“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.
Speter==It looks like you have something to say but you aren’t making any sense. Are you saying people are dying in Iceland in their 40′s because of Vit D deficiency? If not, how is that relevant except that smoking would just be another major assault on your pathetic white wasting away herring fed bodies?
The reason you have white albino like skin is so that if you spend any time at all outside, you will get the Vit D you need. Don’t you ever go outside? Take a Vitamin Pill? Eat a Fish?
Everyone is so hostile here. I don’t get it. Just another posting about one society trying to help its members. We all should be so lucky.
Bobbo, Saying something and saying nothing at the same time is a wonderful privilege of people with thinking duality.
my main point is the whole “fear fear fear, dont do this don’t do that.” society we live in is upside down in many cases.
Certain risks are outlawed and banned and shunned while greater risks are ignored or promoted.
Vitamin D in point relating to disease being blamed ‘solely’ on smoking (while fish may contain vit D??? they also contain mercury etc these days, not sure if we should trust supplements from big corps who farm the fish – however i do believe artic Krill is a good source of omega 3 which is also benificial) BUT sunlight also contains bio photons.
sunlight should be the preferred method. this country where this is happening should look at environmental factors as well as smoking related health issues and see if there is any correlation between distance from the equator and increased cancer rates.
blaming one thing entirely is easy to do, but have a look at smoking rates and illness rates around the equator/asia (and with a non western diet)and i think there will be some surprises…
also smoking is blamed at the “cause” when often it is simply a trigger in a person predisposed or not quite at optimal health.
i smoke (but only tobacco rolled not cigarettes.)
do i have the right to ask food delivery trucks to stop bringing food or oil or shoes because the diesel fumes are posioneing everyone near the highway?
is this issue even discussed? or because it affects the majority it can be left alone..
same issue different kettle or hypocrites.
and IF passive smoke was “as bad as they say” we would have no one over the age of about 60 as most people that age would have been exposed during their youth and already died.
and what about people spreading ecoli by shaking someones hand? oooh the horror, lets ban that too… (low immunity here we come)
it still makes sense that smoking around kids should be avoided, but in an adult environment we make our own choices. there are designated smoking areas and in non smokers don’t like it they can avoid them.
nanny state to police sate in 60 seconds here we come…
Why do we care? Smokers die sooner and spend less money on health care than non-smokers. Yes, that’s true.
Another reason why iceland may have a disproportionate amount of smoking related illness is possibly due to that fact there is not much to do there except freeze, fight the bankers, roast some cod?? or puff the cold away with a schmoke and a pancake???
as i said, a “disproportionate” amount compared to the rest.
when something is “disproportionate” and used in a study or to create laws – it tells me the science is flawed – especially if being used in a general context.
Roddy6667, yea but they smell bad. Worse than a hippy.
After reading all that, I feel like going from 2 packs a day to 3..
I’m in flavour country!
What is irritating to me is that all these monkeys that want to drink, smoke, do drugs, overeat and all the other indulgences of life scream for the right to do it.
They believe they are ONLY hurting themselves and no one else and should be allowed to do as they please so long as it harms none.
And yet they KNOW in the back of their minds that all these things do harm their selves, and thus harm their families through stress and less funds for doing good things. They harm the medical system that has to put them in hospitals and care for them when they get sick from years of doing it. And raise the cost of visiting hospitals for all because they clog up the works.
But to these people they deny they are the problem. Not being able to kill themselves and putting their own desires above others is the problem.
Selfish, good for nothing monkeys that drag the whole of life down with their filthy habits.
No man is an island. They know that that. They just don’t give a fuck about anything but themselves.
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GregAllen, your numbers are off. You claim 30 billion per year in Medicaid costs, and saying the numbers are a net negative. But you forgot the detail you started with. Having pe9ople die early saves lots of money in Medicare and Social Security benefits. Maybe $300,000- $1 millio n dollars saved for each person who dies early.
“No man is an island. They know that that. They just don’t give a fuck about anything but themselves.”
No, we give a fuck about a lot of things. We just don’t give a fuck about you. You could kindly stop doing all of us the “favor” of caring so much about us to micro-manage every minute of our lives because you think we’re costing you something.
I’ve seen the aftermath of all that expensive “treatment” for things like cancer. It’s worse than death. If I get it, self inflicted or otherwise, I won’t cost you a gaddamned dime. But you would probably make it a point to have treatment forced on me just so you could have a reason to bitch because I didn’t live the way you wanted me to.
I think the “Death” branding does not adequately capture the danger inherent in smoking. We need packets of actual diseased organs attached to cartons.
#69–Notatall==nice capturing of an important idea: “No, we give a fuck about a lot of things. We just don’t give a fuck about you.” //// and quite right you are. Why/how cursor got on the High Nanny State Horse is beyond me. Uncharacteristic for him to be so.
Then you intrigingly say: “I’ve seen the aftermath of all that expensive “treatment” for things like cancer. It’s worse than death. If I get it, self inflicted or otherwise, I won’t cost you a gaddamned dime.” /// Well, sure it will but that cost, hopefully minimal, will be part of the social contract==what we all owe/receive to one another by virtue of being in the same society. Shake and bake, hurdy gurdy, helter skelter, all bobbing around, brownian motion, all to our own purposeful effect. So how do you plan on minimizing your cost of dying from cancer? Slow and painful, takes years?
JCD: You’re seriously passing up on some easy money not offering a bozo filter. You wouldn’t even have to butcher my name on NA to get it
This is great! Iceland is coming along so nicely as the new model for world control. No government can be too big. Apparently that was were the USSR went wrong, it just didnt have ENOUGH government. We better follow california’s lead and get right on that. Maybe they can even come into my house and make sure that I had the right breakfast. Dont forget your vaccinations!
Watched a not too good show on PBS tonight: Enemy of the People on Point of View (POV) all about the Killing Fields of Camboida and Brothers No 1 and 2. There, a government of almost no economic resources and almost no rules about how to do anything wound up killing millions of their own citizens in what looks like a shotgun approach of racial purity to save their political philosophy.
How to understand this infamy using the same words/concepts that are used in our own political discourse when it comes to truthfully labeling tobacco products as a killer and requiring a prescription.
Somehow, it doesn’t strike me as the same thing.
Notatall==you study this for your self actualization, how would you describe the two situations? Are they mostly the same thing, or very, very different?
Inquiring minds want to know.
#74 It’s called “starting point” Dumbbo. If you cared going to school in the first place you would have learned how to recognize trends.
Yeah. Let’s create yet another black market. You’ve already made tobacco so expensive I just buy it from truck hijackers.
Oh, wait. Hijacking is a job, right? So the government finally IS creating a few jobs. Never mind.