The true cost of smoking

I'm not sure, I'm not a scientist but is any of this proven?
What is for sure is that smoking is bad for the health , but so many other things are as well.Does smoking cause cancer for sure? is it a rule. It's a risc, but will it cause cancer for sure in anyone.

Smoking is a risc, just like going to Mcdonalds, just like crossing the street.
Hey I can be responsible and cross when the green light is on but what if a drunken driver smashes and splatters me all over the street.It's a risc.
I better not try to cross the street ever. How about those 85 year old vets from WW2, they smoke unfiltered crap and are still going.

Food is worst than smoking people!!!It's the number one cancer factor.
One pack of cigarettes a day VS. eating at Mcdonalds every day, 3 meals a day. Smoking would lose for sure.

I am a smoker, smoking is not good, I do not advise anyone to smoke.
It's just that people distort things, most of the things are just as bad as smoking. People that go against other people that smoke are control freaks. They like to control other people's life and tell people how to live.
Usually those who do this are fat bags , feminists and people that dream to impose they're will on others.They come up with crap like second hand smoke disease , of course none of this has been proven but they insist anyway.

If tobacco is so heavily taxed, then smokers are already paying for their health care.. so your government should be doing the right thing with the taxes gained.

I think one asnwer to the problem of the cost to health systems, is for voters to force their representatives to insure the massive taxes are put into the health system and every available means are taken to assist the addicted to break the habit.

I can't provide links but I did read a significant article last year, somewhere, about the real numbers of illnesses caused by passive smoking in the USA... and the figure is extremely low. The numbers for getting lung cancer from breathing polluted air is much higher. By using the word pollution I refer not just to auto fumes, but airborne particles from manufacturing/processing, your computer puts out highly toxic vapours when you have it turned on, the paint you use in your house is unhealthy, the clothes you wear, the bed linen if not cotton or wool has toxic particles, etc, etc, ad nauseum.

The major problem with smoking related illnesses MUST be put squarely on the shoulders of the tobacco companies who put over 300 highly addictive and poisonous chemicals into their products... in order to hook the smoker. It is an addiction. It is one of the hardest addictions to conquer.

I am a smoker of 34 years, and I hate second hand smoke, the smell of ashtrays, and seriously despise other smokers who don't give a sh!t about anyone else. I want to gag when I walk down the street into some smokers pollution.

Wow. What's with all the smoking threads the last few days.

If you want a lot of points start a thread on SMOKING or OBESITY.
Way to go.

As I said in the other smoking thread YESTERDAY , that here in Oz we already pay $10 tax on a large pack already. It is meant to go towards our health care but it's guzzled in consolidated revenue.

I heard on the news tonight that smoking inside homes and in common areas of unit blocks is being considered for the big ban.
Of which I ACTUALLY AGREE with in RENTAL PROPERTIES.

It still doesn't effect me because I smoke outside on my balcony and don't smoke indoors anyway. I'm a polite smoker and don't want to smoke around visitors and my son who is living at home at the moment.

So, soon folks will have to move on to the Marijuana mob or find some other hobby horse to beat with a stick, as smoking will soon be a luxury rather than a habit.

Cigars anyone......

I have news for you, we are all going to die and few if any of us will die during sex when we are 96 years old.

Smokers die earlier, and they do run up some costs near the end.

Mormons and clean living people do live longer, then they die in nursing homes (expensive) after running up many years of treatment for all the expected chronic diseases of the elderly.

Medicare and SS are going to go broke BECAUSE OF THESE PEOPLE.

The health costs for smokers pales by comparison.

We ought to give cigarettes away for free. These people die young and if there were more of them, SS and Medicare might remain solvent for a longer time.

The NYT had a series on how irrational we are concerning our views of our "golden years". Trust me, they are not.

There is something to the saying, "Live fast, die young, and leave a good looking corpse".

Journalists and rogue reporters may be picking up smoking with the invention of this cool new toy to use.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

reply to post by ravenshadow13


There are three kinds of lies. Lies, damn lies, and statistics.

Studies and statistics can always be done to get the outcome that you want. They aren't 'scientific' by any means.

Ahh! Finally someone gives me a platform to share my thoughts something I have been discussing with family and friends for many years. I'm so happy to know it has been hit on by other posters so I know it is a thought that is completely logical to many.

Like increases in taxes on smokers, so too should this kind of tax be imposed on those who chose to abuse themselves with the unhealthy act of eating limitless amounts of junk food!

Call it the "TWINKIE TAX" and it should be added to everything you can buy off the grocery store shelves that isn't "good" for you.

Furthermore, as stated earlier in this thread, I suggest that charging $40 for a box of Twinkies, or Doughnuts, or Ice Cream would greatly reduce the amount those over-eaters would indulge in, and in turn, lower the cost of health care enormously and almost instantly! Losing weight has been proven to reduce and remove many of the health problems associated with it unlike cancer that doesn't necessarily go away if you stop smoking or smoke less.

The fact that there is a "Morbid Obesity" epidemic in the United States makes it safe to assume that over the years the cost of health care has been impacted and the Non-Twinkie-Eaters (who don't smoke, I might add) have had to absorb the increases in insurance premiums and taxes to take care of the Junk Food Junkies. I'd like to go even further and say if you recieve state medical insurance - and you are overweight - you should have to WALK to apply for it AND your state food stamps/cards should restrict what you can buy with it! Lettuce for everyone!

Rates and premiums according to a persons BMI? I'M ALL FOR IT!

reply to post by jesspassinthru


I support a higher tax on alcoholic drinks. Beer, spirits, wine, and anything else with alcohol in it should be taxed more by volume and alcohol percentage. For too long have the people had to support increased health care costs created by alcoholics either directly, or indirectly by their poor choices that have/can lead to the injury or death of others, and themselves.

A dollar per ounce of 10 percent alcohol content would be a good place to start the calculations.

Originally posted by asmeone2
reply to post by Wildbob77

 

By that logic we shouldn't let anyone eat junk food, go to Mcdonalds, watch TV, drink coffee, drink alcohol, use a cell phone, work a job where they will be exposed to chemicals, ect. ect.

God forbid they might get cancer and we'll have to pick up the tab, right?

You actually posed some pretty good ideas. Alcohol, tobacco, and the food industry are some of the largest if not the largest 3 health issues in America. Outlaw all three! NO MORE BOOZE! NO MORE TOBACCO! NO MORE MCDONALDS!!! Man, imagine what all those people would be like when they have to face reality without their respective crutches

I'm all for freedom of choice but choice of slow suicide is just stupid

All the Obama bashers should be all over this with their irrational fear of socialism. If we didn't have such health issues maybe we wouldn't have to pay so much as citizens... I like it.

[edit on 30-1-2009 by ImaNutter]

Ya'll should read this I wrote in another thread. Found common everyday items that contain toxins and carcinogens that are known and proven to cause a wide variety of cancers.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Cheers!

reply to post by Amaxium

AMAXIUM -- Thank you for your posting. Very lucid.

This is my first post. Only one thing to say. Do not derive too much pleasure from watching someone else's rights being taken from them. Your rights could be then next item on the menu. Smokers' rights are merely the hors d'oeuvres. Do you think you can avoid becoming part of the main course??

I like the idea of a tax on the behaviors that everyone has pointed out are bad for the health of people.

Fast food.... Not healthy
Tobacco..... Not healthy
Alcohol.... Not healthy.


So, why not do a study that figures out what the cost to society really is for unhealthy behaviors and apply a tax to offset the true cost to society.

Perhaps people would choose the salad bar if a bigmac actually cost $10 and a salad is $3.

I don't want to take rights away from people but I do think that people that indulge in unhealthy behaviors should pay the true cost to society for those behaviors.

reply to post by alkali

A very touching story. But you forgot something: the rest of the story.

Perhaps one day I will end up being too weak to fight against the guy who tries to take me to that hospital and be brought in in distress from a smoking related ailment. I'll take that chance. Perhaps it will be excruciatingly painful. I'll take that chance too. Not because I like pain, but because I don't.

I receive two benefits from smoking. One, I get some relief from excruciating pain every day of my life. You see, I have a gastro-intestinal disorder that produces extreme pain on a daily basis. Doctors can't cure it. I'm sure you are aware of Acid Flux Disorder (ACD)? That's just one of the less painful symptoms. The effects of nicotine actually alleviate my pain to a large degree. Oh, and before you start blaming it on smoking, I have had it since birth. My stomach is actually malformed; apparently a genetic condition that I got a higher dose of than my father.

I spent years and a small fortune trying to get the doctors to just figure out what was wrong with me. When they finally did figure it out, all the doctor could finally say, after literally months of time off from work and tens of thousands of dollars in cost, was "there's nothing we can do." Gee, that was a deal. Well, I had discovered there's something I can do: smoke. If I smoke during or right after I eat, I don't wind up convulsing on the floor (yes, that has happened before, although it doesn't happen every time. Some times I just double over in pain).

Two, and this is possibly related, I tend to stress out pretty easily. I've already had one heart attack from stress, several years ago. I decided pretty quickly I didn't want another one. I've had more than one doctor try to put me on a pill to combat the stress (including Valium). Sure, why would I stop smoking a natural plant in order to take a man-made pill that costs more than the smokes and doesn't give me the pleasing taste of tobacco (yes, I like the taste of a fine smoke)? Either will keep me from going into a canyption fit over minor stuff, so why shouldn't I use the one that gives me more control of myself and a bit of pleasure in the process? Oh, maybe because the doctors and pharmacies don't make any money off of the smokes...

You see the effects as they come in, by definition when the patients are in distress. Try looking outside that ER to the people who are not in distress and see if you can understand there might be a reason they took so long to come to you. There are otherwise healthy people who smoke, you know.

And don't worry about having to see me in such a state. As long as I can fight it, I would rather die at home in my own bed than lying in a hospital with tubes poking out of me. The few days you might prolong my earthly existence would be days of torment for me, and I just don't like torment.

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reply to post by nrky

Being surrounded by smokers leads to passive smoking, and we can actually get addicted to cigarettes if we are exposed to enough smoke, which can lead to us becoming smokers, and getting cancer. Hence, passive smoking DOES kill, just not directly, so less culpability.

I have to add this one to my list of smoker's evils. Until now, no one had ever told me second-hand smoke leads to a smoking habit. I'd give you a star if it was believable.

Kudos! Someone has an imagination!

TheRedneck

reply to post by Wildbob77


All boils down to supply and demand. If Big Macs did cost $10 and this did make a large rise in people choosing salad bars, then the cost of salad supply would rise. It is cheaper to produce a big mac than it does a salad. More salad crops would have to be produced to fulfill the new demand and thus the cost would rise to meet the demand. More demand for salad = more land needed to raise crops, more pesticides, more fertilizer, more equipment for cultivation. The farmers would have to recoup these costs by raising the price.

reply to post by Amaxium

If the sin tax is added to a big mac and not to a salad, if affects the old supply and demand theory.

You might have street vendors fill in the supply and not pay the tax on burgers but the cost of salad should go down do to the economy of scale.

I still find it hard to believe that smokers have enough energy to keep protesting so vehemently that they are being conspired against. The counter arguments are so incredibly transparent. It's always about other things or that statistics lie. Other things consist of things like your cars , and your twinkie/big Mac eating etc .

Let's make this simple - smoking is the only addiction where the people near you are immediately physically affected by your behavior.

Stop whingeing and take responsibility! You choose to smoke, it's YOUR addiction, so keep it to yourself. Form smoking clubs and smoke ten packs a day in them, and see how many non-smokers come to your club to complain? NONE!

The latest posts by smokers here are a perfect illustration of the human tendency to cling to opinions no matter how ill-advised, ignorance based, and indefensible they are; and to justify behavior no matter how lacking in merit and harmful to self and others it is. You're right, regularly inhaling a concentrated soup of multiple highly toxic chemicals does NOT cause health problems -- it's just a conspiracy theory. Better to buy your way to cancer on an installment plan than to accept having been wrong -- your lungs may rot to bits, but at least your ego's intact, right?

[edit on 30-1-2009 by Mynaeris]

Perhaps the smokers should wearing a sticker with a S on the clothes..

the past has proven that it works!! in no time there where only a few left...

Here's what I don't get.

Air-dried tobacco wrapped in regular untreated "papers" and burned has few of the dangers and side effects of commercial cigarettes.

If they put carcinogenic chemicals in snack cakes to make them more addictive, would we be trying to make everyone stop eating snack cakes, or would we be trying to make the manufacturer stop adding the chemicals?

So, amidst all the sound and fury, why doesn't anyone address the real issue?

Make the tobacco companies stop putting all the nasty chemicals in the cigarettes, and they won't be so dangerous. Or addictive.

They won't smell as bad, either. What's the difference between pipe or cigar smoke and cigarette smoke? The additives and chemicals.

TOBACCO gets the bad rap as the current trendy societal evil, but tobacco is not the majority of the problem. The sugar, additives, and chemicals put in the cigarettes are.

I've even read posts in this thread listing some of the nasty dangerous chemicals put in cigarettes, but somehow this is one more thing being held against smokers instead of against the companies that put all those chemicals in there in the first place.

Waaay back in the 60's there were some (promptly suppressed) studies that couldn't find any statistically significant link between smoking air dried pure tobacco (as people in poorer countries did and do) and cancer. But when the studies were done for English and American cigarettes, which use sugar-cured tobacco and have all the chemicals added, there is a statistically significant link. Hmmm.

Why don't we ALL get together and start a campaign for all natural cigarettes? Cigarettes will become less addictive, less harmful, and less unpleasant, and chances are good that fewer people will smoke because tobacco in & of itself is not as addictive as the chemical-laced cigarettes. Wow. A win-win for everyone!

So of course it will never happen. Makes too much sense, or something like that.

reply to post by ressiv


Is hyperbole your native tongue? Though since you picked on that example let's see how smokers are like Israel, and we will make non-smokers the Gaza strip. Non-smokers are feeling their quality of life impinged upon every time you choose to smoke. They can smell you, they have to breathe in your smoke ( if it tastes so good, why exhale it) when they are in the public, be it the beach, on a hike, at a sports stadium, at a concert, standing in line somewhere, directly outside the door of a no-smoking venue, but when they start speaking up against it you decide that they have declared war and must be told that you are in the right!

By the way I don't think smokers need the letter S , non-smokers can smell them.

Originally posted by alkali


Anyway. Being in the medical field I can't understand why anyone would smoke. Call me crazy, but I have no desire to go out like many smokers do. I work in the ER and the other night a woman came in from a hospice because her trach tube was clogged. When the ambulance brought her in I was in another room tending to someone else but I figured this would be like all other trach tubes I've unclogged, no biggie. When I walked into her room I was taken back by the patient. Her head was literally larger than a basketball and had little venous return. Her tongue was bulging out, her eyes were swollen shut and she was completely helpless. It didn't take long to realize she had esophageal cancer and turns out it was from years of smoking.

Maybe some smokers can help me because I can't figure this out. By smoking, you're more than likely going to go out with a bang. It's going to be unbelievably terrible with more pain than you know what to do with. You're going to come to the ER, I'm going to see you and I'm going to know that you're going to die, but I won't tell you that. You'll be admitted to a floor, they'll run a lot of tests on you, you'll be referred to an oncologist and the whole time you'll be clinging to hope but the medical staff will know you don't have a chance and you're going to die. You'll go through all kinds of fun cancer treatment that probably won't do a damn thing and your family will be crying and praying the treatment will work and you'll get better, but you won't. Eventually you'll be taking about 1 breath every minute and a half. You'll still be responsive but only responsive enough to squeeze your loved one's hand. Soon after that your body will begin to shut down. The doctors and nurses won't do anything because they know nothing will save you. Your family will watch as you go into asystole and then that'll be it. That seems like a scary situation to me.

And don't think this is uncommon, it happens all the time. Ask to shadow a physician on the oncology floor.

And no one cares if you have a grandma that lived until she was 100 and smoked all her life. That's not going to happen to you. That's extremely rare so don't bother bringing it up.

Smoking is bad for you and everyone else. Quit being stupid. There's no justification.

Thank you for the vivid picture that the relatives of the smoking rights advocates will get to live through. It's not only that the smoker has to die a horrible and expensive death but your relatives have to live through that experience as well.

It's all so sad.