Smoking in the News

I started to blog some amusing conflicting tidbits found in the news the last three days about smoking. As I hit this page, though, of listings of articles about cigarettes and smoking, I changed my angle.

(Depending on when you get this, the emphasis of the page will likely change. I'm too lazy to take a screen shot).

Here's a sampling of headlines.

• target="_new">Study: High School Students Smoking Less
• Do cigarettes cause cancer? I'm not sure, says boss of sued tobacco firm (Probably not if you glue them together and use them as bookends)
• Tobacco chemical brain drug hope
• German smokers laugh off health warnings (The "warnings" are hilariously strange from an American perspective - worth a click)
• Smokers: Beware Bad Air
• Tobacco firms try back-door protest
• Smoking opponents generate new heat (Registration required - about a smoking ban in the works in Illinois)
• Restaurant employees seen as major risk group for cancer (Out of Finland)

A couple of quick thoughts. One, this is almost as bad as diet/nutrition information. The article about underfunded anti-smoking initiatives explains that much of the "tobacco settlement" money isn't going toward stopping the use of tobacco. At the same time, a study is released stating that current efforts are, for the time being, working with America's kids.

Then, we have the conflicting stories from the UK and Finland about a, um, biased source - the former head of a tobacco company stating, naa, probably doesn't cause cancer, and the article that restaurant employees are a major risk group for cancer.

I'm looking for evidence that smoking is healthy, and the byproduct article about Parkinson's (the tobacco chemical brain drug hope).

Now, quickly, before I make my salads and get some exercise.

What's this mean? Well, all I need to know about smoking is not to do it. That's easy as a lifetime non-smoker, not even a puff. It's not so simple for others, of course. The activity killed my father-in-law before his 45th birthday (I believe I have the age right. I never met the man). It aided and abetted in my father's sudden heart attack death at 62. It's something I can't claim to understand.

I'm censoring myself (read: writing/striking this three times and tempering it each time) before I go off into passionate drivel about this issue, so you don't get the last three paragrphs I wrote. It can be summarized as "I don't want to breathe your dirty air, and so I don't visit." Off to make salads and exercise.

hln

Posted by hln at November 14, 2003 05:56 AM | Health/Fitness/Nutrition | TrackBack