Tobacco being phased out in the UK

[Grinkle]

Wow - this seems huge to me. @Jonathan Scott I'd be interested in your views on how popular this law is both with those subject to it and those not subject to it.

Personally, I'd welcome such a law in the US, but I suspect I'd be in the minority.

https://www.allsides.com/story/public-health-uk-set-generationally-ban-all-tobacco-products

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

Could never happen in the US and I'm actually somewhat against it. What needs to end are the addictive additives in products. If someone wants to smoke tobacco leaf, go for it.

 

[Jonathan Scott]

Wow - this seems huge to me. @Jonathan Scott I'd be interested in your views on how popular this law is both with those subject to it and those not subject to it.

Personally, I'd welcome such a law in the US, but I suspect I'd be in the minority.

https://www.allsides.com/story/public-health-uk-set-generationally-ban-all-tobacco-products

I can't speak for anyone else, but I've never smoked and I wouldn't mind if smoking were completely banned, and most vaping too. This seems well justified on general health grounds. But I'm not at all happy with the "nanny state" approach of making laws to enforce a specific code of conduct.

The recent UK laws requiring total prevention of access by UK under-18s to "adult" materials, requiring personal identification, are ridiculous, as there is no natural threshold at which one suddenly become "adult" enough, and I for one don't trust many websites enough to give them personal information. Over-cautious application has restricted access to lots of potentially useful websites, while at the same time websites which have ignored the restrictions are enjoying a boom in usage. Anyone who wants that access anyway can simply use a VPN to pretend they are outside the UK, so there has now been discussion about banning the use of VPNs! And I saw only a few days ago that a proposed new law to ban "harmful pornographic content" including depicting incest is being amended to include "step-incest", even though such a relationship is not illegal in England and Wales.

Of course, California is also trying to legislate similar checks, including age verification in the operating system for any system capable of downloading files, which is next to impossible, not only because there are billions of devices already out there without such checks, but also because there is no way to apply age verification to permission to write or modify an operating system!

And the recent UK government ban on supporting "Palestine Action", a non-violent organisation, simply because some of its members did something foolish, was so obviously wrong that a High Court hearing concluded it was illegal, but the government are still appealing that. Protesters sprayed paint on two RAF aircraft, including on the engines, which was apparently intended to "disable" them by spoiling their appearance until they were cleaned, but the government claims (without any detailed information) that this damaged the engines and it cost millions to repair them (despite the fact that both aircraft were back in active use shortly afterwards). At the most, the relevant protesters should have been punished, but instead the government made it illegal to express support for the "Palestine Action" organisation in any way!

The UK government's next ban is on smartphones in school. It's not clear exactly what that will involve. Some schools already have a robust process where smartphones can be taken to school but must be locked inside an individual container (provided by the school) during the day. In some cases, they can be taken out during break time. But a one-size-fits-all rule is never going to work. In some cases, kids need to be able to contact family, for example to change pick-up arrangements. And in some cases, it may be necessary to contact the kid for similar reasons. When I was young, the only way to contact a child at school in an emergency was to phone the school and ask for a message to be passed on, and I guess that could still work. But I feel that if the rule was that smartphones must be set to silent and not be touched during lesson time then at the sort of schools I attended there would not be any problem!

 

[jack action]

We have been brainwashed about the harms of tobacco for over 50 years, yet there is still a 14-year-old today who will want to smoke even if their parents and grandparents don't. Let them.

The only thing you control is yourself. If you think health care costs too much, abandon it and see how much it costs to pay your medical bills on your own. If you are afraid of second-hand smoke, stop hanging out with smokers; if they are everywhere, stay home by yourself. Yes, there are compromises (not law-driven) to be made if one wants to live with others.

Why are there still people who think prohibition works? There are laws against drugs from cannabis to crack, and they are completely ineffective, anywhere in the world. It doesn't work for alcohol either.

These laws only serve the needs of a few who decide to apply them - when they want - to someone they don't like and whom they want to control.

Drug control policies are failing.

Decades of harsh laws that punish and stigmatize people who use drugs and others involved in the drug trade have led to mass incarceration, disease, suffering and violence. Criminalizing drugs does not decrease their use or supply. Instead, it drives the trade underground, increases the harms of using drugs and fuels organized crime, corruption and violence.

The prohibition of drugs directly impacts our right to health. People who use drugs are denied access to medical treatment or are deterred from seeking medical assistance for fear of being reported to the authorities. This increases the risk of overdose and other threats to their life and health.

Drug policies designed to punish people exacerbate the risks and harms associated with drug use. These policies can lead to increased transmissions of HIV and other diseases. They also obstruct access to drugs for medical purposes, including for pain relief and palliative care, resulting in further harm and suffering for millions of patients.

What is the “war on drugs”?

The term “war on drugs” was first used in 1971 by US President Richard Nixon with his aggressive and discriminatory campaign to enforce drug prohibition. Since then, it has been used by many governments around the world to launch crackdowns on people who use drugs and reduce the trafficking of drugs. These campaigns rely on harsh punishments to deter people from using or selling drugs.

From mass killings in the Philippines and the application of the death penalty for drug offences in Malaysia, to mass incarceration in the USA and torture in Mexico, the “war on drugs” has been a driver of widespread human rights abuses.

There is growing evidence from every region in the world that the “war on drugs” fails to decrease the use and availability of drugs. Instead, it undermines the rights of millions of people, exacerbates the harms of using drugs, and intensifies the violence associated with illicit markets.

In reality, the “war on drugs” has been a war on people.

It disproportionately affects the poorest and most marginalized communities, who carry the burden of this failed strategy. It traps entire communities in cycles of incarceration, violence and poverty.

 

[Grinkle]

This seems well justified on general health grounds.

This is where I was coming from. If tobacco were to be only discovered today on some remote island, I don't think it would ever be approved for any kind of human consumption.

But I'm not at all happy with the "nanny state" approach of making laws to enforce a specific code of conduct.

Why are there still people who think prohibition works?

If someone wants to smoke tobacco leaf, go for it.

I also lean libertarian in general; that said, I see societal benefit in regulating access to addictive substances, especially in a free-market society.

 

[Jonathan Scott]

In the UK standard health care is essentially free, but the cost to the National Health Service of dealing with smoking-related disease has been a big problem.

Smoking in any sort of enclosed public space (including transport) has been banned for some time as it impacts the health and comfort of others who cannot easily avoid it. (Some have maintained that the health risks of second-hand smoke are minimal in most contexts, but many like myself consider it very unpleasant to be exposed to smoke at all). These bans are supported by a majority of the population (around 80% and increasing over the years). Since the main ban started in 2007, statistics have showed very significant rapid reductions in smoking-related health problems. And even vaping in any enclosed space impacts others, and has been increasingly associated with its own health problems.

I don't see much in common with drug control. Smoking was once considered normal but has been proven to have a serious health impact, including impacting others nearby, and excessive NHS resources were being used to address smoking-related disease.

 

[Jonathan Scott]

There have been various suggestions that rather than banning smoking, the government should somehow get those who smoke to cover the potential cost of their health care between them, for example by charging a very high tax on tobacco which is then directed to the health service. However, this has already been tried in various environments and is only partially effective, and has side-effects such as promoting a black market.

 

[fresh_42]

I wonder whether someone ever did the calculation. Yes, medical treatments, particularly surgeries, are expensive, and it's the main argument to justify restrictions on tobacco of any kind, be it high taxes or, in this case, a total ban. And the tobacco taxes on cigarettes have already been very high for decades. I remember a discussion about the price of cigarettes in England more than twenty years ago. However, a higher life expectancy is also very expensive. I'd really like to see a study that actually counted for both. I am not convinced that the answer is as clear as they want us to believe.

I am basically a liberal person. I am no friend of regulating every part of people's lives. And as the drug wars around the world demonstrate, they are useless. We are currently discussing general speed limits in Germany to reduce fuel consumption. I mean, who is it to prohibit people from driving slowly without a commandment? Why do people always want the government to impose restrictions on others? I think, and I know that this is a minority opinion, that the same is true for drugs, tobacco included. Chasing production and distribution is widely accepted, but are they necessary? The question of why there are consumers is inconvenient and complex. But it is, in my opinion, the real problem, the demand, not the supply. Fighting the demand is unpleasant and difficult, so let's fight the supply chains. What a hypocrisy! This is a widely used principle in politics: fighting the effects rather than the causes, because it's cheaper. To ban tobacco consumption in a country that invented gentlemen's clubs to provide gentlemen with a place where they could smoke pipes and cigars in peace seems audacious to me. Unfortunately, it is always the more left-leaning governments that are all too quick to restrict civil liberties.

But before everyone jumps on me for my radically liberal views on drugs, I must confess, to my shame, that I, too, am not always able to maintain this position. For example, I am very glad that not every lunatic here is allowed to walk around with a firearm, or that murder remains illegal, even though I doubt that the criminalization has any effect on the number of murderers. And I have to confess that the availability of firearms does have a proven effect on the number of victims of gun violence. What the right position is when it comes to a drug as old and widespread as tobacco remains to be seen. Not that we'll end up with opium dens in Britain just for cigarettes.

 

[Grinkle]

I believe the broad availability of pharmaceutical opioids in the US is instructive. Chat says about 77% of US OD's since the early 90's when Rx Oxy became prevalent involved the use of illicit drugs, and 36% involved the use of Rx drugs. The 77% number supports the idea that addicts are going to use regardless of what's legal vs illegal, I think.

 

[sbrothy]

I'm a smoker and I'd welcome such a law. If nothing else then just to make it harder to start. Unfortunately I already buy my cigarettes on the black market. (A pack costs about $10 legally!). Still, in principle, I agree.

EDIT: One thing that perplexes me slightly is that bubble gum cigarettes were phased out a long time ago but you can still buy a liquorice pipe? Go figure.

 

[dlu]

Canada has had regulatory smoking laws on tobacco for several decades.
I do not see anything earth shattering coming out of the UK.

For tobacco products - no sale to anyone under 18, no display of products on shelves, no differentiation between cigarette packages ( ie generic packaging ), no advertising of tobacco products ( including sponsorship for public events ), all packaging to include health warnings, including on each individual cigarette, smoking banned at workplace and business and public areas and within 10 feet from doorways ( could be 10 metres, not sure ).

Several years back the tobacco manufacturers were sued for the sale and promotion of a product they knew to be harmful to the user. Payouts were in the high 100s of millions $.

I am surprised that the rest of the world, especially the western world, has lagged behind.

 

[jack action]

Canada has had regulatory smoking laws on tobacco for several decades.
I do not see anything earth shattering coming out of the UK.

For tobacco products - no sale to anyone under 18, no display of products on shelves, no differentiation between cigarette packages ( ie generic packaging ), no advertising of tobacco products ( including sponsorship for public events ), all packaging to include health warnings, including on each individual cigarette, smoking banned at workplace and business and public areas and within 10 feet from doorways ( could be 10 metres, not sure ).

Several years back the tobacco manufacturers were sued for the sale and promotion of a product they knew to be harmful to the user. Payouts were in the high 100s of millions $.

I am surprised that the rest of the world, especially the western world, has lagged behind.

And, despite all of that, people - especially young ones - are still smoking in Canada.

 

[sbrothy]

And, despite all of that, people - especially young ones - are still smoking in Canada.

What's more insidious is that youth now use these tobacco pillows you put in between your gum and teeth. Smoking is out. Granted, you probably wont get lung cancer but we'll likely see a rise in jaw, and larynx cancer among others.

I saw on a documentary that one of these pillows is the equivalent of 20-30 normal cigarettes. Admittedly, the delivery is far from the same but the numbers alone are scary.

EDIT: Sorry for the edits, but my keyboard is also sick. From nicotine ash.