New Taxes Push Cigarette Prices Over $8 A Pack In New York

All Headline News ^ | June 3, 2008 | Vittorio Hernandez

[Diana in Wisconsin]

Albany, NY (AHN) - What health warnings could not accomplish, taxes may. New York residents who could not give up the habit may finally surrender their packs with new state taxes of $1.25 expected to hike the cost to over $8 a pack in New York. The average cost is $5.82 across the states.

With the additional tax, the Big Apple residents would be paying $2.75 taxes per pack, the highest in the nation. The new revenue generating measure is expected to add $265 million annually to New York's coffers.

Convenience store and smokers are not happy with the price and tax increase, but health officials are. More than the increase in state income, health officials foresee an spike in smoking quitters by 50,000 adults and 7,000 teenagers.

Dr. Scott Sherman, a stop smoking expert, told Newsday, "The two biggest factors that have made a difference in New York City is the tax and the smoking ban, basically making it more difficult to smoke."

When the first cigarette tax hike was imposed in 2002, a 21 percent dip in smoking was logged among adults and 52 percent among high school students.

At more than $8 a pack, the habit burns up to $3,000 annually for people who light up one pack a day. Others, however, would still insist on holding on to the vice until their pockets could afford it. Mary Ryan of Forest Hills told Newsday her breaking point would be when nicotine would cost $15 a pack.

[nightlight7]

I was thinking of the FORCES website. It did not impress me at all.

Indeed there is a great variety of people (quite a few well educated, intelligent and generally good folks) and agendas there. That lack of focus on their primary purpose (to fight antismoking scam) is making them ineffective. I have told them so few times in their own "Tavern" (discussion board).

On the other hand, facts are facts and anything quoted with proper citation to primary scientific source is fine, no matter what other flaws they may have. I recheck facts I claim from multiple sources (including google scholar and pubmed) and I pick links for convenience of having lots of facts collected in one place. You can also check the mentioned months long debate against competent and medically well educated folks - no fake scientific citation would survive there for longer than few hours.

The problem I have with this is that you are asserting, against virtually the entire scientific medical establishment, that smoking doesn't cause lung cancer or COPD.

There are scientists in medical fields (my education is theoretical physics) who have a similar view. Not very long ago doctors, medical researchers and even medical textbooks would suggest smoking for asthma, stress, depression, anxiety, bronchitis,... (e.g. see here or here). In the heyday of British Empire, for health reasons smoking was compulsory for students in their elite schools. The history tells us that these antismoking waves have come and gone (pdf) many times before, hence this one will fizzle away, too. Especially since its claims rest entirely on pure junk science while contradicting all the hard science in this field.

There are presently few small groups of scientifically educated smokers, working quietly in the background of their day jobs, gathering and analysing huge quantities of scientific material about the health effects of tobacco smoke (mostly hard science from the reasearch by pharmaceutical industry itself, which has been quietly trying for decades to replicate the therapeutic & protective effects of tobacco smoke with their own drugs; nicotine is just a tiny gear of the full medicinal magic of this ancient 'gift of gods'). Soon you will see our own sites with all that info presented in a coherent and readable form, followed by a highly focused campaign to educate smokers (and only them) about the real facts on tobacco smoking. Once the fifty million American smokers are out of the antismoking Matrix, the antismoking swindle will perish overnight.

I am not blindly denying the obvious. Show me a single scientific paper demonstrating experimentally that smoking causes any of the "smoking related" diseases. It doesn't exist. For any "normal" carcinogen, you expose lab animals to it and after while they get cancers and die prematurely. For tobacco smoke, you expose mice, hamsters, dogs,... to it and they live longer, healthier, including getting fewer cancers. Or you randomly divide group of smokers into "quit group" (those urged and helped quit) and "smoking group", then monitor them over years or decades, and the quit group ends up with more lung cancers, heart attacks,...

That's what hard science has found so far and that's why you don't see much on that kind of research about smoking. All you will see are statistical correlations (smokers have more of this or that disease). That alone is a mere hint that smoking may be cause, but it may also be protective or therapeutic against the real cause (since a therapeutic/protective agents will correlate equally well as causes with various medical conditions). To get beyond the "hint" you need hard science. Yet, fifty years after this latest wave of heavily financed (and obscenely profitable) antismoking "science" began, they are still in the "hint phase." The hard science has backfired badly, time and time again, so they just parrot what works (in making billions for them), the hint that smoking may be (or may not be) a cause of 'smoking related' diseases. By the time you hear the second and third hand retelling by the "journalists" in mass media, the "may be a cause" becomes "is the cause." (That's not overly surprising, considering the amounts of the Big Pharma advertising on TV and in newspapers.)

As to Big Tobacco position on this, they are businesses which will say whatever their lawyers and PR experts tell them is the most profitable thing to say. They're dwarfed by the antismoking forces (the Big Pharma and "public health" bureaucracies), so they play as they have to.

[megatherium]

Show me a single scientific paper demonstrating experimentally that smoking causes any of the "smoking related" diseases. It doesn't exist. For any "normal" carcinogen, you expose lab animals to it and after while they get cancers and die prematurely. For tobacco smoke, you expose mice, hamsters, dogs,... to it and they live longer, healthier, including getting fewer cancers.

Julie A. Hutt, et al, "Life-span inhalation exposure to mainstream cigarette smoke induces lung cancer in B6C3F1 mice through genetic and epigenetic pathways," Carcinogenesis 2005 26(11):1999-2009.

Abstract: Although cigarette smoke has been epidemiologically associated with lung cancer in humans for many years, animal models of cigarette smoke-induced lung cancer have been lacking. This study demonstrated that life time whole body exposures of female B6C3F1 mice to mainstream cigarette smoke at 250 mg total particulate matter/m3 for 6 h per day, 5 days a week induces marked increases in the incidence of focal alveolar hyperplasias, pulmonary adenomas, papillomas and adenocarcinomas. Cigarette smoke-exposed mice (n = 330) had a 10-fold increase in the incidence of hyperplastic lesions, and a 4.6-fold (adenomas and papillomas), 7.25-fold (adenocarcinomas) and 5-fold (metastatic pulmonary adenocarcinomas) increase in primary lung neoplasms compared with sham-exposed mice (n = 326). Activating point mutations in codon 12 of the K-ras gene were identified at a similar rate in tumors from sham-exposed mice (47%) and cigarette smoke-exposed mice (60%). The percentages of transversion and transition mutations were similar in both the groups. Hypermethylation of the death associated protein (DAP)-kinase and retinoic acid receptor (RAR)-ß gene promoters was detected in tumors from both sham- and cigarette smoke-exposed mice, with a tendency towards increased frequency of RAR-ß methylation in the tumors from the cigarette smoke-exposed mice. These results emphasize the importance of the activation of K-ras and silencing of DAP-kinase and RAR-ß in lung cancer development, and confirm the relevance of this mouse model for studying lung tumorigenesis.

(The article explains that the strain of mice used, B6C3F1 mice, were chosen "due to their low background incidence of lung cancer.")

[nightlight7]

Thanks for bringing up this experiment, since it is a perfect illustration of what I was explaining earlier. In fact, this is the same research group of Pfizer contractors who did the F344 rats study in 2004 that I discussed last year in "smart drugs" forum, as mentioned earlier here. They merely repeated a minor variation of that same experiment and ended up with the same results that blew in their face exactly the same way as before, albeit you couldn't tell any of that from reading only the abstract or their intro section (meant to please their Big Pharma employer for providing its PR department with antismoking press releases).

1) This time they used different breed of genetically optimized cancer mice, the B6C3F1 mice. These ones develop cancers spontaneously in virtually all tissues and organs, albeit comparatively less in lungs than F344 rats, and die from it by age of 2 yo.

2)These spontaneous cancers proliferate the most wherever there is the best blood supply. Since the combination of nicotine and nitric oxide in tobacco smoke stimulates vascular growth factor as well as circulation (Viagra effect of NO), the best blood supply for growth of these neoplasias will be wherever there was the greatest contact with tobacco smoke (nasal cavity, trachea, lungs). Of course, there will be less blood elsewhere, hence the slower growth of tumors there, as the paper notes on page 2006).

3) The refinements from their 2004 experiment, in which the low exposure group had 100 mg/m^3 of smoke particles and high exposure group 250 mg/m^3, was that this time they used 250 mg/m^3, which is near asphyxiating exposure level and about 15-20 times greater intensity than particulate levels a human smoker experiences (due to 6 hour/day exposure, 5 days/week they estimate exposure as equivalent to 4 packs/day, albeit all smoked in 6 hours and no breaks between cigarettes). Note that this same research group conducted similar experiments on carcinogenic effects of diesel fumes (which indeed do cause lung cancers) using 0.35 to 7 mg/m^3 smoke particles, which is 36 times lower concentration than the one used in this tobacco smoke experiment. Interestingly, this time they picked only female mice and only at 250 mg/m^3 exposure level, which was precisely the combination that fared the most poorly in their 2004 experiment (in that case many F344 female rats in 250mg/m^3 group died shortly into the "experiment" from plain asphyxiation).

4) As before, their experiment backfired showing again that the smoking mice, despite living their entire life under the nearly asphyxiating levels of tobacco smoke, lived longer than the control group (sham exposure): Buried deep on page 2006, they admit in words the real finding on the effect of tobacco smoke on the health & longevity:

"In spite of the higher lung tumor incidence and multiplicity in CS-exposed mice, survival of these mice was significantly longer than for the sham-exposed mice. Longer survival in the CS-exposed mice is likely a sequela of the lower incidence and delayed onset of other types of fatal neoplasia, in part due to the reduced body weight in these mice."

In short: Miracle medicine tobacco 1: Big Pharma 0.

You can also check a more detailed discussion of this type of experiments and their precursors in that earlier thread.

Summary: Here we have in Anno Domini 2005, a would be crowning experiment, half a century into this latest antismoking wave of futile attempts at using hard science to show any actual harm of smoking. With all the Pfizer's and other Big Pharma and government bucks and contractors behind it, this is what they got to show -- the female genetic cancer mice, hugely overexposed and in the worst possible way (6 hours of continuous asphyxiating concentration, like chain smoking 4 cigarettes simultaneously and without a second of a break for 6 hours a day), ends up living longer than non-smoking mice.

If that is the best they can do, smoking is even better for you than anyone ever suspected. How do you make the most potent and most beneficial medicinal plant humans have ever known appear bad within hard science? As seen here, it plainly doesn't work and it can't be done, no matter how much money and research man-years they pour into that pursuit. They are pretty much stuck with what they have been doing in mass media and schools last fifty years -- parroting the thousand and one variants of the same statistical correlations between various diseases and smoking which are by themselves mere hints of possible causality, being equally consistent with causal and protective/therapeutic role of tobacco smoke. The hard science tells which one it is -- smoking is good for you.

[megatherium]

The point of the article was not to prove that cigarette smoke causes cancer; that's already well-established from the epidemiology alone. The point was to demonstrate a reliable model for lung cancers caused by cigarette smoke, in order to study how and why these cancers form. So of course they will select a mouse strain that is susceptible to cancer; they want the poor beasts to develop their neoplasms in the year or two of lifespan granted to these animals. After all, humans typically only develop lung cancer after several decades of heavy smoking; no one can afford to wait that long for an animal model to bear fruit.

Well, I should stop here; you clearly know more about this subject than this member of the lumpen professoriat. Perhaps one day, your provocative ideas will be vindicated. But until then, I'll stick with established mainstream medical science—it's the best we have.

[nightlight7]

... cigarette smoke causes cancer; that's already well-established from the epidemiology alone.

Epidemiology of tobacco smokers has not established any such causal relation. The mere positive statistical correlation between smoking and lung cancer in self-selected population smokers does not establish causality of smoking since presence of such correlation is equally consistent with several hypotheses:

(a) A common genetic trait makes people more likely to smoke and to develop lung cancer (both elements have a strong genetic contribution). Some genetic elements of precisely this kind have been found recently (see also another similar paper).

(b) Upregulation (near doubling of levels) of key antioxidants and detox enzymes in human body (glutathione, catalase and SOD) by some unknown components of tobacco smoke (not nicotine) implies that people who are exposed to any among variety of chemical toxins and carcinogens at work or at home will find smoking to provide relief and protection by virtue of nearly doubling their detox rates. Hence, tobacco smoking is a form of self-medication and a marker for various toxic and carcinogenic exposures, which themselves are responsible for excess in lung cancers.

(c) Some components in tobacco smoke cause lung cancers.

Epidemiology, even absent the numerous anomalies found regarding the relation of smoking to "smoking related" diseases, doesn't differentiate between the (a), (b) and (c). It is at best a hint that requires hard science, animal experiments or randomized intervention trials, to disentangle the causal chain. But whenever hard science was applied here, it backfired showing that hypotheses (a) or (b) are a better model for the observed correlations.

The point was to demonstrate a reliable model for lung cancers caused by cigarette smoke, in order to study how and why these cancers form.

All they have shown is that cancers which in this mice develop rapidly due to their genetic defects and not to any mythical carcinogenic effect of tobacco smoke, can be redistributed if one redistributes vascularization and the resulting blood supplies. They have also shown that smoking mice lives significantly longer and stays thinner. I'll take that kind of deal any time.

After all, humans typically only develop lung cancer after several decades of heavy smoking; no one can afford to wait that long for an animal model to bear fruit.

Carcinogenic properties of various chemicals or radiation are routinely tested on lab animals. You expose mice to such carcinogen and they get more cancers and die sooner than non-exposed animals. Only smoking requires semantic games in which substance that makes you live significantly longer and stay thinner is declared harmful to your health.

But until then, I'll stick with established mainstream medical science—it's the best we have.

The experiment discussed is as mainstream science as it gets. It shows (as many before did) that tobacco smoking "significantly extends lifespan" and helps reduce weight (due to about 30% increased basal metabolism in smokers).

If you follow the links I gave in this thread (e.g. see here for a concise list of citations), you will find that tobacco smoking also increases and maintains during aging the levels of youth (pro-)hormones testosterone, DHEA, pregnenolone, increases and maintains youthful levels of key neurotransmitters (acetylcholine, dopamine, norepinephrine; a smoker in his 50s has levels found in nonsmoker in his 20s; see here & here for MAO B levels with age), upregulates telomerase (the fountain of youth), key antioxidants by 80+ percent (glutathione, catalase & SOD which is another 'fountain of youth'), neutrophiles by 25% (the frontline defenders against infections), vascular growth factor and circulation (especially to lungs, heart and brain),...

No single substance humans have ever encountered, natural or synthetic, comes even close to the spectrum and depth of the beneficial health effects of this ancient medicinal miracle plant. And that is precisely why the Big Pharma and the rest of the "Sickness Industry" are fighting it so viciously and spending billions every year to buy antismoking laws and regulations, to whip up antismoking hysteria (through creating and financing "grass roots" antismoking groups) and churn out antismoking pseudo-science. It brings them returns through tens of millions new patients (even from just additional Alzheimers, Parkinson's & depression patients) and vast billions in drug sales and treatments. People will lie or do whatever it takes for that kind of money.

You can remain scared away from this medicinal miracle as you wish. I have a neighbor, a guy in his early fifties with wife and couple kids, mechanical engineer and a corprate manager, fitness nuts (yoga, jogging, bycicling, gardening,...). Last summer there was a block party and I lit up (together with some little old grandma, the only other smoker there; this is Lexington MA, an ultra-PC town). He came to me, expressing surprise that such well educated person would ever smoke. So I unleashed the kind of stuff I wrote above, then hopped over to my house and brought him few books, later that evening emailed him several links (including the mentioned "smart drugs" forum thread). Few days went by and here he comes across the street to my house, to ask what cigarettes I smoke. I instructed him and showed him how to roll his own from pure, additive free leaf (American Spirit), gave him web site links where to order. Then about two weeks later, while I was taking a dog for a little pee walk, he approaches me again, all smiles. He had started smoking and he never felt better. Few years ago he started getting nasty headaches nearly every afternoon and doctors couldn't help him. They were gone now. His mood and sex life perked up as well (he didn't dare tell his wife, though, she is another health nuts and much less open minded, and so still smokes secretly few a day). His weekend bycicling route around town, which used to take him an hour before, was now taking 50 minutes.... I couldn't stop him and go my way, that's how enthusiastic he was about his secret fountain of youth. That is just one of half a dozen friends, neighbors and relatives, men and women from mid 20s to 60s, all former nonsmokers who started smoking within last two years when shown the facts they never heard of before and allowed to make their own informed choice.

This brings to mind an interesting story about an Australian medical doctor W.T. Whytby who suffered from bronchitis and asthma and on suggestion from an old doctor friend, he started smoking. Not only did his lung problems clear up, but the ancient 'gift of gods' got him so rejuvenated and re-energized, that he went to law school and became a lawyer, too. He practiced successfully both professions into the ripe old age and wrote couple books in 1970s/1980s "Smoking is good for you" and "Smoking scare debunked" (scanned copies are available online, see the link above). He also advised his patients to smoke for variety of ailments, he drove Australian antismokers nuts for years (they even burned his house down), he publicly offered a $10K reward to anyone who can scientifically show that smoking causes any harm at all to the health of smoker which went uncollected...

[nightlight7]

One of the links above got lost -- the sentence should be:

"... Some genetic elements of precisely this kind have been found recently (see also another similar paper)."

[nightlight7]

Oops, another mangled link given earlier. This should say:

If you follow the links I gave in this thread (e.g. see here for a concise list of citations)...

[nightlight7]

Nice to see you around, nightlight.

World is small, eh. Antismoking hard "science" seems to be even smaller -- just few posts above a fellow brings up a recent scientific paper appearing to show experimentally that smoking causes lung cancer.

It turns out, as another one did last year, and as all of them did since 1950s, when you check their data buried in the paper, that smoking mice lived "significantly longer" and it kept their slim, prom dance figure the rest of their lives, too. The Pfizer's scientific mercenaries who did the experiment knew better than to test the mice on maze solving, since that would have shown that smoking mice kept their brains in much better shape as well.

If that kind of success is the pinnacle of the antismoking hard science in 2005, over half a century since they began this latest hysteria, their time is up pretty soon. They have been stretching the supposed "delay" from quitting smoking for lung cancer, emphysema, bronchitis, asthma,... from 10 years early on to 50-60 years nowdays, soon to be 70-80, at which point the delay will cross the natural lifespan and they will be digging out corpses to see whether the ones of smokers developed lung cancers and emphysema after they died.

[megatherium]

OK, one more post.

So as I understand it, you're arguing that the extraordinary correlation between cigarette smoking and lung cancer is not because cigarettes cause lung cancer, but for other reasons, such as persons who are more prone to lung cancer self-medicate by smoking. But the sort of alternative explanations for the correlation between smoking and cancer that you mention were raised—and answered—decades ago: The epidemiologists were able to establish causality to an extremely high level of confidence (based on very large studies that enabled them to statistically distinguish between risk factors to determine the ones that were responsible). I'm not particularly conversant on the details of this old debate, but I do know the debate ended decades ago. And if you don't trust the academic or government biostatisticians and epidemiologists who determined these facts (because they're part of some conspiracy with Big Pharma, or something), there's nothing I can do to help you.

[nightlight7]

the extraordinary correlation between cigarette smoking and lung cancer

It is not nearly as "extraordinary" as you may have been mislead to believe. In countries (Japan, China, Greece,...) that have resisted present antismoking hysteria, the correlation is virtually non-existent (risk 1.5-2, plus anomalies). It was also very weak here back in 1950s, before the hysteria took off.

...is not because cigarettes cause lung cancer, but for other reasons, such as persons who are more prone to lung cancer self-medicate by smoking.

The protective effects of tobacco smoke, such as nearly doubled key antioxidants and detox enzymes (glutathione, catalase, SOD) are well established facts of hard science. It follows then that those who smoke will nearly double detox rates for variety of environmental toxins and carcinogens, hence obtain relief under such exposures i.e. they will have perceptible benefits from smoking. Therefore such exposures and their consequences (cancers, ill health) will correlate with smoking, not because smoking has caused those effects but because it provides relief from some toxic effects of those exposures.

This mechanism is analogous to the correlation between the use of sun glasses and frequency of sunburns -- if you were to poll all Americans on how many hours last year they wore sun glasses and how many times they had sunburns, those who used sun glasses more would have had more sunburns, since sun glasses are simply a proxy measure for the level of sun exposure -- people who needed sun glasses were likely more exposed to sun than those who didn't need them. One would not jump to conclusion that sun glasses cause sunburns, despite the positive and likely strong correlation, since we know what the role of sun glasses is. They are in fact protective against sunburns (of retina and skin surrounding eyes), yet their use correlates positively with frequency of sunburns.

The epidemiologists were able to establish causality to an extremely high level of confidence (based on very large studies that enabled them to statistically distinguish between risk factors to determine the ones that were responsible).

Sorry, but whoever has who told you that epidemiology can resolve the causal chain through statistical operations on self-selected samples of population has lied to you. It can't do that. Statistical correlations can only tell you that smoking and lung cancer (or emphysema) are within a cause-effect chain (graph) of arbitrary complexity, with some common point. But it can't tell you where in that chain to place smoking or any among dozens of other known "risk factors" or myriad of unknown elements. Placing smoking element at the root, as the cause is simply an act of faith (motivated by profits). Hence such placement is not a scientific fact.

To protect yourself against being duped again by the pseudo-scientific claims of some mythical powers of epidemiology, check this very readable and amusing online book (free): Science Without Sense: The Risky Business of Public Health Research. It lists and illustrates with real life examples all the "junk science" tricks you and millions others are falling for (in order to be fleeced) daily.

What is scientific fact is that smoking mice, even under the horribly rigged conditions of the experiment you cited, lives longer and remains thinner. If someone would tell you about experiment on "Substance X" that extends lifespan by 20% and keeps you slim, you and everyone else would say -- yes, I want some of that. But as soon as you hear that "Substance X" is tobacco smoke, the spin will start seeking to make this most self-evident benefit appear as being bad for you (it's only bad for the Big Pharma, and that's why they spend billions every year buying antismoking laws & regulations, creating & financing fake "grass roots" antismoking organizations to help whip up hysteria, fabricating and peddling antismoking pseudo-science,...).

If you follow links given earlier, you will discover that this facts is not some fluke or anomaly but the most persistent feature of thousands of such animal experiments done since 1950s on all kinds of animals, ways of having them smoke, various other conditions... they always came out this same way -- the smoking animals end up better off, live longer, stay slimmer, do better on mental and physical performance tests,... That's why you don't ever hear about them on TV or in school -- they, the hard science, went the "wrong" way.

[megatherium]

Placing smoking element at the root, as the cause is simply an act of faith (motivated by profits).

Oh please. I'm personally familiar with people in the medical research community. I am willing to trust the competence and honesty of medical and public health researchers. Good bye.

[nightlight7]

(motivated by profits).

Oh please. I'm personally familiar with people in the medical research community. I am willing to trust the competence and honesty of medical and public health researchers.

Doctors and medical researchers are not much different than anyone else, except for being greedier (or here), more pretentious, more arrogant and the single most hazardous group for your health and life (e.g. far more than gun owners). Other than that, they're just like us regular folks.

[Puddleglum]

That’s a nice chart but I wonder how many years of smoking it takes for emphysema to kick in, etc. My dad smoked for years and years but died of emphysema at 65.

[Little Ray]

Darn. If I wasn’t married, I’d take a couple of weeks off and smuggle trunkloads of cigarettes from North Carolina to New York.

[Tribune7]

Betcha tax revenue drops, smoking continues and big grins appear on the faces of convenience store owners in Pa. & points south.

[strider44]

Show me the study that proves smoking doesn’t turn your teeth a nasty yellow and make your clothes stink like hell.

[nightlight7]

...how many years of smoking it takes for emphysema to kick in, etc.

That question was addressed above. In short, the antismoking "science" is starting to look like doomsday prophets who set the end-of-the-world date, then when nothing happens on that day, another "prophet" enters the game and predicts another date and the 'doomsday just around the corner' theory still holds.

The theory doesn't hold unless one can stretch and shrink delays as needed, over decades and between countries. The bottom line, though, is that even if they had all the statistics to match precisely with some fixed delay (which they don't), that's still merely a hint that there may be a causal relation. It doesn't by itself show that smoking causes any of 'smoking related' diseases, but merely that smoking and some disease D are in the same arbitrarily complex chain of causes and effects. Since therapeutic or protective factors are also in the same chain of causes and effects (e.g. people who had surgery or visited cardiologist last year will have shorter life expectancy than those of the same age who didn't), one has to follow up the statistical hint with hard science to find out what role does smoking play in that chain -- is it causal or protective/therapeutic

You never hear about these experiments, and thousands were done since 1950s, in mass media or at school, since they invariably come out the "wrong" way -- they show that smoking is beneficial for the health and longevity.

You can see an example of that "paradox" even in this thread -- I asked if someone could bring up an experiment in which smoking was shown to cause lung cancer. Another member brings up a paper that appears to show to show just that. Upon closer reading (beyond the weasel-worded abstract & intro), it turns out that smoking mice in that experiment lived significantly longer and stayed slimmer, despite extremely heavy and unnatural smoke exposure (like chain smoking four cigarettes simultaneously, one batch after another for 6 hours without a break, day after day). You can read more on this "paradox" in an earlier thread here.

[nightlight7]

Show me the study that proves smoking doesn’t turn your teeth a nasty yellow and make your clothes stink like hell.

Teeth of this chain smoker, age 47, don't seem particularly yellow.

As with any aspect of human appearance, it's a matter of care (many Hollywood celebrities smoked, many still do and looked pretty good). Regarding your intense feelings about smell of tobacco smoke, that's a matter of taste. There used to be perfumes and aftershaves that smelled like tobacco or tobacco smoke. Fashions change. Some people, such as person posting as "strider44" above, are more susceptible to mass hysterias and that's their problem. In few years it will flip again and smoking will be not just good for you, but cool again.

[Just another Joe]

I'm not particularly conversant on the details of this old debate, but I do know the debate ended decades ago. And if you don't trust the academic or government biostatisticians and epidemiologists who determined these facts (because they're part of some conspiracy with Big Pharma, or something), there's nothing I can do to help you.

If you were particularly conversant with the details of the studies you would know that of studies done on this subject, including the three largest ever done, 80% find no connection between smoking and ANY type of life threatening disease. This is scientific fact.

In epidemiology it takes an RR of, at least, 2 to even BEGIN to show causality and most epidemiologists expect an RR of 3 or more before they will assign any type of causality between a cause and effect.

Go take a look at the studies and see what the RR is on most of them.

The answer might surprise you.

[MNJohnnie]

Yo Leftists,

If high taxes is the way to discourage smoking, why are you always arguing for higher income taxes?