No Cigarette Smoke in Prisons

In many jails smoking was prohibited. For example, the smokers among Georgia’s nearly 60,000 prison inhabitants will soon have to smell out their cigarette butts for good.

Brian Owens, Georgia Department of Corrections Commissioner has ordained to all state prisons smoke-free by the end of the year. This anti-tobacco action has been tried in the past too and was approved in many other countries after most of Georgia’s jails have been smoke-free for years.

For example, in Hall County, jail residents at the 1,000-bed lockup on Barber Road aren’t permitted to smoke, unlike their neighbors at the Hall County Correctional Institution, who are allowed to smoke outside in the morning and before dinner and also they can smoke outdoors. Anti-tobacco scientists consider that from a public health point of view, they think that this is an excellent initiative.

In 2009 the state planned to spend $226 million on prison health care, including $72 million in direct care. But in 2004 when the state had approximately 12,000 fewer prison residences, was up from $133 million.

For example a 2004 study showed that 70 percent of incarcerated people are smokers, compared with the national rate of 23 percent of adults in the U.S.

Georgia Department of Corrections spokeswoman Peggy Chapman declared: “Tobacco use is linked to different health problems which further to the rising cost of health care. The Georgia Department of Corrections’ mission of protecting public safety contains actions to support a healthy lifestyle among inmates and reducing growth in health care costs, which are paid for by the citizens of Georgia.”

But currently most Georgia prison inmates are permitted to smoke outside in designated areas at designated times. For example, the old Hall County jail on Main Street in Gainesville had the same devices in some jail day rooms before smoking was banned 10 years ago.

So, because of this legislation most of prison smokers had to quit cold turkey. This year, even the prison system is giving inmates improvement notice and proposing an eight-week, two-hour-a-week smoking cessation program from the American Lung Association.