This article describes what happened in Helena MT after an anti-smoking ordinance came into effect there in June 2002 and is also a good example of one type of epidemiological research that can help humans.  Bear in mind that humans happily went on smoking for another quarter of a century because the animals forced to breathe concentrated tobacco smoke did not get lung cancer or suffer heart attacks.

    Soon after the ban went into effect, "doctors at the local hospital noticed
that heart-attack admissions were dropping."  Their observations prompted a study in conjunction with the University of California, San Francisco, "to
measure the potential short-term effects of a smoking ban."

    With only one cardiac-care hospital within 60 miles, it was almost a sure bet that any  of Helena's residents experiencing a heart attack would wind up there.
 
  The study found no change in heart attack rates in patients living outside the city, but after six months there was a dramatic 58% drop among those living within city limits.

    "'We know from longer-term studies that the effects of secondhand smoke occur within minutes, and that long-term exposure to secondhand smoke is associated with a 30 percent increased risk in heart attack rates,' says Stanton Glantz, a professor of medicine who conducted the study's statistical analysis. 'But it was quite stunning to document this large an effect so quickly'".

    It was also stunning to witness what happened next. "The Montana State
Legislature, under pressure from the Montana Tavern Association and tobacco lobbyists, rescinded the ban in December. The result: heart-attack rates bounced back up almost as quickly as they (had) dropped."

    The relatively sudden  drop is less surprising when you consider that  "only 30 minutes of exposure to (tobacco smoke) causes platelets in the bloodstream to become stickier" expediting the formation of clots which can lead to heart attacks.
People working in a smoky environment have been found to have  twice the normal risk of developing cancer, asthma, and miscarriage.

    Ms. Ellis goes on to assert that the New York City ordinance does not seem "to have drastically depressed business."

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