Jump to full article: Michigan State University (MSU), 2008-02-09
Intro: A young asthmatic woman who collapsed and died shortly after arriving for her shift as a waitress at a bar may be the first reported death to be reported nationally from acute asthma associated with environmental tobacco smoke.
This case report by a Michigan State University physician, published in the February edition of the American Journal of Industrial Medicine, not only outlines circumstances under which the woman died, but also raises a number of issues regarding safety in the workplace.
The report states the woman arrived at the bar in Michigan and, according to co-workers, seemed happy and healthy. About 15 or 20 minutes later she collapsed and within a few minutes died.
"This is the first reported acute asthma death associated with work-related ETS," said Kenneth Rosenman, an MSU professor of medicine and chief of the Division of Occupational and Environmental Medicine. "Recent studies of air quality and asthma among bar and restaurant workers before and after smoking bans support this association." . . .
"This death dramatizes the need to enact legal protections for workers in the hospitality industry from secondhand smoke."
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