To think smokers should not smoke next to a no smoking sign?

[PopMusic]

(My first aibu - am bracing myself)

Today, I was parked outside a hospital waiting for my parents to come out. Right outside the entrance of the hospital and for about 50 metres, there are numerous signs (I counted eight from where I could see) signs saying "please do not smoke here" and "no smoking". I was waiting for about ten minutes, and I saw lots of people (15) smoking around the whole no smoking zone inc. several people (6) actually smoking next to a no smoking sign. I was partly amused by the irony of it but I also thought there must be a reason why it's a no smoking area, so why are they smoking there? Why could they not walk a little way and smoke where there were no signs? Just to let you know, the whole entrance area inc. way beyond the signs is sheltered and it was not even snowing nor raining.

Ah yes, those poor victimised smokers, last bastion of the disenfranchised. Forced to endlessly justify their own expensive and life-threatening choices by imposing it on ill people in the doorways of hospitals , because walking a few metres further away is too stressful, and ready to dismiss anyone objecting to their selfishness as sactimonious.

There you go, an wonderful example Inertia. 10/10.

Likewise.

Not a smoker though, not smoked for 25 years. Just not uptight and sanctimonious about it.

It drives me mad when I go to the health club which is also an hotel to see people smoking right under the 'no smoking' sign at the entrance.

Last time it happened, I asked the smoker if he was illiterate - he claimed he hadn't seen the sign.

Fgs it's a health club, I come here to be healthy, not to breathe your filthy smoke on the way in or out.

Again fifty odd if he is smoking outside the non smoking signs have no legal authority so it doesn't matter if he sees them or not he is legally entitled to ignore them sorry but that's how it is

Yes, a polite sign including the word 'please' will not sway the hardened smoker. They will only obey if there is a legal consequence.

The thing is it shouldn't even need a sign. Surely just a bit of thought for others says you don't smoke outside the door of a hospital?

It's interesting that some people seem to know they won't ever need to use NHS services for to a smoking related illness. I wonder if they could help me out with the lottery numbers too.......

About 5 or 6 Trusts in the past few months have gone back on their non-smoking policies and either reinstated or put in new smoking huts because they know they cant enforce their smoking bans in the grounds, they can then ask people to move from the doorways to the huts.

I work In a hospital, on my last week before mat leave a colleague and I decided to sit on the steps outside main entrance in the sun on our break. There are huge no smoking signs. A parent sat right on step in front of me and sparked up - I politely told her it was a no smoking area & also that I was clearly heavily pregnant - she gave us a load of verbal abuse, refused to move then rang someone on her phone calling us 'bitches' - I despair I really do. Personally I think hospitals should do more to enforce it, I work in a childrens hospital & it sets a poor example. X

Our hospital spent ££££ providing smoking shelters, made no difference people aren't willing to walk the extra 10 yards (out of puff?). To all the people saying indoor areas should be provided, having a smoking section in a hospital is a little like having a pissing section in a swimming pool. People need to smoke, I get that but would it be so hard to keep entrances clear for the sake of everyone else?

if you want to smoke, go ahead. But you do stink, disgustingly, and a lot of you also drop your litter on the ground. So if you could walk away from where other people have to be, and carry the portable ashtray that someone mentioned, then people wouldn't hate you so much. Dirty habits should really be done away from other people.

you've clearly made it to the shop to buy the stink-sticks, so you can move a little further.

Wow such hatred!

Having a smoking section in a hospital is a little like having a pissing section in a swimming pool.

That was brilliantly put But a load of old tosh. There are such things as extractors. When you eat in a posh restaurant, does the place stink of bone stock, other people's leftovers, garlic and onions? Even if you can see into the kitchen? Nope. The wonders of modern technology, innit!

They don't have indoor smoking areas because they didn't want any. Simplesdat. An exception was originally made in the law for hospitals. Everyone said no!

I wish they did have them. If they really can't, I wish they'd put sheltered areas, with heaters, near the entrance - just like the ones created by pubs who'd rather not lose their customers. They don't bother because, unlike pubs, people have to go to hospitals so hospitals don't need to care.

It's funny how nearly everyone on this thread has assumed all the smokers are well, but never wondered why they're at a hospital! Most of us are there for treatment. An extra 50 yards - or however far you'd like the smoking area to be - is a long way for me (not a smoking-related illness.) I struggle to get there in the first place. It's even further for patients on freshly-issued crutches, older people with poorly feet, confused psychiatric patients and exhausted neurology patients. Just saying "Well you shouldn't smoke" isn't going to make us any better and is startlingly un-compassionate.

some people seem to know they won't ever need to use NHS services for to a smoking related illness ... I'm fairly sure, as there won't be any NHS services by the time it gets me. Don't you read the news?

They made an complete exception for smokers in prison so a smoker is treated better in prison than they are in hospital. Smoking is not illegal (yet) but smokers are vilified, it's pretty pants really. Glad I stopped smoking a long time ago but I have found that the best craic in the pub tends to be with the smokers so have often ended up freezing my butt off in the garden with them.

But ameybee your hospital CANNOT legally enforce no smoking in an outside area whether or not its inside or outside hospital grounds so legally it wasn't a no smoking area. I personally would not have smoked near a pregnant lady but would not have taken any notice of the no-smoking signs in your hospital grounds.

Smokers need smoking shelters that are quick to get to and not immediately next to the doors. If the whole place is non-smoking, then they will, as human beings break the rule in the most convenient place for them. Which will be by the door.

I don't know what collection of twerps thought up the recent rash of "be strict on smoking- remove the shelters policies" but it is pissing me off. I am a non-smoker who gets sent into painful coughing fits by smoke (dunno why- it just slowly began when I was 16 or so) and a building near me, that I have to visit regularly has now erected a replacement smoking shelter right to the edge of the grounds, to make a point. Right next to the main gate, so that I have to walk through a fug! They used to have several, all down the side of the building.

Yanbu, whenever I've been to my local hospital I've seen smokers near the entrance doors, mostly patients. The whole hospital is meant to be a smoke free zone, it really annoys me. Surely if you're on a drip and can barely walk it's a sign you should take your health seriously and not be dragging the equipment to the entrance to light up?!

Blimey, you lot would deny a dying man his final cigar & brandy, wouldn't you?

I've got strong feelings about motor vehicle pollution and the fact that most of you walk/push your toddlers around town at exhaust-pipe level. You've never heard me saying you should be made to suffer painfully for it :(

Who cares about legally enforcing it? What about manners, courtesy and a little bit of thought? Loads of things are legal but you wouldn't do them.

What about manners, courtesy and a little bit of thought?

Well, yes, that's what we smokers have been saying all along