Biography: Martin Pion is president and charter member of Missouri GASP (Group Against Smoking Pollution) Inc., founded in 1984 and receiving 501(c)(3) non-profit status in 1986. Mr. Pion played a major role in defeating an effort by the tobacco lobby, in collusion with the statewide tobacco control coalition, to pass a weak preemptive state smoke-free air law in Missouri in 1987. Since then, he has worked at damage control at the state level while promoting strong smoke-free air legislation locally. Recent major successes in the latter area include the enactment of comprehensive smoke-free ordinances in St. Louis City and County in 2009, effective January 2, 2011, which will cover over one million people. Mr. Pion has undertaken or initiated a number of studies of levels of secondhand smoke in airport smoking rooms using nicotine monitors. A peer-reviewed paper entitled "Airport smoking rooms don't work" was published in the journal Tobacco Control in March 2004. He has also authored a number of other independent, unpublished studies of the efficacy of enclosed, separately ventilated smoking rooms that are permitted under some local ordinances.

Conflicts of Interest: None (no present or past funding from tobacco companies or pharmaceutical companies).