It was one year ago this week when a statewide law banning smoking in restaurants went into effect. And while some restaurant owners complain the ban has hurt their business, a public health expert said overall air quality has improved at establishments where the ban is in effect.

WWL-TV

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Dr. Edward Peters, LSU public health expert, collected air samples from nearly 130 bars and restaurants around the state before and after the ban went into effect. He recorded a 90 percent drop of the cigarette smoke particle matter in restaurants.

“The restaurants and bars before the law had very high levels of this particulate matter, but after the law went into effect, we saw a dramatic drop in the particulate matter in restaurants,” Peters said.

In restaurants, the particles in the air went down from 382 microns per meter cubed in a 24 hours period to 59 microns per meter cubed over the same period. In bars all exempt from the smoking ban, the levels went down some, possibly because fewer people were smoking; but they were still dangerously high: from 963 microns per meter cubed to 694.

Peters said researchers have uncovered levels of up to a thousand microns in casinos and 2,500 microns at cigar smoking events -- dangerous because the EPA set safe levels at about 35 microns per meter cubed over a 24 hour period.

Some in the restaurant industry have cried foul because they said Louisiana allows still allows smoking in places like bars and casinos. They want a level playing field.

“You can still smoke in a bar, bars that serve food how is that any different for the customer to inhale smoke in a bar that serves food than in a restaurant,” Wendy Waren, spokesperson for the Louisiana Restaurant Association.

Steve Pettus, managing partner of the Palace Cafe', said the legislature ought to ban smoking across the board “if the true interest…was to protect the well-being of Louisiana citizenry.”

The Louisiana Restaurant Association said it’s possible that the smoking ban in restaurants drove smoking customers to eat in bars that serve food, but it's hard to say how much business was lost because it’s generally been down since Hurricane Katrina.

Representatives hope the Louisiana Campaign for Tobacco Free Living will pressure the state legislature to make the ban apply on a broader scale, but in the meantime, health experts said that before the ban, air quality levels in restaurants were the equivalent of non-smokers smoking three cigarettes a day.