Let’s give Micheál Martin our full support for his smoking ban

WHEN his stint in the Department of Health is over, Micheál Martin will not be best remembered for the health service reforms he presented last month. His enduring legacy will be an initiative he announced last January.

And when future generations of health and political commentators look back at the year 2003 they are likely to conclude that the most important health report published this year was not the Prospectus Report nor the Brennan Report nor even the Hanley Report. The report with the greatest potential to transform health policy in Ireland is the Allwright Report.

Dr Sean Allwright is a senior lecturer in epidemiology at Trinity College and he chaired a scientific working group which published a report last January, officially named a report on the health effects of environmental tobacco smoke in the workplace. For shorthand it can be called the Allwright Report.