Tobacco Documents Online

31.J L- 1 1- 9 0 L.! E D 1 7:01 C & B L3 ASH D C rLLLti.7LIC, AULKLAIYLI . ~ . R~+11 have P. 2 ? pAQGfRAMME: ALICE WORSLEY S'TATION: TIME: 10. 16 asMGF-. 1 ALICE WORSLEx: I' 1l have Dr, 78mes Repace, a physicf.st froo the vnited States Envixonmental Frotoction A.genay, we're going to be talking to J,a,rne i about sjck buildir+ge and also ajDout pasoive smoking. For those of us who : eren't smokers, we become qua.to aware of other peopie' s smoke and if xou ;don't like other people's emoke y" sometimes think, well, you know r what is it doing to me. Mes inhaling this other pcraon's smoke, does it have an effect. Wei1 we're going to find out from Dr. Repace in a moment whether in fact it does. And also, when you're in A building and there are people smoking in the ~building is there any way of making it 166s , ~ dangerous for us to breathe in the air without getting all the pollutants < < . from smoke. maybs t'here i~ something, I don't know. Well we'1l find out , all ;about that for yot%, and xbout the effects of sick bull.dings oM,us in i juat a momant. (OTHER 5U9~aEC'i'S) My guest this morning is Dr. Semes Repace, he's a physicist fYom the United States EnVixonmenta,l prQtedt.~on , Agericy =d he 's been here ;in New zealand to do a series of leoturetx and talks aboutt paiwsive smokin ig in partfoular but ha's also an expert on sick ~ bui~.dinVs and it's been an sxpresWon that we've heard over the last oou,pl( of years and we're going ~o talk to ,7&Mo$ in a moment about sicX I~uilding; 7 f and 'of course the ef fects off other peop2e's smoke on us who perheps , do no• smoke. But Jsmes before w~ go any further# for those of us WhO don't know much about some of the big agencies you'we got in the States, what is the Uni~ed States EnvironmonteY Protecti.on Agency, Sounds maaeLveo is it. ~ ~ ZAMLS.REpACEs W'e11l actually it's not very massive by American ttrms. ~ We 4ave about ten thousand employees all over the country and about six ~ 't,housand. of those in Wnshinqton DC. A.nc3 the agency is charged with proteco the environment and the public health of Americans by cleaning up the aig ; and ;'the wattr. . C4NT

.'.7UL-11-y0 WED 17:ki1 C & B WHSH DC P_ 24 -lTEM: DATh: . MGPAMME: ALICE WORSLEY TiME: 1D . 1$ a.it1. QAGE: 2 Is.it, is ;it more of a ful1, time buainess,r,ow than say It was'lD, 15 years agp. Are'thexe a lot more concerns for the agency now. :' I' I1 have 22 1iAr 90 $TATIDNt 3tadio I WO~t Right. REPAC9.- There certainly itre. Th+ere are laws being passed every year In more recent years we've be~'rs getting much irito the area of tox#.G w&ste disposal which turns out to be avexy, Vnry difficult thing to do. ; Traditionally, we've been 1andfiJ,ling a lot of our wasten and including o ur toxic wastes and now that's no ionger acceptab3e and people are baginrr to turn to incineration and, of cotAxse, nobody wants a hazardoua waste inoinerator in his backysrd and so they've thought of burning it at sea and -a.t turns that we had a. hearin g in $roWnsville, Texa,s, about burning in the Gu1f of Moxioo On inoerator nhipS atd 12 thous4nd people turned out to oppose it. (woralay: is that right) That' s right so it' s, we're facin moma really knQtty problems. it'a the 'not in my backyard' syndrbme and it's ~ust, you bagin to run out of options so sometimes our work is very difficult. And I've really worked in a lot of these areas my$e1f, I used to be in the Nt8oor Air PQlicy Office and dealt with multi media question; ltkee the trtansference of pollutantz from the water to the air and, back ~ in 1986, we formed an Indoor Air polIutian programme and i became involved in that. Because it beoame , apparent early on that, although outdoor air poll.u•tL_-,, is a serjous cause of disease and can kill people.PeopY.a spend 90% of their time indoors, and that would include New Zealand ~ i true really the induatriaLworld over, we spend most of , , micro environtnentg, at work and -at home. the outdoor air; rtally people's , by indoor e,xposures. es we11. It's aur t#,me in two And beoau$e the levels of ai:c po~,~.ut~.on are higher ~.n most C~.s~es and from most pollutants than in tQta3l exposure to air pollution is O O domir~a~ 4A W©RSLEY: That's incredible because I thirik a lot of us would tend to CONT

3IJL-1 1-9~ WED 17 '0.-~ C ?• P Wfii SH DO P_ 25 . r,v, ovn; t 1•uoG r=Lt1iz)wt--, AIJClCLAIVD 1TEMt Y'11 have PAOC3p.AMME: ALICE WDMEY DATE: : 22 Mar 9 0 STATION: Radio I TIME: 10.16 a, m AAGEc 3 WORSLLY. aontd: think that when you go into a building, as, long as it's got ;airconditioning and things you don't consider yourse1f at risk in a building, do you. Yot ooAsider it more when you walk out on to the street and:you've got the car fur~es paasi.nq you by and Somebod.y burning somethin , in the distanae that's the big wdr.r-y. xEPACS: That's right, that's right. In fact the advice of the PA used to if you're conc$rri6d about air pollution on smoggy days, go in the buildings ar;d stay there and don`t come out. Well it turns out, even on a smoggy day the levels of i-ndoor pollution in office buildings may be far greater than the 7.ove3s of emog on the city streets. r once did a, demenst+ ~ ion ;for a television'oa,mer'a crew a few years ago in this, on the stzeats of W'ashington which, in the summer tima are actually fairly pollut+ed, very, snmogSy city. And :1 carried a portable air pollution mon~tor with me and I made a rneasursment of the air poliutiori levels on city str$et$. And , not to get too much into the teohnical detail, but the level on tho metex , vra8 40 on the city streets, right at a bus stop, with the buses cort:ing and going every S or 10 minutes.A•z,d then w6 walked into a restaurant where there were people smpking and the levels were running about 200. So you pan easily see that# bocause there are indoor sources of air pollution , likeitobaoop tsmoke, like otfioe copying machines, 0oughing and Sri+eezYng whioh gozerate germa a.td ipdoox air, insufficient ventilation, al].owing . , ievelg of pollution in a confined spacesindoore to accum,4alate often to the , . point whare people begin to get atck. And of oourae if the pollutants are deadly you can die. Lag3onnaireR Disea,vo is afamou$ examp].e. WORSLEY- Have you been hearing about that while you've been h6re abott Qur Legionnair+as di.s4i~ase probltma. ; by the wa, CnN7

•JI,.J'L=11-9f3 WED 17 :0-3 G ... D Lar=iSH DC # ....,,,,.,, rLL,=rcM1d, Ac,CKUAND V 11 have PAdc3RAMME: ALICE WORSLEY DATS, 22 !MaX 90 BTATJ4N; Radio I TtME: 10.16 a.mPA4E: . .R3Ep^ ACE ;, Yes. Xes, these are, you know the buiIding-technoiQgy is very ai.mi:,lar t3-awQrld over. I was struck, I've only been in Auckland now for 4 days, but I was struck on h,Cw similar the new buildings here are to buildi.i in Atlanta, i,n Washington AC, in Boston, the technology i$ the same and c unfoXtunate.Zyf the problem4 that you anCourster are the aame. The sick buildings. I was in the television station yesterday getting a, c3o,ing a , debate an6 siome of the workerg in the TV studio were compl.aining, welcome ~ to our sick building.. ' And you coald feel it, you could fee3, that there wez prcblems. So these problems -ars quite Significant a.nd they're caused by 1a ; of mttention to detail by the architects, by the ventilation engineers, by the developers and builders, by the people who own and operate the bu3,ldin ~ by the building occupants. Exhesre's really no oontroZ over the niceties of buiYding degiqn to make thett habitrible. Many of our buildings are quite bemu#iful (WCraley: Yes) but are th6y really habitable, are they just riot, those g1ass mauaoleums that, are antombing ua in gas chambera and a11, too . ofteri thatrs true. The Woxld Health C,rganisa,t.icn has e$timated that 30% of xnew and exi.sting bUildings have sick building ayndrome and what is that, ~ that is the phenomenon wheze the eacupanta of the building get eye, noee ~ and throat 3.rriat,ipn, headaphefs, diZZiness, nausea and their productivity ; decxe'rsaes.In tha worst cases they can bec=e disabled and on the other i hand,~ there are pollutants 3ike tobacco smoke #.n build.inga, which not only I can cause the phenomena of sick building syndrome but they can . , at inoreated risk of cancery of heart disease and o£ from ipng terrn expo$ure in the woxkplaccor at home. i also put youN re$piratory diaease Wa~Y: '~4e1_ let' a 10ok fir9t Cf all a.t 3uat for another minute or two at thQ si.r7h buildings and then, afttr the break we're going to move on to the paasive smok.3.ng. YQU just mentioned copying mnchirias. We've gott about one minute. Just what's the effect of some of the machinery that vou have CON

JL7L-1 1-90 WED 1? :Wt- C S: D WASH DC wri tj -ouc, c"tnowc, AUt„K[AVD P - 2 ; RF.M; I' lI have I'ROOFtAMME: ALICE WORSLEY QATE, .22 --- Mar 90 • ~~- STAT!OlVt Radjo I TiME; 10.16 a,.m, PAOE: 5 WORM_ EY : ~„contd: in a bui].ding on polluting the air. REPM Well it can be quite GQns3.d.erable. Tho s'tandard high production oQpyi.ng maohines that you find in many office environments, give off gases and particles which can f 3.oat in the air and can be breathed in by people and can often make them aick. Builflings were really never designea to take into aocount these off~oe oopiera. They shouldn't be exhtausted into the general building circulation, they should be set, put in separately ventilated rooms which are exhausted to the outaide. That's one exrimple of the kind of detai3l that the building designers and bu3ldors really don't ~ pay attention to. And if you look into what kind of, po3.lutants ci=6 out of office copittrs in many cases they're frightening, they're serious chemicals that can interfere with the elasticity of the lung or which may have cancer causing properties. WORSr,EY: wel.l after the break, we' ll take a look at some more of the ef fects inside buildings on our health and then we r l l take a look at the effec~s of passive smoking on our health as well. Thrat' s coming up shortly. (ADS) (NEwS) We've heard about the concern that they are now showing in the United States about the faot that the air you breathe inside ~a often more polluted than the air you breathe outside and .2 thiMk a].ot of us had always thought that it wouldt you know, be not tod bad indoors but, acoording to the research that' s been done, 3.t' s not showing that at all. N And we've been talking this -siok building syndrome and you were also talkin<~ too about the devastating effects sQmetimes that these sick buildings can ~ have on poople. Can we talk fjust a little bit more about that James, ~ REFACE: We have found that, if you try to work in a bui3ding which is COt1T •

I,Tlt•L- 11-<-=10 WED 17-0=* C & D L1F'iSH DC •- -~ 6 nvUr+3-NIHU 1T~MI DATE: 3[' 11 have MH 911 S7Ai'ION: gag io 2 PRQWMME: ALICE WOPSLEY YIMEc 10.16 a.m,PAGE; 6 REpACE: ~contd; a sick building. What happ6ns is you begin to get theae symptoms which are disorienting, tho trying to work for a].ong time even uziier low levels ofpollution can break down the imcnune ay'9tQm of , certa#.n :people and they begin ,to exhibit the symptoms of multiple chemical sensiti.vity. They begin to be la].lexgic, so to speak, to things that never bothexed them b*lore, W4 actually have a sick building at EPA neadquartexs . n Washington which is quite tragic, we had a episode o~ bad carpeting which caused some of the problems, we had mould cont.amination of the ventilation system which caused r ther problems, we had poor ventilation which oatased problema stiY1. 'for more peop1e and we wound up withh three or four people who were actually disabled, who were no longer able to work in the building at all, ;who wer6 no long6r abie to drive 6n the atre6t in their cars, just the autoinobile exhaust• would make them siCk and so they are at homs, they're just disabled. And th$re are still otherS who can' t enter the buiZdinj, they have to work in a restricted workplaca. And so it can become an eConomic di$aster, a health ditatter for peopl6 and, unfortunately, the medical :ommunity knows very little about these phenomena and they have adopted the poaition;th,at, well thisis really a kind of psychiatric diaorder. W0~ RSL3x.Xee, that It's all in the mind REPACE;Yee, that it's all in the mind, yet, sure the pain ie real but it's really e4mething that' $ in the. mind. And those of us that have been working Q ~ with these problesns for severtzl y6ar$ know that it i.s not so and these are ~ real phenomena but they are $o poorly res+sarched that it ia difficult to O ~ convir,ce• the medical Gommunity-that the phenomena are real and so we are beginning to mount aseriou6 research prograrrune to uncover these facta. %JU CbNT

-JUL-11-90 1..IED 17 :05 C _Y fi L1ASH DC #TEtVl: DATE; X011 have 22 Mar 90 $"tA'f tON; 1~,dfl.ib I R _ ? 9 PROGRAMME: ALlkwE WDRSLEY TIME. 10,16 a. in PAGE: 7 w~~: it is, it'a quite frightening when you consider thatt and how, is i.t mainly Jamas, new buildings as opposed to oldar buildings, like bu3.ldings within the 1a8t decad6 that h4ve the probltm, or can it be old buiZdings too. gEpACE: ' It tends to be new build#.nga more becausO the older buildings ar$ ~ particularly in the colder climatesy where energy used to be cheap but now more expensive, and the buildings have been built tighter so they iaak ~~less. And to save money; " trie btilding caperatoz't hatr6 becn CIosing the foutsidar air dampers so t.hey rrt not taking freth air into the buildirsga any more and this is causrngl all kinds of problems tor people in bui].d,ings who have to'breathe. They're not gattlng enough breathing air and they're begin- t.ing tb' fa3.l asletp and to get sick. In many cases we have bui3dings that aral modtrr, buildings are designed with enclosed parkinS ga.ra5es, the f$n.s aren't being run in the gartgts and the exhaust gases from ths -car go up the elevator shaft and gtt di$aeminated throughout the building and people get $ioky And when they do, they just don't know what to do aE.bout it. They -,ma.ke copplai,nts to the building management and often the building manngcment takes a Wensive position and dcna.es that the problem exists. And then it festera, sometimes for a zdnth or even years and then th.e worksro begin to . . lose faith that the mn.nagemant of the building knows what its doing and. they're' right of course. And then what happens is, particularly in the United States which is aa very; litigious society where everyone sues everyone elso (Wors3,sy : Y'es ) you get 3.awsuits. And then everyone ioses. WDR.SLEY: So what oan be done then James, I mean yOu knQw, if ydu've got a sick building are there modifioatiQns thao: you can make that can make it environmentally a little bit better to work in.

'JUL- 1 I -'D 0 L3EL 1? : 0 S i:~ !iEM: DA7E; !-J H S- H RadiO I Dt: F' _ 3o PROGRAMME; ALICE WpRSL£Y YI MF.: 10. 16 a.. m.PAGE: REp~, Well once you've got a sick bui3.ding, what you'we got to do . , 3mmeq~.ataly i~s to move out ~pa4pXc who are atf eeted. They should not stay i the building because they ~an wind up with multiple chemical sensitivities you've got to rnake alt.arna4iwe work space immediately and yc+u'va got to ta i the complaint seriouQly. SeCOndly, you.'ve got to get in a building investi ~ or in who knows what he, or sha, iS doing bac>'xuse a lot of the things that go wxc~ng with bu3~~.d~.ngs are just commons&nse kinds of things whert the air intakes are located close to the exhausts or there's standing water ir, the ventilation syetem, or,the oarpeting is a bad batch, or the earpeting got wtt and is now mouldy, ~or it is roof leak and movld is growing, or the , I capy3.ng mtachines are loctsted in unventiLat+ed areas and that kind of thing, ti. : B , So there's commonsense kinds of things that you Can do. The important thing to realise ia that action hes to be taken very swiftly to avoid a ~ aerious health impact, And; of course, you can h~hve 3.egionella which can i kill people very quickly. i i I ! WO YgY: we just had some more outbreaks of Legionnaires D3seaaa in New Zealand, it's something that crops up every so often here. , REP Xes, it's very com.mon in the United State6i (Worsley z Ts it) yes and 'commarilX is misdiagno$~ d by p4r3icians. They think it's just a simple pneumonia when, in fact it' a not,. , . ~ WOEXaIt's a lot worse thah that (Repaoe: That's right) So obviously there are thxngs to be dotib and of coursa you always come against the prQb,lern that people don't want tQ spend money to make things better fox, know, the people who arr wt~rking there so it can be a real battle and we in New Zea3and may be a l.it'tlg bit behind beaaus,e we'r© only just start#.nc to wake up to the fact that some buildings are sick. But if I can just. COt

•JUL-11-'99 WED 1? :E3E. C x S WABN DG` ~T~: I' ii have DATE; 2 2 Mar 9 8 STATION: R$d3.o I P_ z.1 PApGRAMME. ALZCE WORSLEX TiME: 10.16 a'rnPAGE; 9 WpRShEY: contd: move quickly on to oAe other area that you touch on whio~ ; e1so, comes into the s ick building syndrome and that' sabout people 's smok I and (Repaces Thet's right) , how we take it in. l3ow much of a problem in a sick building is other people'a smoke. . ~ REPACti Well the National inutitutp of Ocoupationml Safety and Health ~...._.r,_~.. , recommends that wh$never ycu have sa sick bui3,dingp $moking should be i f stopped immediate1y because it is such a significant source of indoor , • air pdllution, both EPA an~ NIARCH as it' 9 called, agree that there shou9.t . be no smoking in a si.ck building and that non smakerg should be protected nDta~ious of these, of course, are lung oancer- and respiratory effects in ~ nhildren, f l { WORSLEX. Has it actually been proved though James that smoking,, inhaling othtr peop3e' Ssmoka is i.n~ uriQus to your hea].th. { REP~A.....M Unquestionably. InI1986 a scientific ooneeneus was established in 1 the ~nite+f States by the d~finitive reports of the United States Surgeon ~ General who is the chief O~ theFublio Hae,lth Service and of the National Aaademy of Sciences which is a sc,ientific body of national experts convenc- . { , to ipQk at the issues oi`, to look at a lot of issues, but in this caaa ( 2~ of ir,voluntary, or paasive; Smoking. And they came independently to the ~ . i eame! cor,clusion that enviranme;ntal tobacco smoke or passive smoking, is a ~ cause of lung cancer in healthy non smtaknre and it is also a cause of t hospita5.isatic,n for bronchitis and pneumonia in infants 4nd small ohildrer s They, they came out very oliar2y and sa3.d in no unca~rtain texms, that these things were true and that non smokers therefore. should be protected from fkom~ the chronic effoota af environmental tobacco smoke and the mo,at I the .effects of passive smoking and EPA has weighed into this and we CON

..JUL- 1 1-•PO LJED 1 7:0i C ?- E IJaSH DC P..3.2 I ITEM: . ' I' l3l have 4 DATE; 22 Maz 9 0 STATION: • RAd3.o I PROC3RAMME: ALICE WORSLEY TlME: 10_ 16 a-3p,,C3E: 10 REFAM co.ntd: are going to put out a significant amount, of public information this ytar, warni.ng the public that environmenta7l tobacco smok~ is one of thc most wide$pread and harmful air pollutants and we are . raoo,ramending that one or two policies be adoptec4. (A) either restrict smokxng within a building to aSeparately ventilated system where non smokoxs cannot be exposed or (B) exclude smo3cing from the building ent3.re: and my persoAa7l preference is the latter, ror several reas4ns; one ,it'3 a lot cheaper to restrict, smoking from the building with the stroke of a pen, you don' t have to make any fancy modifications to the ventilation syatem and alco there is a!significant riak from passive smoking to smokers thern8o].ves. G3ORSLEY: Tr, smokers themsalves Absolutely, that+s not generally appreciated. one might think that ; since' ~tlie are '~w~x• " i. ,the~ direc.t ~ exposiares they get from . , inhaling cigarettes, pipes , or aigars that the increased risk f rom passive smoking might be negl.igible, Sut, in fact, it is not. Relative to a l+at° a say a smoking man who has a non smok3rig wife, a smoker who has a smoking wife has a 40t increased r'iak of cancer. W©RMY: Secbuse the two of them are smoking and they breathe each N . ~ other's smoke as well as t~e smoke thay're already breathing of their own, rJ . , ~ . fD RE, 'AB: They breathe each other' s smok+tr, Yes, this suggests that it is 0 N the envi.ronmQntal tobacco smoke, tho smoke that oomes off the burj;in5 arsd of the cigarette and what's exhaled from the lungs of tho smoker is actually responsible for a lot more of tht di$eases of smoking than we had ~:ver suspacted. CONT