Is smoking good for you?

@Ionus,

I know a chap who had a leg cut off at the top of the thigh. He had never smoked in his life. He scoffed a lot of saturated fat though. Had he smoked he would have joined the smoking statistics.

It's ten years since the event and he's still with us and costing the taxpayer a fortune and creating work for NHS staff.

I knew another chap who died of lung cancer six weeks after stopping working. He cost the taxpayer next to nothing in comparison. You would need a thousand of the latter to equate the cost of the former. And the smoker had payed punitive taxes for 50 odd years which the fat eater hadn't.

Which case helps the medical profession to prosper. And not only to prosper but to have enough left over to make commercials against smoking and, as a result, police action and legal processes.

Any arguments about passive smoking apply equally to passive driving. Probably moreso.

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@spendius,

Quote:

Perhaps people like to blame smoking to avoid blaming any other reasons for disease. It's a nice, simple explanation. Perfect for the righteously indignant. And it avoids looking into other factors such as diet, stress and working conditions or living in proximity to roads and airports where non-smokers are thrashing backwards and forwards on un-necessary errands to relieve their nervous stresses and giving the kids playing in their gardens no choice.

Which people? I hope you don't mean me, because I'm not blaming smokers for anything. I was just agreeing with the poster who said it can be injurious to one's health - as can consuming certain foods immoderately, stress, lack of exercise, and a whole host of other behaviors and environmental conditions.

Quote:

living in proximity to roads and airports where non-smokers are thrashing backwards and forwards on un-necessary errands to relieve their nervous stresses and giving the kids playing in their gardens no choice.

So only non-smokers drive back and forth on unnecessary errands? I know that's not true. I see smokers flicking butts out their windows all the time - and I know they have at least one errand they need to run that I never do - and that's to go to the shop to buy cigarettes.

So, I guess, on balance you must think it's a good thing that I DON"T also smoke in addition to driving to work and the grocery store and flying to see my mother.

Don't get so defensive. We all do what we gotta do. I'm not weighing and measuring who's causing the most problems for society. I'm just weighing in with my opinion that I think it's true that smoking- along with a lot of other human behaviors- can cause issues with one's health.

1 Reply

@aidan,

I'm pretty sure that's all anyone is saying. It's spendius and BDV that are trying to make this in to some large scale damnation of smokers.

My only point of contention with the OP is that smoking is not an overall healthy activity, like exercise, or a balanced healthy diet b

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@spendius,

Quote:

I know a chap who had a leg cut off at the top of the thigh. He had never smoked in his life. He scoffed a lot of saturated fat though. Had he smoked he would have joined the smoking statistics.

And we can agree smoking would have made it worse, right ? But what about cases of people whose only bad habit is smoking ? What do you attribute their circulation problems to ?

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@spendius,

Quote:

I knew another chap who died of lung cancer six weeks after stopping working. He cost the taxpayer next to nothing in comparison. You would need a thousand of the latter to equate the cost of the former. And the smoker had payed punitive taxes for 50 odd years which the fat eater hadn't.

Which is a good argument for a fat food tax, not a supportive argument for lowering smoking taxes.

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@Ionus,

Quote:

http://www.amputee-coalition.org/fact_sheets/amp_stats_cause.html

Toes are commonly amputated on diabetes sufferers, but I am talking about major limb amputations.... above the ankle/knee, above the wrist/elbow.....Anyway, how many diabetics smoke ?

These stats only show us that male african americans will most likely loose a limb.

Funny how facts can be used to whatever aim an author wishes to push, (stats from same site,) Diabetes Mellitus (54 per 10,000) then "Dysvascular Disease" coming in a bad 2nd, some 12 times less likely (4.6 per 10,000).

Them stats do not point to cigs causing the majority of problems.

http://www.amputee-coalition.org/fact_sheets/limbloss_us.html

Quote:

The number of new cases of limb loss is greatest among persons with diabetes, with 1 out of every 185 persons diagnosed undergoing amputation of a limb.

As for diabetics who smoke, 19% is the figure, funnily 33% of the worlds adults smoke, so does smoking reduce your chance of getting diabetes ?

http://www1.worldbank.org/tobacco/book/html/chapter1.htm

1 Reply

@BDV,

Ofcourse its bad very bad one for health.

1 Reply

@Kimaya,

That depends upon what you mean by "health".

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@BDV,

BDV wrote:

As for diabetics who smoke, 19% is the figure, funnily 33% of the worlds adults smoke, so does smoking reduce your chance of getting diabetes ?

Maybeso. Maybe smoking kills them before diabetes is detected.

Does a freezer full of Weight Watchers frozen dinners cause obesity?

Statistics can be fun, alright.

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Day seven over. No nicotine in my system now. Or shouldn't be.

Cravings only strong when I drink beer.

1 Reply

@Builder,

Prepare for a slowing down of brain activity.

1 Reply

@spendius,

Cool, percolated coffee at the ready.

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@Builder,

That just speeds up stupidity and makes it last longer. Nicotine stimulates creativity. I think not smoking constitutes dereliction of duty.

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@spendius,

Hahahahaha. The devil wears prada.

You bastard. LOL

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@Builder,

I have a very technical book called The Physiology of Excitable Cells by Prof. D.J. Aidley who is a top gun on such things. It's too technical for me. I bought it at a second-hand book fair for about $1. For that much I thought it might have a few tips on exciting my cells. There are 4 references to nicotine in it relating to how to regenerate decaying brains.

It's a good thing being stupid you know. Look how popular the stupids are on the evolution threads. They get thumbed up. People don't feel threatened by stupidity.

Last night in the pub the lone barmaid went outside for a smoke and we had to wait for her to come back to fill up our glasses. That's a proper pub. These tongue up your arse establishments get on my wick.

When one naff bloke showed signs of impatience she replied, as you might expect,--"I've only got one pair of hands". At which a couple of regulars smirked.

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@spendius,

Actually Builder, are you a builder btw? salt of the bloody earth are builders--builders built that courthouse in LA for the leagles to perform their expensive ballet in--but--I was going to say--I've always found it odd, a bit incongruous I mean, to be served by a barmaid who had been performing the Queen of Heaven role all afternoon.

To see a bunch of ugly, overweight, lazy good-for nothing blokes being waited on hand and foot by a barmaid running around like a blue-arsed fly, often having been prised into a uniform, when she's the only special person in the joint, is enough to almost bring me to tears.

I stopped smoking for two years. I had read in a medical journal that such a period of abstinence restores the lungs to their original pristine state and I knew that abstinence restores other physiological states so I gave it a go. It was a bit tough. Nine months I would say. I sympathise. But I was helped by the knowledge that I intended to start again after two years. The thought of my never, ever having another cigarette ever again would have been too much.

So there's a tip for you. I have no idea if it has any value. I wouldn't do the patches or the sniffers under any circumstances. Your resolve with be strengthened by an intention to start again if my experience is anything to go by.

1 Reply

@spendius,

Eggsellent advice, Spendy. And free too.

Yes, I am a builder, tho I'm tapering off on the scope of my structures.

Spending more time on the creativity, rather than the enormity of my undertakings.

Good to know that my body will be totally healed after just two years of not sucking in that demon, Nick O'teen.

1 Reply

@Builder,

For total I would give it four. The shorter the period of abstinence the less pristine the restored state. I can do nothing about my sweet tooth except grit my teeth. I think a craving for sugar, and for fat, is the pristine state. That would be because in the foggy ruins of our evolutionary history sugar and fat were both rare and valuable substances. Too rare to overdose on. Now they are both in very plentiful supply.

So you'll have to watch for your appetite which smoking had dulled the edge of. Avoid having large boxes of chocolates within easy reach when you are trying to relax. Many a lady has had cause to regret not adhering to that simple rule when stopping smoking.

Is smoking good for you?

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