cost of lung cancer care 23, 500, 000, tax revenue 12 000,000 00, so about 5x but my zeros might be wrong
The tax and duty on a packet of premium ***s is £6.17. 3 packs a day for 30 years amounts to £202684.50. How much does lung cancer treatment cost per patient bearing in mind that a fair proportion of sufferers discover it too late to be treated.
1950's, The smoking debate is a bit of an iffy one. fair enough the person smoking has the choice, what about the non smokers inhaling their smoke?
Also bear in mind that the majority of smokers don't catch lung cancer but still pay the tax so you should divide the cost of care by the number of smokers.
Not just lung either; throat, mouth, skin, liver, pancreas, stomach, kidney, bladder, cervix, bowel, etc... Not to mention other respiratory problems and different medical conditions (e.g. leukemia) as a result of smoking. Also, doesn't take into account the effect of passive smoking on the health of others, or even NHS cost of programs/campaigns supporting people trying to give up (although I guess this is a good thing in the long term).
Then you are in a different arena where Politicians have to ban, or otherwise, on far wider issues. That is what we elect/ throw out Politicians for - nobody elects interfering nosey parker do-gooders.
true, i'm not defending smoking but the tax revenue from alcohol and tobacco is twice what the NHS spends on treating related diseases, interestingly some health economists suggest the biggest cost is actually obesity, so we should increase the tax on doughnuts
I've heard that the anti smoking zealots now want to ban people from smoking in their own private vehicles! Apparently council tenants are told that they must not smoke in their own houses before a visit by any council official. I don't smoke but I am all for personal freedoms and the last time I looked Smoking is still legal.
This is a difficult one for me as I lost my Mum to lung cancer. She smoked for many years and despite pleas from myself and other family members, she couldn't give up the habit. It really is a dreadful way to die and I swear that if any smoker saw my poor Mum towards the end of her life they would never draw on another cigarette. To put it into perspective, I loved my Mum and I know many say this but to me she was the best Mum in the world. She always put others first, especially her children and went through life with no real luxuries but rarely complained. I'm telling you this because as she lay in her hospital bed with morphine shooting into her bloodstream to numb the pain and oxygen being pumped into her lungs, her mind in a completely vegetative state I was praying for God to take her life, I just couldn't bear to see her like that. Can you imagine that ? The woman that gave you life and worshiped you, the person that you loved more than anyone else in the world and you wanted her to die ? That night will haunt me forever and I wouldn't wish a death like that on anyone. R.I.P. Mum, God bless
I've never understood why (where trialled) there has been such opposition to a "fat tax", whether applied to food or individuals. We tax most things that cause a drain on government resources (car tax to repair roads, alcohol and cigarette's are taxed for healthcare, etc), so why not tax fat? Whether you go after the products and tax by the amount of fat, salt, sugar, etc in each thing, or you give people a tax rebate* based on how low their body fat % is, I do feel something should be done. The cost of junk food plays a big part in why people eat it. *I'm going with rebate rather than an additional tax, as you're never going to get voted in saying you'll tax fat people more. And sorry to hear about your mum kickitoff, cancer is possibly the most evil thing I've come across.
Car Tax repairs the roads!!! What shower did you come down on? Next you will be telling us that NI pays for the NHS!
Ok, well in theory anyway. Seeing as government spending is such a mess, it's really all just theory anyway.
Props to you Kickit for sharing a very personal and obviously still painful experience. Whilst people will continue to debate the rights and wrongs of smoking, which I believe is an important process no matter which side "wins", the individual tragedies that occur should never be trivialised or reduced to mere soundbites by politicians and pressure groups.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0387808/ If you haven't seen idiocracy, it's worth a laugh, not least to see where perpetual dumbing down of the populous may lead...
