Well, we do, don't we? Catalytic converters and all that. Long way to go though.

There's a certain symmetry between smoking and driving, isn't there? In both cases it would be great if people did less of them but a shame to have to pass laws to make it happen. Both are regarded as the rule by people who do them but it would be rather lovely for those who don't (and for those who do, even if they don't quite realise it) if they could be treated as the exception. Both have a certain kind of rhetoric employed to defend them (from the likes of Hitchens or Clarkson at least) along the lines of 'why shouldn't I enjoy [my cigarette/driving at 100 mph] if I want to' to which the obvious reply from those who don't quite go for the side-effects is 'go ahead but don't do it anywhere near me'. And, er, both kill about a million people a year worldwide. At least I remember reading something of the sort although I don't have the facts to hand - seems about the right order of magnitude though.

Er, yes, sorry, I've stumbled into the wrong room again. As you were. 

Well, I would imagine the majority of those killed by smoking are those who themselves smoke, whereas responsibility in terms of which drivers (or pedestrians) are killed is rather more intricately distributed. I'm guessing, of course, but would imagine so. Also, that probably doesn't take into account the effects of exhaust fumes, which could potentially have a much more cataclysmic effect (in terms of the environment). I've never heard anyone suggest that smoking produces anything remotely like the amount of greenhouse gases that cars do.

To extend this idea a little, no smoker is smoking because he thinks it's healthy for him, so you're not going to make him stop by repeatedly explaining that it isn't healthy. You need to look at the real reason why he's smoking and spend your advertising budget on reversing *that* perception.

So it would appear obvious that government health warnings about cigarettes are at best inefficient and at worst a complete waste of money that really should be spent elsewhere.


Ah, but governments don't really want people to stop smoking, do they? They just want us to think they're doing something. So maybe their efforts are better thought-out than I'm giving them credit for... (Cynical, moi?  )

Indeed I forgot to suggest the other link between smoking and cars: our elected representatives like to take postures against them while raking in the resulting tax revenues... ('Oh, they're punitive, you know.')

Passive smoking injures and kills as well of course. The children I see in smoky cafés don't have any say in the matter. Neither do the employees if they want to keep their jobs. I would also suggest that current perceptions of the matter sometimes make it socially unacceptable to avoid other people's smoke - when you lit up in the restaurant last night, Ian, how would you have reacted if I'd left?

Exactly my point: putting the onus on the non-smoker...

Good for you and good luck with it!

I have never smoked but my oldest brother and younger sister both do and did (respectively).
My brother characterises his habit as among the biggest day to day strains on his marriage (not as big as the strain caused by the hours that he works - which is why he says he goes back to smoking) and my sister found she just couldn't afford to bring up three children and carry on smoking (brother-in-law hasn't quite caught up to that one yet). My brother says that starting smoking is the one thing in his life that he regrets and, in the dark nights of his soul, he blames himself for my asthma (complete rubbish - I was showing symptoms long before he started smoking - but incidentally I am now officially not an asthmatic! Hurrah!)

Having said all of this, the period of my life where I seemed to principally live in a pub inhaling second-hand smoke was possibly one of the most enjoyable, if not all rather hazy now. I have to wash my clothes when I come back from the pub now, so I won't be sorry when the ban comes into force. I'm rather hoping that my brother will quit too.