SYRACUSE -- The Great American Smokeout is a day when smokers are encouraged to quite the habit by going without a smoke for 24 hours. Hospitals in Onondaga County are also using the occasion of this year's Smokeout as an opportunity to educate their staff and patients on a new smoke free policy.
Many area hospital campuses have been smoke free since 2005, but on Thursday the final stage was fully implemented. A law enacted by the Onondaga County Legislature went into effect on November 1st banning smoking within 100 feet of a hospital, but local medical centers chose to use the first few weeks of the new requirement to educate visitors and staff, and post appropriate signs.
The ban applies to public streets, sidewalks and parking facilities. Violators are subject to a $50 fine.
At Upstate Medical Center, officials say they are going to have a bit of a grace period. “We're going to inform people that they shouldn't be smoking if they are smoking in the wrong place and direct them to put it out, the first step will not be to fine them,” says Dr. K. Bruce Simmons, Director of Employee/Student Health.
St. Joseph’s Hospital is also going totally smoke free. Since they are located in a more residential area, they face a different problem. A few years ago, when the hospital became a smoke free campus, a few neighbors complained that hospital patrons were venturing onto their property to light up. Keeping that in mind, the hospital says they have tried to add signage to areas that won’t affect the neighbors.
“We defined the line so we aren't pushing people into the neighborhoods. So we are concentrating out education effort to the areas where we do have neighbors, because we don’t want to be a bad neighbor. We don’t want to push people into someone's front yard, that’s not what we're here to do,” says Keri Ganci, a St. Joe's public relations specialist.
Ganci says the spirit behind the new law is to keep smokers away from where patients might have to walk.
