I was on the BBC Radio Wales phone-in yesterday.
Emma Griffiths Hughes, mother of a new born baby has launched a petition to stop people smoking outside the maternity unit at a local hospital.
Ms Hughes said she was driven to action after being forced to leave the Bangor hospital with her baby through a cloud of eight smokers on either side of door.
See Calls for crackdown on smoking outside Ysbyty Gwynedd maternity unit doors (Daily Post).
Needless to say the discussion didn't stop with smoking outside maternity units. It quickly became a more general debate about smoking anywhere on hospital grounds.
Also on the programme was Suzanne Cass, CEO of ASH Wales. Suzanne sounded pleasant if a little patronising but her insistence that every smoker is an addict annoyed me and I became a little shouty.
"People drink alcohol," I pointed out. "They're not all addicted to it."
Like all tobacco controllers she also wheeled out the argument that 70 per cent want to quit.
I disputed that (quoting former Labour health secretary John Reid, once a very heavy smoker, who estimated the figure to be nearer 30 per cent) but added that even if it was true there's a huge difference between wanting to quit and being forced to quit.
Anyway, I know it's bad form to criticise a young mum but I couldn't help it. Smokers are the ones who are usually accused of being selfish but here, it seemed to me, the tables were reversed.
And so I told presenter Jason Mohammad that Emma Griffiths Hughes was being selfish. He was aghast. Nevertheless these are the facts as I understood them yesterday.
Hughes would have been in hospital for perhaps a day or two to have her baby. When it was time to go home she left the maternity unit and a for a second or two her child was exposed to a whiff of tobacco smoke (allegedly).
Emma got in the waiting car (it must have been electric because I can't imagine she would want to expose her baby to any exhaust fumes) and off she went, never to return. (Well, not for some time, hopefully.)
Emma wasn't satisfied however. Angered by having to walk past a group of people smoking in the open air she decided to launch a petition calling for a crackdown on smoking outside the maternity unit.
(I should add that smoking is already prohibited in the area but smokers ignore the signs and, according to one or two callers yesterday, staff get abuse if they ask them not to light up.)
Anyway I hope Emma's house is kept immaculately clean. Even if it is (and I've no reason to think it's not) most houses are full of chemicals from carpets, furniture and curtains, not to mention millions of dust particles.
Imagine exposing your child to all that pollution in your own home day after day and then compare it to the briefest exposure to a whiff of tobacco smoke in the open air!
So save us from the pollution police and their perishing petitions. The fact is, despite being surrounded by pollutants all day long, we survive and are living longer than ever before in human history.
My advice to Emma Griffiths Hughes?
One, enjoy this time with your new born baby.
Two, have some empathy for those for whom a cigarette break may provide comfort and a sociable interlude at a stressful time.
Three, mind your own business.