Smokers Forbidden To Light Up In Public Areas

[harmonist]

Public Health Minister Mongkol na Songkhla yesterday held a press conference to launch the 17th ministerial order and place no-smoking labels at Hua Lampong Railway Station.

He said 52,000 Thais died a year from smoking-related diseases, especially lung cancer and heart disease. It cost the country more than Bt50 billion in healthcare services for patients with lung cancer, heart disease and emphysema.

Hahahahahahahahaha, Public Health Minister Mongkol na Songkhla is incredible stupid. Can somebody go and tell him?

How about prohibiting the real smokers first: public busses, coaches, tuk-tuks, cars, industrie and much more.

Non smoking at a bus stop ? What a nerd ! Only smoking makes the air breathable at all. And that applies everywhere within shit ######ing Krung Theb. If you wanna escape the smoke, you gotta go 30 miles outside Bangkok, except for the south, in this direction it takes about 200 miles to escape the smoke.

[pumpuiman]

You non-smokers stay out of the smoking areas. You are not allowed to enter. These areas are designated as smokers areas. If you dont like it too bad. It's for your own good. You could die!! (goverment studies have shown)

We smokers would like a whining free zone to kill ourselves in peace. Please respect our wishes.

[chicagogato]

Amazing the excuses smokers will use to justify their habits !

Second that!

For those who do: If it was easier to quit, would you?

[donmeurett]

Smokers forbidden to light up in public areas

Children from the Action on Smoking and Health Foundation campaign with no-smoking labels at Hua Lampong Railway Station. Every public area will become smoke-free following an order from the Public Health Ministry

From now on, smokers will find it harder than ever to find a place to light up because every public area will be a smoke-free zone following the latest ministerial order from the Public Health Minister.

According to the order, which takes effect today, offenders will face a Bt2,000 fine, while owners who allow smoking on their premises or fail to place a no-smoking notice will be charged up to Bt20,000.

The ban forbids smoking on public transport, at bus stops, in elevators, public phone booths, libraries, theatres, children's playgrounds, drugstores, meeting rooms, massage parlours and spas.

Smoking in indoor stadiums is also banned - excluding snooker rooms. The ban on smoking also includes schools and educational institutes.

Air-conditioned areas in art exhibition halls, galleries, museums, shopping malls, barbershops, Internet cafes and karaoke booths are also no-smoking zones.

The ban includes the lobbies of hotels, resorts, condominiums, apartments and restaurants, excluding entertainment areas.

Smokers are still allowed to smoke in their personal offices, individual rooms or rooms provided as smoking areas.

Public Health Minister Mongkol na Songkhla yesterday held a press conference to launch the 17th ministerial order and place no-smoking labels at Hua Lampong Railway Station.

He said 52,000 Thais died a year from smoking-related diseases, especially lung cancer and heart disease. It cost the country more than Bt50 billion in healthcare services for patients with lung cancer, heart disease and emphysema.

A no-smoking law has already been enforced in covered areas of restaurants and public places that were air-conditioned.

"This ministerial order has added more no-smoking places. The ban is to protect the health of non-smoking people from 4,000 kinds of toxin in tobacco smoke," the minister said.

Mongkol encouraged anyone witnessing an offence to call 02-590-3342.

Mongkol has also tried every means to reduce alcohol consumption. Even though the Council of State's ruling invalidated his ministry's Food and Drug Administration-initiated move to comprehensively ban alcohol advertising, the ministry is exploring other legal channels.

Source: The Nation - 29 December 2006

GREAT IDEA Thailand is finally seeing the Light..

[Bruce1]

I watched my father die of lung cancer and emphysemia after 50 years of smoking. He simply couldn't give it up until his dyin g day. The habit was too strong. When they pumped out his lungs (twice) out came all this black and green stuff! Yuk!

Should be banned in all enclosed areas.

I agree with those who say smoking is nothing compared with vehicle exhausts. The govt. should set a good example and put all those dirty smelly govt. buses off the roads until they can pass a tough emissions test. Then we'll now they're serious about air pollution and personal health. If the Transport Ministry lacks the balls to clean up the buses, then the health minister should intervene on health grounds.

Edited December 29, 2006 by Bruce1

[tartempion]

and whilst the nations guardians are in a tidy up mood can I add unleashed soi dogs and peoples home disco/public broadcast system to the removals wish list as well? The noise pollution is bad for my mental health I know. Ooh ooh and plastic bags too! b2000 fine for every loose dog, plastic bag and volume knob over 35....

Agreed, add Suvanabhumi departure hall the noise pollution hasard.

Although not all unleashed soi dogs are that bad to get poisonned.

[malcolminthemiddle]

Oh Yea. I do what I do because I like to do it. To stop me from doing what I like to do will make me do things I don't like to do which in turn makes me not a happy chappy. Let me choose please. Thanks.

The only reason for people to hate smokers is that they ENJOY smoking, and ENJOYING something useless is sinfull in this society based upon neo-con american standards of hypocrasy.

So you smoke because you enjoy smoking?

This may be the most deeply engrained rationalization of all as it has a solid basis in the following flawed denial logic. "I don't do things that I don't like to do." "I smoke lots and lots of cigarettes." "Therefore, I must really enjoy smoking," instead of the correct conclusion, "therefore, I must really be chemically addicted to smoking nicotine." Did you enjoy being the unaddicted "you" or have you forgotten what it was like to live comfortably inside a mind that does not crave for nicotine? If you cannot remember what it was like being "you" then what basis do you have for honest comparison?

Ask yourself do you really enjoy being addicted to nicotine or is it that you liked not having to experience what occurred when you didn't smoke - withdrawal?

Studies have long ranked nicotine as a more addictive substance than either heroin or cocaine. In fact, cocaine's generally recognized addiction rate among regular users is 15% while nicotine's addiction rate of over 70% is at least five times as great. Imagine convincing your mind that it " likes " being addicted to the drug that addiction scientists now rank as the most addictive substance on all of planet earth. We are nicotine addicts . A pack a day smoker smokes 7,300 cigarettes each and every year. How many of your last 7,300 nicotine fixes did you really enjoy ? How many of the next 7,300 will bring tremendous joy to your life?

I don't mean to preach but isn't it time to be honest?

[gburns57au]

I am very careful to respect the wishes of my non smoking friends and my non smoking fiance.....I try to make sure that my second hand smoke does not annoy them.....I avoid smoking around them and when a non smoker alerts me to the fact that my smoking is annoying them I move to rectify that...

I guess that makes me socially concious of my smoking habit.

[FREDPAT]

I understand people dont want to breathe second hand smoke. No complaints there.

However, I am tired of governments telling me what I can and cannot do. Its rather ridiculous to ban smoking like this when the air quality in Bangkok is so poor. I'd rather sit in a room where people can smoke than sit behind a bus belching out black smoke which is full of particulates and carcenogens.

The dust and shit in Bangkok air is surely more hazardous to peoples health than passive smoking.

I read a report a while ago that for those people who spend 3 hours or more on the roads a day breathing Bangkok air from traffic had vastly increased chance of developing lung diseases.

While were at it lets ban alcohol too. It also causes plenty of diseases and costs money in terms of

health care. And what about fast food? Not such a problem in Thailand, but its statistically healthier to smoke than be obese, in terms of life expectancy at least.

Like I say, when will governments stop interfering in peoples private lives?

I agree. What next, a ban on crappy dressing, bad cologne, tatoos, etc.........?????

This is a stupid law, and once again a perfect example of how this and previous goverments, as well as those of the United States, Canada, and other Western countries, blindly follow the "political rhetoric of the day." While I agree that smokers should be considerate of the personal space of those around them, I completely disagree with people's blind faith in highly biased, selective selection of "fact" when it only supports the particular agenda of whatever "left-wing, tree-hugging" group of the day is clamboring for headlines. Before launching into an attack on me, please read the below exerpt (http://www.data-yard.net/10f1/health-police.htm) and do some ACTUAL research before jumping on the proverbial "secondhand smoke kills!" bandwagon.

Just how willing campaigners are to pursue all strategies soon became clear. In March 1998, The Telegraph revealed that an international study by the World Health Organisation had failed to find any convincing evidence of a link between passive smoking and cancer. The article prompted uproar among anti-smoking campaigners and denials from the WHO, which insisted that the study had found a 16 per cent increase in cancer "risk" among those married to smokers.

The WHO, in what has become a standard ruse in the passive smoking debate, ignored the fact that the 16 per cent risk figure was not "statistically significant". That is, it had failed to meet the standard of proof usually demanded by scientists.

As The Telegraph has discovered, however, passive smoking research is an area where the usual standards do not apply. If they did, last week's wholly negative findings would have surprised no one. For long before the publication of the original BMJ studies, it had been clear that the 25 per cent extra risk figure was likely to prove a wild exaggeration.

The evidence comes from research into a key issue in the passive smoking debate: just how much smoke do non-smokers actually inhale? Surprisingly few attempts have been made to gauge smoke exposure directly. Those that have raise grave doubts over claims that passive smoking poses a significant health risk.

In studies across Europe over the past decade, air quality experts at Covance Laboratories, Harrogate, gave air monitors to thousands of people and measured their exposure to smoke. The startling results showed that passive smokers are exposed to the equivalent of six cigarettes a year, an extra lung cancer risk of 2 per cent compared with non-smokers. The figure is 10 times lower than the BMJ studies claimed.

So small a risk is, however, in line with last week's negative findings. It also explains an awkward fact rarely mentioned by anti-smoking campaigners: more than 80 per cent of all studies of passive smoking have failed to find a statistically significant link to lung cancer. Only by subjecting them to abstruse statistical techniques can they deliver the goods.

One technique is anything but abstruse, however. It involves simply ignoring results that do not fit. In the original BMJ reports, a major US study showing no extra heart disease risk from passive smoking was excluded on the grounds that it did not fit with the positive results, and had been funded by the tobacco industry. The air monitoring studies have been ignored for the same reasons.

Scientists are understandably chary of research backed by an industry with a history of deceit. Yet so widespread is the conviction that passive smoking is a proven killer that researchers who think otherwise have little choice but to apply for tobacco industry support. Prof James Enstrom, of the University of California, the lead author of the study whose negative findings sparked last week's controversy, said the research would never have seen the light of day, except for support from the tobacco industry.

Originally set up in 1959 by the American Cancer Society, who recruited 118,000 Californian adults into the study, the follow-up effort was long supported by taxes levied on cigarettes. In 1997 the funding was suddenly cut off. Prof Enstrom suspects that health officials in California just were not keen to fund research that might undermine the original BMJ studies.

Prof Enstrom, compelled to take tobacco industry money to complete the study, then found that journals were unwilling to publish his negative findings. He told The Telegraph: "One journal we tried had published three positive studies before, but despite getting a glowing referee's report on our work, they refused to accept it."

After the BMJ published it last week, he has been subjected to a barrage of criticism: "The whole process has been aggressive, vitriolic hate," he says.

Within hours of publication, he and his co-author Dr Geoffrey Kabat, of the State University of New York, came under attack by the very organisation that had set up his study: the American Cancer Society. "We are appalled that the tobacco industry has succeeded in giving visibility to a study with so many problems," said a spokesman, adding that the study was "neither reliable nor independent".

Please don't believe everything you read or hear before checking ALL the FACTS.

Happy New Year to all!

[Guest mascot]

Somehow I think the farangs will be the only ones fined same as we are the only ones who drop butts in the street, ofcourse the thais will probably be milked at a lower scale and now the police have another fine source of revenue. Enclosed area is a lovely vague description and should have thousands of interpretations.

[chiang mai]

It is my choice to risk lung cancer and any other form of disease by smoking cigarettes. In doing so I accept this may not be everyones choice hence I commit to carry out my habit in such a way as not to inconvenience or put at risk the health or lifestyle of those around me. My responsibility is to keep others around me free from the risks and any unpleasantness from second hand smoke. The responsibility of others is to me is to allow me to conduct my life in a way of my choosing.

[nikster]

Great news, but ...

excluding snooker rooms [and]entertainment areas.

Why on earth not? They're the worst places!!

Because... even the health ministry knows that would be impossible.

Not that the other measures are enforceable.. except at the end of the month when the Police goes out to make some money - helmet-laws, parking laws, and now smoking laws enforced on specific days of the month, and completely and utterly ignored the rest of the time.

For example - I drive by police every day with no helmet on. Even behind police cars. Through police stops. Anything. Traffic police waves and smiles at me. Except the end of the month, when scores of Policemen are out to fine each and every helmet-less driver. It's completely beyond me how this is supposed to enforce the laws.

It will be the same with smoking. New laws are no good if basic enforcement is absent.

[nikster]

It is my choice to risk lung cancer and any other form of disease by smoking cigarettes. In doing so I accept this may not be everyones choice hence I commit to carry out my habit in such a way as not to inconvenience or put at risk the health or lifestyle of those around me. My responsibility is to keep others around me free from the risks and any unpleasantness from second hand smoke. The responsibility of others is to me is to allow me to conduct my life in a way of my choosing.

If all smokers didn't just say that, but actually acted upon it, these laws would not be needed because smokers would not smoke in public.

The problem is that smokers are oblivious to the pollution they are causing and ignore the non-smokers around them. Then they ask to be left alone to do what they want to do.

I don't care if you smoke in your little chamber - I just don't want to inhale the smoke. Not even a little bit of it. Not even in "open air" where I am fine just as long as the wind goes in the right direction.

I don't even mind smoking in bars much - it's my choice to go in, and if its full of smoke, well, maybe I will choose to stay out. But public places are a different story. As for smoking in restaurants, that's just gross.

[mrbojangles]

Well, i'm a smoker and i'm quite happy about the ban, the same as i am happy about the ban coming into force in England next year.

It will HELP me to cut down smoking and that is one thing us smokers need, is HELP. You "Do gooding" bunch of hypocrites, who also help to pollute the world, forget that this is a drug and we are ADDICTED !! There should be a better infrastructure to help us give up!!

I'll be happy when the whole world has stopped smoking but i can't wait to see the faces of the non-smokers, when the £16billion (or whatever it is in the UK) that is currently raised on taxing ciggies, has to be put on another tax. Yes, i will still be paying..........................but not as much as i am now

[Toeknee]

Great news, but ...

excluding snooker rooms [and]entertainment areas.

Why on earth not? They're the worst places!!

So Jack Nicholson won't be going to Thailand, then?

[Toeknee]

On my first visit to Ireland in October 2003, they were preparing to ban smoking in pubs. My daughter in law said, according to her father and his friends, it would never work, it would be the end of Ireland, the Virgin Mother herself was undoubtedly a chain smoker, etc. But on my return to Ireland in Sept 2005, the ban was in full effect, and the Irish smokers had somehow adjusted.

But then, the Irish may respect the rule of law more than Thais do. We shall see.

You forgot to mention the 600 country pubs that have closed in Ireland in the last 2 1/2 years.

[mrbojangles]

On my first visit to Ireland in October 2003, they were preparing to ban smoking in pubs. My daughter in law said, according to her father and his friends, it would never work, it would be the end of Ireland, the Virgin Mother herself was undoubtedly a chain smoker, etc. But on my return to Ireland in Sept 2005, the ban was in full effect, and the Irish smokers had somehow adjusted.

But then, the Irish may respect the rule of law more than Thais do. We shall see.

You forgot to mention the 600 country pubs that have closed in Ireland in the last 2 1/2 years.

A very valid point there ToeKnee. Ireland had to make many bar workers redundant after introducing the law

[PeaceBlondie]

On my first visit to Ireland in October 2003, they were preparing to ban smoking in pubs. My daughter in law said, according to her father and his friends, it would never work, it would be the end of Ireland, the Virgin Mother herself was undoubtedly a chain smoker, etc. But on my return to Ireland in Sept 2005, the ban was in full effect, and the Irish smokers had somehow adjusted.

But then, the Irish may respect the rule of law more than Thais do. We shall see.

You forgot to mention the 600 country pubs that have closed in Ireland in the last 2 1/2 years.

A very valid point there ToeKnee. Ireland had to make many bar workers redundant after introducing the law

I didn't know that. But aren't there like 89,789 country pubs in Ireland?

[nyles]

Oh Yea. I do what I do because I like to do it. To stop me from doing what I like to do will make me do things I don't like to do which in turn makes me not a happy chappy. Let me choose please. Thanks.

The only reason for people to hate smokers is that they ENJOY smoking, and ENJOYING something useless is sinfull in this society based upon neo-con american standards of hypocrasy.

So you smoke because you enjoy smoking?

This may be the most deeply engrained rationalization of all as it has a solid basis in the following flawed denial logic. "I don't do things that I don't like to do." "I smoke lots and lots of cigarettes." "Therefore, I must really enjoy smoking," instead of the correct conclusion, "therefore, I must really be chemically addicted to smoking nicotine." Did you enjoy being the unaddicted "you" or have you forgotten what it was like to live comfortably inside a mind that does not crave for nicotine? If you cannot remember what it was like being "you" then what basis do you have for honest comparison?

Ask yourself do you really enjoy being addicted to nicotine or is it that you liked not having to experience what occurred when you didn't smoke - withdrawal?

Studies have long ranked nicotine as a more addictive substance than either heroin or cocaine. In fact, cocaine's generally recognized addiction rate among regular users is 15% while nicotine's addiction rate of over 70% is at least five times as great. Imagine convincing your mind that it " likes " being addicted to the drug that addiction scientists now rank as the most addictive substance on all of planet earth. We are nicotine addicts . A pack a day smoker smokes 7,300 cigarettes each and every year. How many of your last 7,300 nicotine fixes did you really enjoy ? How many of the next 7,300 will bring tremendous joy to your life?

I don't mean to preach but isn't it time to be honest?

Whatever reason people have to smoke - if they enjoy the nicotine or their addiction or just the nice smokey feeling, I have to respect the fact that they do smoke as it is not yet forbidden by law. I have stopped smoking myself two month ago, and actually I did not find it that difficult even though I did smoke more than 20 a day. But I dont want to condemn other people that want to go on smoking. Thats their own choice. I guess that coffee is addictive as well, but I still fancy to believe that I enjoy coffee. And I DID enjoy cigarettes before. I stopped because it has become to difficult to enjoy cigarettes anymore as you cannot smoke anywhere these days.

[Toeknee]

socially-concious smokers

There's an oxymoron, if I ever saw one.

Billions in health care costs, lives of caregivers turned upside down.

No smoker is socially-conscious. Sorry.

Well, Bill Clinton is a smoker and Churchill was too, while Hitler was a notorious anti-smoker just like you. You are a man with a cause! What about all the people driving around in big SUV's which they for sure dont need polluting the world as we know it and causing a lot of bloody accidents. I have a bicycle and used to smoke. My consciousness would be more bad if I had been driving around in a big car, thats for sure mister holy grail Toptuan. Now I sttopped smoking but I really dont mind that other people smoke. Thats up to them. Give us back freedom off thought and let us get rid of those "we know the truth" people, thats pestering this world a lot more than a litttle tobacco smoke.

mister holy grail Toptuan

Your wasting your time with him:

1) He is a neo-con Yank

2) From Khalifornia

3) Its his, phat ass, duty to tell everyone else what to do

Question, why is he in Thailand if he hates it so much?

Edited December 29, 2006 by Toeknee

[aaaaaa]

I knew one guy who did the following to those NON-socially-concious smoker: he'd request them once; if ignored, he'd come and fart next to that person and say - "if you can do whatever you like wherever you like - why I can't do the same? I like your smoke as much as you enjoy my stinky fart!" to those even more stubborn he would threaten to sh1t next to them and see if they'd like THAT ! although as I know he's never fulfilled his threat - usually it would never come to that because the smoker would finally get the point.

[toptuan]

socially-concious smokers

There's an oxymoron, if I ever saw one.

Billions in health care costs, lives of caregivers turned upside down.

No smoker is socially-conscious. Sorry.

Well, Bill Clinton is a smoker and Churchill was too...

And somehow this is supposed to make me feel good about smoking? Clinton was mostly into multi-purpose cigars, right?

...while Hitler was a notorious anti-smoker just like you....

Oh, pulleaze! Your twisted logic (the rational fallacy is called "poisoning the well," or discrediting the source to divert from the real argument) is pathetic.

Edited December 29, 2006 by toptuan

[fiddlehead]

How about all those Harley Davidsons? They hurt my ears BIG TIME. Just put a decent muffler on it please! If they're gonna ban everything that is bad for us, why stop with cigerette smokers. (not a smoker but one that sees more freedom's going out the window all the time)

[chiang mai]

So much of this is about freedom of choice. I agree that smoking is not sensible for a persons health but there are so many other things that are even more so. Personally I choose to smoke and I hope I do so in such a way as not to offend others. I do however have my doubts, despite numerous studies to the contrary, that second hand smoke in such minuscule quantities as to be negligible have a negative effect on others. If for example I was to try and light up a cigarette in a crowded elevator (which I would not) I would know I was wrong. But if I sit on the sea front in a mild breeze, yards from anyone else I would feel relaxed about smoking a cigarette. Yet under legislation in many countries I would be an offender in both situations and that I believe is wrong. The problem for me here is that individual freedom of choice is being eroded by overly zealous legislation when what is really needed instead is to reinforce individual responsibility. There's already a long list of things we cannot and must not do and many of those things are sensible. But what comes next I wonder and how far will the list extend.

[Kaak]

So much of this is about freedom of choice. I agree that smoking is not sensible for a persons health but there are so many other things that are even more so. Personally I choose to smoke and I hope I do so in such a way as not to offend others. I do however have my doubts, despite numerous studies to the contrary, that second hand smoke in such minuscule quantities as to be negligible have a negative effect on others. If for example I was to try and light up a cigarette in a crowded elevator (which I would not) I would know I was wrong. But if I sit on the sea front in a mild breeze, yards from anyone else I would feel relaxed about smoking a cigarette. Yet under legislation in many countries I would be an offender in both situations and that I believe is wrong. The problem for me here is that individual freedom of choice is being eroded by overly zealous legislation when what is really needed instead is to reinforce individual responsibility. There's already a long list of things we cannot and must not do and many of those things are sensible. But what comes next I wonder and how far will the list extend.

Check. Reason 426 to go live in Cambodia.

[toptuan]

I am very careful to respect the wishes of my non smoking friends and my non smoking fiance.....I try to make sure that my second hand smoke does not annoy them.....I avoid smoking around them and when a non smoker alerts me to the fact that my smoking is annoying them I move to rectify that...

I guess that makes me socially concious of my smoking habit.

While that's all commendable, you're still not socially conscious. Sorry.

Who's going to pay for your health bills while you spend years dying, possibly having your lungs partially cut out or pumped out? Who will pay for the medical services who will have to bring those large oxygen bottles to your house for years on end? Who's going to take care of you, wiping you up because you lack the energy and breath to get off your bed due to your diseased lungs?

Put that onto your poor non-smoking wife and children? Why punish them?

You're thinking too short-term, my friend.

[Toeknee]

Well, i'm a smoker and i'm quite happy about the ban, the same as i am happy about the ban coming into force in England next year.

It will HELP me to cut down smoking and that is one thing us smokers need, is HELP. You "Do gooding" bunch of hypocrites, who also help to pollute the world, forget that this is a drug and we are ADDICTED !! There should be a better infrastructure to help us give up!!

I'll be happy when the whole world has stopped smoking but i can't wait to see the faces of the non-smokers, when the £16billion (or whatever it is in the UK) that is currently raised on taxing ciggies, has to be put on another tax. Yes, i will still be paying..........................but not as much as i am now

when the £16billion (or whatever it is in the UK) that is currently raised on taxing ciggies, has to be put on another tax.

One estimate put the figure at £20Billion. So if a complete total ban was in enforced, it could mean an 8% increase in income tax (done by stealth taxing of course).

Smokers are the 'Perfect Taxpayers' - contributing far more in tax to the State, than a non smoker, and then dying younger. Therefore 'paying in' but not 'taking out' of the health budget. Didn't you wonder why even the US Govt did not go for a blanket ban, they even supported Philip Morris (Marlboro) when they took Benson&Hedges (BAT) to court in Hong Kong, for pinching their international market share.

[toptuan]

So much of this is about freedom of choice. I agree that smoking is not sensible for a persons health but there are so many other things that are even more so. Personally I choose to smoke and I hope I do so in such a way as not to offend others. I do however have my doubts, despite numerous studies to the contrary, that second hand smoke in such minuscule quantities as to be negligible have a negative effect on others. If for example I was to try and light up a cigarette in a crowded elevator (which I would not) I would know I was wrong. But if I sit on the sea front in a mild breeze, yards from anyone else I would feel relaxed about smoking a cigarette. Yet under legislation in many countries I would be an offender in both situations and that I believe is wrong. The problem for me here is that individual freedom of choice is being eroded by overly zealous legislation when what is really needed instead is to reinforce individual responsibility. There's already a long list of things we cannot and must not do and many of those things are sensible. But what comes next I wonder and how far will the list extend.

Check. Reason 426 to go live in Cambodia.

Reminder: Cambodians get cancer and lung disease too. If you smoke, don't contribute to their demise either. Quit, instead. It's good for the world, not just Thailand.

[nyles]

socially-concious smokers

There's an oxymoron, if I ever saw one.

Billions in health care costs, lives of caregivers turned upside down.

No smoker is socially-conscious. Sorry.

Well, Bill Clinton is a smoker and Churchill was too...

And somehow this is supposed to make me feel good about smoking? Clinton was mostly into multi-purpose cigars, right?

...while Hitler was a notorious anti-smoker just like you....

Oh, pulleaze! Your twisted logic (the rational fallacy is called "poisoning the well," or discrediting the source to divert from the real argument) is pathetic.

well, sorry mister toptuan. To me zealous people are the one that's pathetic in the way they look down upon the rest of the world. Not unlike the way fanatic muslims look down upon other religions.

[toptuan]

To me zealous people are the one that's pathetic in the way they look down upon the rest of the world. Not unlike the way fanatic muslims look down upon other religions.

Anti-smoking sentiments = Fanatic Islam

Now I know the argument is getting desperate.

Since smoking was definitively linked to cancer and lung disease (mid-1960's) it has claimed more lives than the equivalent of 2,857 World Trade Center disasters. (That's 10 million divided by 3,500 for those doing the math.) Putting an anti-smoker crusader into the same camp as a turbaned terrorist is just another sad attempt to poison the well.

Stick to the argument and the facts, my friend. That way you won't look so foolish.