Comment on Smoking ban for people born after 2008 in the UK agreed
mannycalavera@feddit.uk 2 days agoIf it “reeks” of anything it reeks of making a compromise of what is more damaging to society and what could reasonably be done given the current circumstances.
Smoking / vaping hands down trumps drink. That’s not to say drink isn’t damaging but of the two what is more damaging.
It’s actually one of the more sensible things this government has achieved.
torik@lemmychan.org 2 days ago
By what metric are you basing this off of?
mannycalavera@feddit.uk 2 days ago
What metric? Metric? The metric would be: Deaths. Perhaps you mean sources of this claim?
NHS Statistics on Public Health 2023 shows that smoking was attributed to 74,600 deaths. The same statistics show 408,700 attributable admissions to hospital due to smoking.
The Office For National Statistics showed that, in comparison, there were 10,473 deaths from alcohol-specific causes. Whereas the Government figures from another study showed there were 339,916 alcohol-specific hospital admissions, 280,747 alcohol-related hospital admissions under the narrow definition, and 1,018,986 alcohol-related hospital admissions under the broad definition in England (you can read up on the definitions yourself).
So in terms of deaths smoking is by far the greatest of the two evils. Whilst it is right to point out alcohol still causes harm if the government were to focus on one then smoking and vaping is the right one to focus on.
TedZanzibar@feddit.uk 1 day ago
Plus passive smoking. While drinking is bad for the drinker’s health, it’s possible to be around people who are drinking without drinking yourself. The same can’t be said for smoking.