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http://www.smoke-free.ca/heathercrowe/FAQ.htm Read the first FAQ answer. Lung cancer is almost non-existent in people who are not exposed to cigarette smoke. There are a couple other risk factors, such as asbestos, and radon, but most people don't have any exposure to those kinds of things. The Heather Crowe thing is a little anecdotal, but so is my story. I don't have lung cancer or anything, but since they've banned smoking in most public places in Ontario, I find that the smell of smoke bothers me a lot more. When you are used to always smelling it, you stop noticing it. But now that it isn't everywhere, I realize just how bad it is.

As a chemist related to a pharmacist I am fully aware of drug "costs". The point is that I have put in over $10K and have never taken anything out and never will. It is just wrong that I should have to pay for somebody else's hypochondria.

I'm sure if I looked up the stats that revenue from tobacco tax would be much greater than expenditures on smoking related cancers and illness. Lets do just that...:

Direct cost of health care for tobacco related illness in Canada in 2002: 4.36 billion
(http://www.otru.org/pdf/updates/update_june2006.p df [PDF])
Total tax revenues from tobacco sales in Canada for 2002: 7.05 billion
(http://www.smoke-free.ca/factsheets/pdf/totaltax. pdf [PDF])
Difference (extortion profit): 2.69 billion ...just as I expected.

Never mind the fact that doctors do not have the first clue what they are doing, especially when it comes to something as chemically complex as cancer. The majority of health professions students fail basic organic chemistry. I'd bet that it has been removed as a requirement of a medical doctorate by now.

Cancer (uncontrolled growth) is natural. One cannot have life without cancer, that is just the way it its. Yet the snake oil purveyors will do their best to convince us otherwise.

So why should I be forced to pay for a wasteful system that I will never use and do not want?

Brazilians play hardball too: http://www.smoke-free.ca/warnings/Brazil%20-%20war nings.htm

I like the Canadian warnings that come with photos, like impotence (4th down on this page). They're inventive. And, according to CNN, they're effective. Some of them (particularly the mouth diseases one, 8th from top) are sort of gross, though.

- Greg

I like the Canadian warnings that come with photos, like impotence (4th down on this page). They're inventive. And, according to CNN, they're effective. Some of them (particularly the mouth diseases one, 8th from top) are sort of gross, though.

- Greg

It stayed in the nicotine, because nicotine IS A CARCINOGEN.

Nicotine itself isn't carcinogenic, but it is a precursor for carcinogens in the body. Look here[PDF] for a little blurb on how your body forms carcinogens from nicotine (and other tobacco alkaloids).