward. Hell you must hate these guys!!

Have you ever seen or had to provide first aid for the burns inflicted on fellow patients by a smoker who has for a mental health condition when something goes bad for them?
Have you had to deal with the fallout from arguments when a mentally ill smoker is asked not to smoke? For example, one asked not to smoke at a meal, or in a meeting room. Then, worse still, have you seen mental health patients set fire to furniture, bedding, and other patients? Yes, flamable things and mental health patients don’t go well together. Then there are the idiots who simply use smoking as a way to piss people off, literally blowing smoke in people’s faces or threatening to burn people..

So not only do the patients get blamed and call “idiots”, but this person thinks that allowing smoking means giving them unrestricted access to lighters and fuel, and allowing them to set fire to things. So the staff a re incompetent as well there!!

God, you people not only hate the mentally ill, you seem to think anyone working with them is a moron…

For those against this idea, think about this: – Would you let an alcoholic go outside for a nip of Vodka every hour or so whilst being treated in this facility? What about those who are dependent on drugs, should they be allowed to go outside and shoot up or suck on a bong? The answer is no, because it is a place of health and rehabilitation. For the same reason, patients in hospitals can’t go out and eat whatever they want from nearby take-away shops, nor can they do these things mentioned.
On the flipside though, well, I can’t really support any of the comments that have been put forward to do with people’s rights, because once you enter a facility for psychiatric help you lose some of your decision making powers to the staff looking after you. Otherwise there’d be nothing stopping the people needing help just walking out back into society, would there?

Comic_and_Gamer_Nerd said :

You really are not very bright are you?

Do you know anything about the harm of second hand smoke?

As for dr koresh, I now you have some put of wack beliefs but advocating cancer on others is the worst thing you have ever said.

Thanks, CGN, as an intellectual giant your input has been noted. As an opinionated pos (your favourite word, not mine) it has also been ignored. I never advocated cancer on anyone in this thread, and as a smoker I do my best to limit other people’s exposure to my smoke as much as I can. But when you’re outside you’ve got all the vehicle exhaust, factory smoke and a whole other host of carcinogens that blaming smokers for poor air-quality is like trying to piss on a stove to put out a bushfire.

You really think you’re some kind of genius, don’t you? You’re not as clever as you think you are, my man, because your primary measure of intelligence just seems to be whether or not someone agrees with your opinions.

bloodnut said :

There have been studies done that show smoking actually aids schizophrenic patients as the nicotine acts as a mild anti-depressant which has a therapeutic effect on their condition.

Links please? Please prove this, because I believe it to be crap.

“Do you know anything about the harm of second hand smoke?”

Look, I’ve deliberately avoided this topic because it is a whole other issue. But, if you want to go 15 rounds on the junk science that underlies the second (and now, we have third!) hand smoke thing, feel free.

Anti-smoking fanatics have no shame. They even produce “studies” which “show” that inhaling vastly diluted cigarette smoke is worse than being a smoker!

The old folks who are now filling our nursing homes grew up in an era where the majority of people smoked. If they didn’t smoke themselves, they did it by proxy in every home, workplace, shop, cinema etc. Yet, they didn’t get asthma at modern rates (not even close) and are living longer than people ever have before.

I’m not suggesting that smoking is good for you. What I am saying is that the ideological Puritans who seem to have slimed their way into positions of power have not the slightest hesitation in using junk science and outright cruelty to impose their views on the community, especially those who are vulnerable.

I challenge these do-gooder, straightening, callous creeps to explain how inflicting even more suffering on a very distressed person (who will light up the minute they get out of there) is anything other than sanctioned sadism.

caf said :

When someone is struggling in the midst of an acute psychotic episode, that’s absoutely the worst possible time to force them to try and give up smoking. .

I have to agree.

Want to know a few good reasons why smoking should be banned in mental facilities?
Have you ever seen or had to provide first aid for the burns inflicted on fellow patients by a smoker who has for a mental health condition when something goes bad for them?
Have you had to deal with the fallout from arguments when a mentally ill smoker is asked not to smoke? For example, one asked not to smoke at a meal, or in a meeting room.
Then, worse still, have you seen mental health patients set fire to furniture, bedding, and other patients? Yes, flamable things and mental health patients don’t go well together.
Then there are the idiots who simply use smoking as a way to piss people off, literally blowing smoke in people’s faces or threatening to burn people.

Seriously, yes, screw their so called rights, think about their safety, the safety of others and their rights. Then think about the fact that smoking causes severe medical issues including mental health issues for people.

breda said :

It doesn’t really matter whether or not nicotine is mildly beneficial for this or that condition. The point is, giving up smoking is hard for people with every possible personal motivation and social support. To punish vulnerable people in support of the ill-concealed agenda to wipe out smoking is disgraceful.

In NSW, patients have been banned from smoking in the grounds on the specious and dishonest basis that an outdoor worker might be exposed to ‘secondhand smoke.’ It’s complete bullshit. It’s especially cruel to psychiatric patients, but not exactly compassionate to any other kind of patient either.

Look out, all you wine qaffers. If they have their way, in ten years you’ll be looking at pictures of cirrosed livers on the label. If you think I’m exaggerating, look at how the cigarette packet thing began – just a small warning label which grew and grew.

The New Puritans are among us, and are delighting in making people suffer in the name of “promoting healthy lifestyles”.

You really are not very bright are you?

Do you know anything about the harm of second hand smoke?

As for dr koresh, I now you have some put of wack beliefs but advocating cancer on others is the worst thing you have ever said.

Blatant abuse of the mentally ill.

Where are the ‘uman rights crowd now?

It’s the community workers I feel sorry for, can you imagine telling someone who is schizophrenic that you are going to take them against their will into a place where they will be banned from smoking? They will be chasing them all over the ACT!!

It’s obviously beyond the capabilities of the management to create a secure smoking area, so they will force their views onto the patients.

Why is the government of Canberra so bloody useless and so determined to force their own prejudices onto people.

“Nanny knows best .”

DrKoresh said :

breda said :

Look out, all you wine qaffers. If they have their way, in ten years you’ll be looking at pictures of cirrosed livers on the label. If you think I’m exaggerating, look at how the cigarette packet thing began – just a small warning label which grew and grew.

The New Puritans are among us, and are delighting in making people suffer in the name of “promoting healthy lifestyles”.

+1! Too true. I can’t stand this wave of moralistic legislation on how people should spend their free time. Makes me want to find the biggest, stinkiest cigar in the world and blow the smoke in their respective faces.

+2 – I was at the cricket when some modern-day anarchists lit up their cigarettes in the row of seats in front of me.

While not a smoker myself, and someone who is well aware of the risk of second-hand smoke, I must admit to taking in a few deep and enjoyable breaths of the smoke drifting my way.

It smelled like freedom.

ToastFliesRED said :

that being said I do agree that one of the outdoor areas in the new MH block could/should be considered for smoking status

One of the outdoor areas was designated the smoking area, prior the introduction of this policy.
It didn’t work.
Signs instructed smokers to smoke away from the (automatic) doors. They didn’t.
Smoke entered through the door, and the whole ‘socialisation spine’ stank of smoke.
The entrance to this smoking area was immediately adjacent to the dining area. Patients (and visitors) who didn’t want to breath smoke while eating had to move elsewhere to eat.

It’s not the only place on the campus where smoking is not permitted. It was one of the few places where it was permitted (indeed encouraged).

Is there to be similar ‘outrage’ at the introduction this year of the same policy at 2N (Calvary)? Previously smokers at 2N smoked at the doorway and were permitted to use an internal courtyard to smoke at night – very unpleasant for non-smokers.

There’s plenty of support to quit, including nicotine treatments. It’s probably one of the better places to do so.

Surprisingly few mental health nurses stink of smoke.

When someone is struggling in the midst of an acute psychotic episode, that’s absoutely the worst possible time to force them to try and give up smoking. There should absolutely be a designated outdoor smoking area for the mental health unit, and I agree with those who’ve said that not providing this is simply cruel.

bloodnut said :

There have been studies done that show smoking actually aids schizophrenic patients as the nicotine acts as a mild anti-depressant which has a therapeutic effect on their condition.

So, er, prescribe nicotine then! No cigarettes needed.

I’m a non smoker but I can’t see the point of not granting them an exemption n this case, unless it has been demonstrated smoking is detrimental to the condition that they are in there for in the first place.

They should be encouraging people to accept treatment not discouraging them, through this blind policy.

ToastFliesRED said :

Watson said :

Why should all health facilities be smoke-free? Why is it anybody’s business?

Umm maybe promoting a healthy lifestyle?

I see, and the hospital canteen will be “promoting a healthy lifestyle” by banning the sale of food to anybody with a BMI > 24 any day now, right?

@Breda: Well said! But I wish you hadn’t mentioned wine-quaffing as I am now in need of ducking off home early to get into it.

It’s an outdoor area right? It’s not just the mental patients that are insane here.

@ Alderney:

“There’s no such thing as a healthy number of cigarettes, every cigarette does you damage. And if someone can smell your smoke, you’re doing them damage too. Height of selfishness.”
——————————————
Tosh.

There’s no such thing as a healthy number of anything.

The number 1 rule of toxicology is – the dose makes the poison. Statements like that above are just gibberish. The following one – that if you can smell something, it means it’s going to kill you, is even more ridiculous.

It just highlights that the anti-smoking crusade is not about science, but about zealotry. It’s for their own good, so any manner of lies and cruelties are acceptable.

So the council is happy to provide syringes for inmates in our local prison but wont let a patient at a mental health facility have a cigarette?

Good to see they have their priorities right.

maybe patients are leaving to have a cigarette because some of the staff are rude and belittle the patients. I know this because a friend ask me for a lift to pick someone up from there and they were in tears from the abuse they just copped.

Alderney said :

Whoa, cue all the smokers that are now eying off the lift or the stairwell because someone mentioned cigarette.

I had (yes, past tense) a relative who only used to remember she needed a cigarette when she saw an advertisment for cigs. She’d be dead by now because of age, but she died in pain of lung cancer.

There’s no such thing as a healthy number of cigarettes, every cigarette does you damage. And if someone can smell your smoke, you’re doing them damage too. Height of selfishness.

Everyone else should abstain from an activity because it upsets you? Height of selfishness.

Gillian said :

There’s also the issue of mental health patients, particularly those on anti-psychotics, are already at high risk of cardiovascular disease. Add in smoking and you get the picture. It’s also particularly difficult for staff and non smoking patients admitted to units who are heavily (and back in the day we were talking clouds of smoke everywhere) exposed to carcinogens.

It’s a recognised issue and staff in these units aren’t particularly comfortable with it, but there are two sides to the coin that people are missing. Staff have a duty to both the short term and long term health of the patient.

And all manner of nicotine replacement therapy is available and freely prescribed.

I don’t think anyone is advocating a return to the days of indoor smoking. I’m a smoker, and I certainly don’t want that, but being institutionalised and then told you can’t smoke at all is unreasonable. Nicotine replacement therapy is not an effective replacement for actually smoking a cigarette, you’re writing gives the impression of experience in healthcare, so I’m guessing you already know that.

Whoa, cue all the smokers that are now eying off the lift or the stairwell because someone mentioned cigarette.

I had (yes, past tense) a relative who only used to remember she needed a cigarette when she saw an advertisment for cigs. She’d be dead by now because of age, but she died in pain of lung cancer.

There’s no such thing as a healthy number of cigarettes, every cigarette does you damage. And if someone can smell your smoke, you’re doing them damage too. Height of selfishness.

breda said :

Look out, all you wine qaffers. If they have their way, in ten years you’ll be looking at pictures of cirrosed livers on the label. If you think I’m exaggerating, look at how the cigarette packet thing began – just a small warning label which grew and grew.

The New Puritans are among us, and are delighting in making people suffer in the name of “promoting healthy lifestyles”.

+1! Too true. I can’t stand this wave of moralistic legislation on how people should spend their free time. Makes me want to find the biggest, stinkiest cigar in the world and blow the smoke in their respective faces.

There’s also the issue of mental health patients, particularly those on anti-psychotics, are already at high risk of cardiovascular disease. Add in smoking and you get the picture. It’s also particularly difficult for staff and non smoking patients admitted to units who are heavily (and back in the day we were talking clouds of smoke everywhere) exposed to carcinogens.

It’s a recognised issue and staff in these units aren’t particularly comfortable with it, but there are two sides to the coin that people are missing. Staff have a duty to both the short term and long term health of the patient.

And all manner of nicotine replacement therapy is available and freely prescribed.

It doesn’t really matter whether or not nicotine is mildly beneficial for this or that condition. The point is, giving up smoking is hard for people with every possible personal motivation and social support. To punish vulnerable people in support of the ill-concealed agenda to wipe out smoking is disgraceful.

In NSW, patients have been banned from smoking in the grounds on the specious and dishonest basis that an outdoor worker might be exposed to ‘secondhand smoke.’ It’s complete bullshit. It’s especially cruel to psychiatric patients, but not exactly compassionate to any other kind of patient either.

Look out, all you wine qaffers. If they have their way, in ten years you’ll be looking at pictures of cirrosed livers on the label. If you think I’m exaggerating, look at how the cigarette packet thing began – just a small warning label which grew and grew.

The New Puritans are among us, and are delighting in making people suffer in the name of “promoting healthy lifestyles”.

bloodnut said :

There have been studies done that show smoking actually aids schizophrenic patients as the nicotine acts as a mild anti-depressant which has a therapeutic effect on their condition.

Have we a link to those? They could shed some light and sort out parts of this discussion. Handy.

Watson said :

Why should all health facilities be smoke-free? Why is it anybody’s business?

Umm maybe promoting a healthy lifestyle? its an extension of not smoking in restaurants etc. Ever read any of the research on the impact of second hand smoke, particularly on those whose health is already compromised? Either way it is a decision that has been made and endorsed, if you object then appeal the decision administratively not by slagging off on RA about why is it anybody’s business.

That being said I still stand by my original statement that I know of research where cigarettes/nicotine can be a beneficial self medication for individuals with MH illnesses and I think the decision to make all of the new MH block smoke free need to be examined

miz, if your contention was true, nobody would smoke. They’d just pop on a patch, and Robert would be your mother’s brother.

Many people with mental illness smoke heavily, for all sorts of reasons. There is no question that banning smoking increases their distress – hell, it increases the distress of even the most even-tempered person.

Nobody has ever claimed that smoking cigarettes initiates crime or other bad behaviour, unlike alcohol or other drugs which are banned with some objective basis.

Why is the equation so inevitable: social engineer = doesn’t have a clue?

Watson said :

Perhaps simply because they can treat them like naughty kids?

It’s not as if people with serious mental health issues that often lead to depression and suicidal thoughts would give a stuff about the risk of cancer or emphysema. For some, the routine and ritual of going out for a smoke may be the one thing that helps them cling onto sanity.

These anti-smoking rules seem to sometimes be mainly there so some non-smokers can feel good about themselves and satisfy their control-freak streak by patronising immoral smokers.

And that!

I wonder what percentage of psychiatric nurses smoke? I would guess a very high percentage, given the incredibly stressful nature of the job and the often erratic hours. So they must come back smelling of cigarettes to the addicted and deeply troubled patients who can’t smoke.

There would be concerns around access to matches/lighters, and passive smoking, but these can surely be worked out.

breda said :

So, a person who is fighting demons and voices and/or crushing depression is deprived of a cigarette because it’s bad for them. This is self-righteous cruelty in the guise of ‘caring’.

As Aldous Huxley wisely said:

“The surest way to work up a crusade in favor of some good cause is to promise people they will have a chance of maltreating someone. To be able to destroy with good conscience, to be able to behave badly and call your bad behavior ‘righteous indignation’ — this is the height of psychological luxury, the most delicious of moral treats.”

People who are in mental health facilities – or indeed in any other hospital – are in varying states of distress. To pick this moment to inflict further discomfort on them in the name of Public Health is simply sadism masked as virtue.

This!

Watson said :

miz said :

Surely they can give the patients nicotine patches. Win, win – the patient get their nicotine fix (whether therapeutic or addiction-driven) and may even be able to cut down on the ciggies; and the hospital remains smoke free (as all health facilities should be).

Why should all health facilities be smoke-free? Why is it anybody’s business?

well, i don’t diagree that health faciliites should be smoke-free – the question is, what constitutues the ‘facility’? it should probably be the physical infrastructure and the access corridors, so an open air space that happens to be near a health facility, should be accessible to smokers.

and surely, as others have noted, these vulnerable patients are the ones who should be treated humanely and with some respect. this is sadism… [and i’m a non-smoker]

miz said :

Surely they can give the patients nicotine patches. Win, win – the patient get their nicotine fix (whether therapeutic or addiction-driven) and may even be able to cut down on the ciggies; and the hospital remains smoke free (as all health facilities should be).

Why should all health facilities be smoke-free? Why is it anybody’s business?

Surely they can give the patients nicotine patches. Win, win – the patient get their nicotine fix (whether therapeutic or addiction-driven) and may even be able to cut down on the ciggies; and the hospital remains smoke free (as all health facilities should be).

They’ve done the same in NSW mental health facilities.

So, a person who is fighting demons and voices and/or crushing depression is deprived of a cigarette because it’s bad for them. This is self-righteous cruelty in the guise of ‘caring’.

As Aldous Huxley wisely said:

“The surest way to work up a crusade in favor of some good cause is to promise people they will have a chance of maltreating someone. To be able to destroy with good conscience, to be able to behave badly and call your bad behavior ‘righteous indignation’ — this is the height of psychological luxury, the most delicious of moral treats.”

People who are in mental health facilities – or indeed in any other hospital – are in varying states of distress. To pick this moment to inflict further discomfort on them in the name of Public Health is simply sadism masked as virtue.

Perhaps simply because they can treat them like naughty kids?

It’s not as if people with serious mental health issues that often lead to depression and suicidal thoughts would give a stuff about the risk of cancer or emphysema. For some, the routine and ritual of going out for a smoke may be the one thing that helps them cling onto sanity.

These anti-smoking rules seem to sometimes be mainly there so some non-smokers can feel good about themselves and satisfy their control-freak streak by patronising immoral smokers.

Just for clarity there are only two designated smoking areas on the Canberra Hospital campus, the rest of the place is non-smoking and there are many signs around to indicate that. it does not mean that people do not smoke in non-smoking areas but that is a separate issue of enforcement. there is a designated patient smoking area just down Hospital road from the mental health inpatient facility which would be accessible to all voluntary patients, same as for any other ward.

that being said I do agree that one of the outdoor areas in the new MH block could/should be considered for smoking status

It’s a total joke, and why is it the only area in the hospital that is completely smoke free? Of course some patients will quit smoking as a result and that is excellent, but there are some who simply will / can not. They are probably more likely to suffer as a result of the meds they need to take or their actual condition before any smoking related illness gets hold.

Holden Caulfield said :

To put a positive spin on things, I guess the money saved on mental health treatment can be re-assigned for their inevitable cancer/smoking-related illness at a later date.

No, I don’t think it’s mean. But as a non-smoker it’s easy for me to say that.

Not really, any money saved would be used when they inevitably end up in the legal system from lack of treatment.

“It is not the entire campus that has become smoke free it is only the mental health facility,”

Sound like discrimination to me!

There have been studies done that show smoking actually aids schizophrenic patients as the nicotine acts as a mild anti-depressant which has a therapeutic effect on their condition.

To put a positive spin on things, I guess the money saved on mental health treatment can be re-assigned for their inevitable cancer/smoking-related illness at a later date.

No, I don’t think it’s mean. But as a non-smoker it’s easy for me to say that.