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Exam time is fast approaching at McGill University and students who suffer from asthma know all too well what that means: Get out your puffers.

That’s because it’s a stressful time of year when the “no smoking” signs at the smoke-free McLennan-Redpath terrace, near the McLennan Library Building, are most apt to be ignored, and students suffering from respiratory and other illnesses find themselves having to access the library through an incessant cloud of toxic smoke.

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“As someone with bad asthma and allergies, walking to the libraries is a problem for me,” one student wrote in a recent student survey about the possibility of McGill becoming a smoke-free campus.

“(It) makes me cough up like crazy,” wrote another student with asthma.

As the Student Society of McGill University (SSMU) prepares to take a vote on a new smoking policy Thursday — one that wants to address the issue without resorting to smoker-shaming — students have already shown strong support (73 per cent in favour) for making the campus smoke-free in a plebiscite question on SSMU’s winter referendum.