U.K. doctors vote to ban smoking for anyone born after 2000!

[[...]]

I hope this will become a worldwide trend!

 

British doctors have voted to ban cigarette smoking for anyone born after the year 2000.

 

Dr. Tim Crocker-Buqué said the move would create “the first tobacco-free generation.”

 

With much debate, the doctors voted at their annual meeting Tuesday in Harrogate, England.

 

“The level of harm caused by smoking is unconscionable,” Crocker-Buqué, a London research assistant in academic public health, said at the meeting.

 

“It is not expected that this policy will instantly prevent all people from smoking, but (will) de-normalize cigarette smoking,” he said.

 

The government would have to legislate a ban on tobacco sales to anyone born in the 21st century for it to become law.

 

Crocker-Buqué said 80 per cent of smokers started as teenagers, two in three smokers wished they could stop, and nine in 10 wished they had never started.

 

“As doctors, we see first-hand the devastating effects of tobacco addiction,” Dr. Paul Darragh, the BMA Northern Ireland council chair and a former heavy smoker, said in a release from the conference.

 

http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2014/06/24/uk_doctors_vote_to_ban_smoking_for_anyone_born_after_2000.html

[[lo...]]

Yes, great news. Heard it on the radio.  No doubt kids will still try it but it would be a great breakthrough.

 

I just wonder how much of our health budgets go on smoking-, alcohol-, obesity-related illnesses.

 

Scotland has one of the worst records for poor health with our drinking culture and unhealthy diet.    Seems very hard tturn it around. 

 

LF

 

 

 

[[Bi...]]

And to think that when America first banned smoking on aircraft in the 80's we were called Fascist.  Times have changed. Maybe we can ban benzo's next, one can dream.

[[xe...]]

So... the level of harm done from infrequent tobacco use is pretty miniscule, and comparable to other things like "walking on the sidewalk next to a busy road". The level of harm done from frequent tobacco use is significant, but within an order of magnitude of highway deaths, and well within the risk limits of lots of other voluntary behaviors  such as alcohol, racing motorcycles, base jumping.

 

As someone who owns a motorcycle and likes to smoke a tobacco pipe, on average, twice a month... are you suggesting that all such high risk behaviors should be illegal? If not, then why do should we treat tobacco more harshly than other activities?

 

 

[[be...]]

Are the older smokers Grandfathered? Why not ban McDonald's next??

[[Ch...]]

If we want health care costs to ever decline, we'd need to significantly reduce all sorts of high risk behavior, cigarettes, obesity and fast food included…

[[xe...]]

If we want health care costs to ever decline, we'd need to significantly reduce all sorts of high risk behavior, cigarettes, obesity and fast food included…

 

Criminalizing consensual behaviors in the name of reducing healthcare costs is, IMO, a slippery slope to nanny-state hell... and (at least in the US), we waste such an astronomical amount of healthcare dollars on paperwork and a needlessly complex/expensive insurance infrastructure, that I think trying to tackle that problem from any other angle is ignoring the elephant in the room.

 

Ideologically, I understand where you're coming from, but the way I'd solve that would be to have everyone pay into the healthcare system based on both their income and their voluntary activities. Again, speaking as someone who owns a motorcycle and a bicycle and likes to smoke a pipe once in a while, I'd be outraged by any movement to prohibit any of those things, but I'd be open to the idea that they could be reflected in my risk factors and thus in the amount of money I pay in to the system. You wouldn't have to make it a huge penalty, either -- most smokers don't get cancer.

 

If you really want to reduce health care costs through behavioral legislation, why not incentivize very high risk behaviors? The most expensive population to provide care to is the elderly, because every part of the body starts to break given enough time. If everyone spent two years base jumping twice a week in their 50's as part of a midlife crisis, a lot less people would live to be elderly, and things would be cheaper

[[lo...]]

Why not just introduce euthanasia??

 

That would solve the problem and reduce government expenditure on pensions at the same time!!!

 

It seems quite an attractive option during the worst waves

 

:tickedoff:

 

LF

 

ONLY JOKING

 

 

[Guest [Lu...]]

Yeah, as much as I'm against smoking, because I know how easy it is to fall into it's trap, that is just ridiculous. If anything, raise the age to 21 instead of 18, when you're older and a little wiser. But to ban them completely will not work. Never has in the past and it won't in the future.

[[Bi...]]

Forcing people to stop smoking,,,, hummmm, Hitler would be proud of how far National socialism has come if he were alive.

 

I'd just love to see how they will enforce it.  Maybe cops with cattle prods would work

ZZZXXXT, ZZZXXXT,  stop smoking lad  ZZZXXXT

 

Making tobacco illegal would be the only fair way and then people would all move to 'electric nicotine' most likely which may be better.

 

Go Blue!

[[pr...]]

As though the war on drugs hasn't already proven itself over several decades to be a disastrous failure of gargantuan proportions.

[[Bi...]]

As though the war on drugs hasn't already proven itself over several decades to be a disastrous failure of gargantuan proportions.

 

True, I love to study history and there are interesting facts about drugs that are hidden.  First the BIG war on drugs only started in the 1890's when people started having a total fascination with socialism.  You could call the war on drugs social engineering since they where all legal before 1892 and then rapidly started being regulated.

 

Second If you look back 4000 years there were LOTS of anti-drug laws aimed at SLAVE'S - Slave's were forbidden in most cultures from drug intake as it killed there productivity. Over 5000 NO DRUG laws for SLAVES laws from 2000BC to 1892

 

Make's me ask one question, are we slave's to the social engineers?  They due draw there income from our taxes and the more taxes we pay then better they live.  HMMMMMMMM.

[[xe...]]

Make's me ask one question, are we slave's to the social engineers?  They due draw there income from our taxes and the more taxes we pay then better they live.  HMMMMMMMM.

 

it's counterproductive, at least in the tech world You've got stuff like Steve Jobs well know endorsement of LSD, and anecdotally I know a decent number of coders who like to get stoned and crank out work.

[[ba...]]

I heard that a pack of cigarettes cost ALOT in the UK , around 3 years ago i sent a friend from Leeds 2 packs of cigarettes for christmas . Las Vegas is cheap a pack of pall malls cost $3.75, here in texas its $4.93 with taxes, in mexico theyre only $3.50

[[Bi...]]

Make's me ask one question, are we slave's to the social engineers?  They due draw there income from our taxes and the more taxes we pay then better they live.  HMMMMMMMM.

 

it's counterproductive, at least in the tech world You've got stuff like Steve Jobs well know endorsement of LSD, and anecdotally I know a decent number of coders who like to get stoned and crank out work.

 

Sounds like me in my younger years