She stole my post! I agree, in particular, about smokers having the same rights. But they can not infringe upon my rights... Further, they shouldn't have the right to impose their unhealthy habit upon those who are unable to speak for or to protect themselves...children both alive and unborn. Why should a smoker be able to commit their kid to a lifetime of dealing with allergies and asthma..and increasingly fatal disease? Lastly, but not insignificantly, heart disease is the leading cause of death in this country for both men and women. The VAST majority of people with heart disease are smokers. Lung disease is a huge problem...again largely dominated by people who do or have smoked. Lung cancer is virtually exlusively a disease related to smoking. Stomach, esophageal and pancreatic cancer are directly associated with smoking. Many many children who I treat that are on Medicaid, most with asthma, ear infections or allergies, have parents who smoke and who's illness is related to their parent's smoking. And while those parents can afford their $200+/month smoking habit they can't afford to buy tylenol for their kids' fever or inhalers for their kids' asthma (which they wouldn't have if the parents didn't smoke) or antibiotics for the kids' ear infection or to pay their own doctor bill. So we non-smokers get to pay for all this treatment (the uninsured or under insured adults and the kids) that the smokers paid to inflict upon themselves and their kids. I think that's a huge infringement on my rights. I have no problem helping people who need help...but not those who won't make an effort to help themselves. Now, tax the hell out of the cigarettes and all tobacco products, make it a luxury item, put all the money into some bucket to address smoking related illness treatment but with the real goal of reducing the amount people smoke and the number of people who smoke by pricing it such that it can only be done as a luxury...like drinking fine wine and I'm fine with smokers enjoying their "right". But it's not fair to say..."Oh leave them alone, it's their right." It's not that simple as the long term and short term consequences of their decision affects those of us who've never taken a single puff.
Had a patient that claimed 5 packs a day. 41y/o diabetic, looked like he was in his mid-60s age wise. Coming in for amputations of part of both feet...the second time for one of the feet. There's no way this guy will see the age of 50...and 45 would suprise me without major lifestyle changes.:frown:
In between puffs and meetings. Actually, they were partially biz-dev and executive management types so they did a lot of their working while they were smoking outside. One of the guys - great guy btw, brilliant engineering mind, very extreme in everything he did - liked to flesh out designs, code and solutions to hard problems while he was smoking. It was sort of a meditative habit for him.
I remember one of my coworkers, sitting at the computer terminal smoking a cigarette, drinking coffee, and eating M&Ms with peanuts. It was a triple threat: nicotine, caffeine, and theobromine. Tom
i told DH that he was entitled to f$%^ up his own lungs well away from me if he so desired, but the part about cutting short his own life would deeply affect me and our future children, too. and that was 100% unfair to me/us. that was my main argument for him to quit smoking- again- and it apparently got through to him...
They banned smoking in bars a few years ago up here. If our experience is any indication, there will be a drop-off in business for a few months as the smokers stay away while they can't fathom what to do with their hands while drinking, then business will come back as they remember why they went to bars in the first place, combined with an influx of non-smokers who suddenly find going to bars enjoyable. Food sales also go up as people aren't constantly inhaling appetite suppressants
I wish that cigarettes cost $20 per pack in regular stores, and maybe therefore $15 per pack on reservations and such. THAT would be a good start. I have no idea if it would cover the basic costs of all the MIs, COPD, cancer, and missed work days, but it would dissuade a lot of people from smoking. As a society, I think we place so much value on autonomy (in the USA) that we lack the resolve to limit certain kinds of self-destructive behavior that ought to be limited. I don't mean prohibition of alcohol. But making cigarettes hideously expensive -- I really wonder what that would do to death rates for CAD in the decade after that was done. Interesting thought. Got to insert this just because I wonder what the hell he is saying. Is that Hebrew? :kev: Dang. And this one! :deadhorse:
My dad borrowed a pickup truck to help with the move 38 years ago. On one trip with my brother the contents in the bed caught fire. Dad was burned pretty bad getting the stuff off the truck before that caught fire. So, to the smokers who believe it is their right to throw their lit butt into the wild then I claim the right to pick it up and grind it out on their car or discard a cup of soda as I pass. Tobacco is not a controlled substance due to the influence of southern legislators a century ago.
