FREEDOM FROM TOBACCO is a project of the San Francisco Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender (LGBT) Community Center that has the broad goal of helping our community reduce its exposure to smoking and secondhand smoke. 

Our project , Freedom From Tobacco, was named in response to tobacco company marketing that equates LGBT freedom with the so-called freedom to smoke (while 70% of smokers want to quit).

Freedom From Tobacco exposes Big Tobacco's lies by stressing that tobacco companies limit our freedom by addicting us to a deadly product.  Tobacco is the only legal product that, when used as directed, kills the user.

Tobacco is a problem that has a greater impact on our community because we smoke twice as much as everyone else and tobacco kills more people than AIDS, alcohol, drugs, suicide, murder and traffic accidents combined.

Secondhand smoke is also a serious problem in our community, because smoking continues to be common in many LGBT bars, and secondhand smoke is the third leading cause of preventable death in the U.S.  Through our research we have discovered that there are several bars in San Francisco where smoking is taking place in violation of the law.  Please write a letter to the Department of Public Health urging them to take action to protect the health of workers and the public.