“I think Iceland can be a test tube to try out progressive things because we are a small country and we don’t have a massive lobby for tobacco,” said Thorarinn Gudnason, a cardiologist at Landspitali University Hospital in Rejkyavik. ”We are taking care of people who are dying of this disease in their 40s and we’re fed up with it.”
Iceland’s smoking rate is already one of the lowest in Europe. Just 15 per cent of the population lights up compared to an average of 31 per cent across the continent. However, the story among young Icelanders is more worrisome: 20 per cent of children and teenagers smoke. Dr. Gudnason hopes the new plan will dramatically reduce that figure and cut overall smoking rates to less than 10 per cent…
Tobacco and nicotine would be classified as addictive drugs and second-hand smoke would be treated and controlled like other carcinogenic substances. Lighting up in public places such as parks and in cars with children would be outlawed.
Eventually, smokers who are unable to kick the habit through treatment and various addiction programs — or those smokers who simply refuse to quit — may get a prescription for tobacco from their doctors. Once cigarettes become available only through physicians, the price will go down again — as it would be unfair to tax those unable to quit supporters of the plan say.
“Tobacco is very addictive and we would recognize them as addicts,” said Ms. Fridleifsdottir.
Bravo! It would force a lot of people with lazy personal ethics to confront a personal problem. They can still maintain their addiction if they wish.
Saving their lives is a side effect.
If a law like that were made here, in the US, might they then go after caffeine, or sugar, or …
Wait a minute …
Didn’t some mayor in NYC recently pass laws against everything disagreeable?
“Bravo!”? For more totalitarian Progressive control?
Dear ”We are taking care of people who are dying of this disease in their 40s and we’re fed up with it.” Thorarinn Gudnason: have any of those people killed or injured you? No? Maybe came to your house and robbed you? No? – So get the Hell out of controlling their lives.
@UncDon … Oh, yes. Mayor of Progressivism have struck everything he could. Only one he failed was banning SALT from restaurants… There is time left, though particularly as he already pulled one Chavez on NYC, next one may be coming.
C. Everett Koop, former Surgeon General of the U.S., said the Nicotine was more addictive than Heorin !!! Needs to be BANNED !!! How many kids are HOOKED after just one cig ??? Pot less addictive that cigs, but BANNED MORE AGGRESSIVELY ??? Why ??? Makes no sense !!!
(P.S. I don’t smoke anything, so I have no “skin in the game”.)
It’s funny how so many people want to leave ciggies free to the user’s choice when they want so many other things banned.
Brilliant idea! Let hope everywhere else follows … there is nothing totalitarian about outlawing addictive or dangerous substances. If heroine and asbestos is illegal, then so should be tobacco …
what is brilliant is that they aren’t making it illegal, they are making it cheaper it for people who are addicted and inaccessible to people who aren’t ….
“Bravo! It would force a lot of people with lazy personal ethics to confront a personal problem.”
Stick around, one day it will be one of YOUR personal problems.
Why is it the jerks that advocate diversity and tolerance all the time are the quickest to harass someone else?
Ask your doctor if cigarettes are right for you!
Seems that once a natural product becomes big business then it becomes a health hazard. People grew their own for centuries, knowing it had undesirable long term effects, and moderated their intake to suit. Perhaps what we have is a typical commoditisation problem.
Its definitely not about totalitarianism.
Its about using something other than the $ to shape the marketplace, because we all know that when its about the almighty $, ethics and common sense go out the window and people like the Sopranos (or the insurance companies, banks, lawyers and other scum,) move in and give ethics and civility a hockey stick to the kidneys.
Some day folks are going to figure out that prohibition doesn’t work. If people want to do it, there will be those that provide it. I don’t care if you are talking about beer, tobacco or heroin. You can’t stop people from doing it if that is what they want to do. The only reasonable way to deal with it is to make sure its understood what the consequences are and no public health care for lung cancer as a result of a lifetime of smoking, liver failure for alchoholism, etc. Meanwhile, quit trying to manage our lives. It’s unconstitutional an just plain anoying.
The war on cigarettes has failed.
In most of the world, men smoke much more than women. So obviously, the lower your IQ, the more likely you’ll smoke.
#15–sargasso==you are usually spot on, so let me quibble by correcting/adding to what you posted: “Seems that once a natural product becomes big business then it becomes a health hazard, THAT WARRANTS BEING CORRECTLY REGULATED.”
Certainly you know that it is what it is. Healthy or not, addictive or not, regardless of who grows/sells it, how it is packaged/labeled, regardless of how it is/isnot regulated.
Then you say: “Perhaps what we have is a typical commoditisation problem.” /// and what is that problem? If one person is using a product it tends not to be regulated, but if everyone is using a product then it is regulated for safety/purity and so forth? Would you suggest the reverse?
You retards bitching about keeping a dangerous drug legal so as not to create all the problems attendant with illegalization fail to recognize the burden to your own pocket book with end stage emphysema and so forth. Cancer kills relatively quickly and only affects (40%–?-I forget the numbers now) whereas emphysema affects 99.99% and takes years.
You dipshits ought to be consistent: your pragmatic accommodation of FREEEEEDOM and socialization in your lives and the obligation/consequence of having to pay for your nonsense. So typical you would choose the worst options at both opportunities. Ha, ha.
Pedo: please post a few more random numbers.
The State of California collects $0.87 for every pack of cigarettes sold. The federal government collects another $1.01 for each pack.
I don’t know what it actually costs the federal and state government in health care and other costs but is there a conflict of interest in the government wanting to wean the consumer off of a product that they collect taxes on?
#22–steve==I assume you rhetorically ask: “but is there a conflict of interest in the government wanting to wean the consumer off of a product that they collect taxes on?” /// Of course there is which is why the STATE should not advertise or encourage the use of this legal product. Just like they should advertise only idiots play the lottery.
More LIEberTARD stupidity to think that because something is legal it is bad policy or unconstitutional to ban its advertising.
When cause and effect is made subservient to DOGMA, we get dogshit for public policy.
>> Mextli, Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?
>> Why is it the jerks that advocate diversity and tolerance all the time are the quickest to harass someone else?
That’s because smoking is EXACTLY like being black or gay. 😉
(Seriously, dude, where is your logic?)
Wouldn’t it violate the Hippocratic Oath to prescribe a product that kills you, if used as intended?
>> bobbo, sometimes a doll is just a doll said, on July 11th, 2011 at 1:11 pm
>> More LIEberTARD stupidity to think that because something is legal it is bad policy or unconstitutional to ban its advertising.
Bobbo,
Don’t you know that smoking is protected by the 10th Amendment or something?
>> Steve S said, on July 11th, 2011 at 1:08 pm
>> I don’t know what it actually costs the federal and state government in health care and other costs
I got curious and did some research. In some ways, smoking SAVES the government money though reduced Social Security benefits from early death. ($20,000 for men, 10,000 for women).
http://nber.org/papers/w2234
However, there are plenty of costs.
Tobacco taxes bring in about $2 billion a year.
BUT:
Annual Federal and state government smoking-caused Medicaid payments: $30.9 billion
[Federal share: $17.6 billion per year. States’ share: $13.3 billion]
So, it’s not even close. Taxes should be WAY higher.
Greg–you better stick with being an admirable role model==a comedian you aint.
does remind me of the “funniest joke you will ever hear–really” as announced by Ned Flanders my next door neighbor as we went to his MegaChurch to see a play. Quite lavish production values in our medium to small sized town. The show stopper was during a sketch on Noahs Ark: “Where did all the darn flies come from?”===brought down the house.
Ha, ha. I’m laughing about it even now.
bobbo,
I intended it was sarcasm, rather than humor.
My point is that most people have no clue what’s really constitutional — especially the ones who are always citing it.
People here are equating anti-smoking efforts with fascism! That’s absurd. It’s a harmful product.
bobbo,
I should also say thank you for the compliment. Your joke was funnier when I used Ned Flanders voice in my head.
greg–everything is definitional, but you do have to spin artfully to avoid the label of fascism. What is good or bad except whether or not you agree? Don’t argue against the obviously true–just admit it. Yea–we are going to “encourage” (not force, maybe thats the wiggle room?) you to be healthy so we don’t have to pay for your sorry ass.
The truth.
Not labels and the DOGMA that enforces them.
Yea, verily.
My definition of fascism is the dictionary one.
Social and tax policy that discourages self-destruction is not in any definition I’ve ever seen.
See Greg, your problem is you are too eager to pay for medical treatment for people who make the conscious decision to harm themselves. And then when your own dogood plan proves too expensive, you demand that they change.
I say let them keep smoking all they want and don’t have the government pay for anything. Then they will all die early and help reduce the human footprint on this already resource strapped world.
“Lazy Personal Ethics”? Like being an asshole editor on a piece of shit website?
Sea Lawyer,
I don’t believe in a dog-eat-dog society. Let the Libertarians and Tea Partiers move to Somalia for that.
I do believe that government should promote the general welfare of the people. Smoking sensation efforts CLEARLY fall within that mandate.
>> Semantics said, on July 11th, 2011 at 2:19 pm
>> “Lazy Personal Ethics”? Like being an asshole editor on a piece of shit website?
Wow! Like the cigs, do we?