1 of every 5 deaths in US due to smoking

cdc.gov

5 points·acqq··6 comments

I would love to know how they determined that "49,400 deaths per year from secondhand smoke exposure." This diagnosis does not appear on a single death certificate...anywhere.

It's somewhat scary when you government peddles outright falsehoods like this....

I wholeheartedly agree on this. I believe that the statistics cited in every tobacco study is exaggerated beyond belief because the criteria used is not transparent. What is the criteria for "secondhand smoke exposure"? With many other scientific studies being tampered to show favored results, why not these tobacco studies?

I believe these studies are tampered and the primary beneficiary are the insurance companies because if they can classify an insuree as a smoker, they can claim that the individual is negligent of their own health and therefore the policy is null and void.

If they want to run studies this way, I suggest we review the effects of alcohol on the individual and the psychology of the family that surrounds the individual.

They cite the references:

http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5745a3.htm

Do you want to say it's a conspiracy?

Yes, I do. If you follow the references, no actual evidence is presented.

Any non-US studies?

Right, I took a look:

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passivrauchen

You can use Google translate: apparent estimate for Germany per year is "3.300, more than sum of dead from Asbest and illegal drugs."

It's obviously significantly less than in U.S., but I can imagine that such differences are really possible considering how health insurance functions -- in Germany all people are covered no matter how poor they are. The average quality of life (through all social strata) is certainly much higher. Or just compare the percent of people in prisons, etc, etc.

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