It's absolutely health-related. Menthol is a mild anaesthetic (remember menthol sports cream?) and permits the inexperienced smoker to inhale fully. Same with the eugenol in kretek cigarettes.
Also, salt in meat and vege stews ~ if you have nothing else in terms of flavour, salt makes it infinitely more appetizing.
I understand the rationale behind this prohibitionist, paternalistic approach (maintain a healthy work/consumption force, reduce burden on socialised healthcare, improve GDP), but the additional cost to the economy is already built in to these goods - smoke tax (it’s not just tobacco, it’s anything you could burn and inhale) in the uk more than covers the cost of smoking related illness.
...according to the people who sell cigarettes.
Smoking related illnesses in the UK cost the NHS (taxpayers) around £5Bn year, and taxes on tobacco raise around £9Bn. So it's pretty close, but that £4Bn gap will need to be made up from somewhere. Personally I'd legalise the wacky tobaccy and tax that, but there really ought to be equivalent taxes on vaping too.
Also if life expectancy goes up, there will be an even greater shortfall in pensions too.
No need to demonstrate health risks first?
They only include smokers. They don't include, for example, the children of smokers, who have many much more respiratory illness than other children.
The hospital admission costs only include this list, and only include them when these are the primary diagnosis of the admission episode.
Importantly, the cost used is the payment by results cost, not the actual cost to the treating trusts or GP surgeries.
> Smoking attributable admissions are defined as spells where the primary diagnosis of the admission episode is attributable to the following ICD-10 codes:
> malignant neoplasms: lip, oral cavity, pharynx (C00 to C14), oesophagus (C15), stomach (C16), pancreas (C25), larynx (C32), trachea, lung, bronchus (C33-C34), cervix uteri (C53), kidney and renal pelvis (C64 to C66, C68), urinary bladder (C67), acute myeloid leukaemia (C92), unspecified site (C80)
> cardiovascular diseases: ischaemic heart disease (I20 to I25), other heart disease (I00 to I09, I26 to I51), cerebrovascular disease (I60 to I69), atherosclerosis (I70), aortic aneurysm (I71), other arterial disease (I72 to I78)
> respiratory diseases: pneumonia, influenza (J10 to J18), bronchitis, emphysema (J40 to J43), chronic airway obstruction (J44)
> diseases of the digestive system: stomach ulcer, duodenal ulcer (K25 to K27), Crohn’s disease (K50), periodontal disease (K05)
> other diseases: age related cataract (H25), hip fracture (S72.0 to S72.2), spontaneous abortion (O03)
I literally only have Coca-Cola for an occasional treat these days - My Beloved Irn-Bru, 7up & San Pellegrino have all been adulterated with awful-tasting artificial sweeteners and are simply unenjoyable for me now.
It's a weird future I find myself in, where I will never drink any of these things again, punished because of some third party entity's paternalism where other third parties are concerned (I'm not personally fat nor enjoy a diet that would ever make me so).
The only problem is what they replace sale, sugar fat with can be worse.
Obviously sugar provides some calories, but no one is getting fat from the sugar in cigarettes. The caloric value is negligible.
Yup, ammonia will totally improve the taste.
Yes, it is that addictive that he would knowingly switch to menthols to help him ramp back up again.
I believe the general war on tobacco to be rooted in health concerns, but I believe this action to be a test to confirm the societal acceptance of this approach.
What makes cigarettes so lethal is all the other toxins.
Which isn't to say that lozenges are likely to cause it - it's still primarily caused by inhaling irritants - just using it to illustrate how something that interferes with elastin production might affect your breathing, even if you aren't inhaling it.
It's the same mechanism that smoking damages your skin. Nicotine in your blood gets everywhere. It affects elastin production throughout your body.
Smoking is a multi-stage attack on alveoli. You're both physically damaging them with the smoke and inhibiting their ability to regenerate. But they're a high-use tissue. Even without the additional damage, you're harming their ability to regrow.
I was gonna say, tho, if they were gonna ban ALL caffeine for kids under 18, oh boy Coca Cola would have a shit fit I'm sure.