Pinderfields Hospital in West Yorkshire has installed a loud speaker system that staff and visitors can activate when they see someone smoking where they shouldn’t be.
Staff hope that the system will deter people from smoking next to the windows of the maternity ward.
On pressing the blue button, the speaker plays one of nine prerecorded messages, including, ‘Someone’s nanny, granddad, mummy or daddy is having cancer treatment today. Thank you.’
The Trust has been smoke-free since March this year. However, some smokers still light up despite the no-smoking signs in areas including ambulance drop-off points.
Iain Brodie, General Manager of Facilities at The Mid Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust, said:
“We’ve introduced the system because it’s vital we take every possible step to discourage smoking.”
“Patients and visitors, including new born babies and those arriving by ambulance, often have to pass through cigarette smoke at our hospital entrances, which is totally unacceptable.”
“Our goal is to have smoke free sites, and the ability to broadcast these messages is a crucial step towards this.”
Journalist Dawn Neesom told a Jeremy Vine on Five panel that the recordings of children pleading for smokers to extinguish their cigarettes amounted to ’emotional bullying’.
Dawn Neesom thinks recordings of children pleading with smokers to put out their cigarettes outside hospitals is “bullying” – because they’re often already under immense stress. Does she have a point?@DawnNeesom | @TheAnneDiamond | #jeremyvine pic.twitter.com/tafbohW4Aj
— Jeremy Vine On 5 (@JeremyVineOn5) October 23, 2018
The Trust’s smoke-free policy allows vapers to use e-cigarettes outdoors and away from the main entrances.
