I was a little busy yesterday with various things and, as it was Budget day, I wanted to get something posted about the budget as soon as I could but if there was one thing that annoyed me more than anything yesterday it was the reports of a call by doctors to ban smoking in private cars.
This was supposedly to protect children - but the call was not for a ban on smoking in private cars when children are present. No, they want to ban smoking in cars regardless of who is in it and whose car it is.
Leaving aside the obvious about personal intrusion, it's none of the doctors damn business what we get up to. They are not elected, they are not paid to decide legislation and their views are no more relevant or valid than those of anyone else - they are just members of the public like you and I.
What is more, when literally thousands of people are dying each year simply because of their incompetence and the failure of the institutions where they work, they really should concentrate in putting their own house in order before giving their opinions on areas which are absolutely none of their business.
The NHS is a disaster zone. Their hospitals are infested with superbugs. Patients are stuffed in cupboards and left to starve. Basic care is forgotten and dignity for patients non-existent. GP's work less for more and half of the people brought in to cover the work they refuse to do can't even speak basic English.
If they were genuinely interested in saving lives they'd start by sorting out that mess - not interfering in what you and I do while alone in our cars. I don't even smoke, but I'm happy to let smokers light up in my car. If I was going to spend my life fretting about carcinogens then the ones I'd be more concerned about are those pumped out by diesel engined vehicles - trains, buses, lorries and cars - far more than the odd B&H in my presence.
Incidentally, one of the illnesses in children that doctors attribute to second hand cigarette smoke is asthma. If that is true then why have the rates of asthma risen so dramatically in the last 30 years while the rates of smoking (as well as the places one can smoke) have declined considerably.
When I was a kid, most of us spent most of our time in the company of smokers, but somehow we didn't all get asthma or diseases of the middle ear. If there was a genuine link between the two then you would have expected to see asthma rates decline at a similar rate to smoking - but it hasn't. It has gone up. That sort of thing sets off my bullshit detector.
4 comments:
Here here. I hate smoking, but I hate government interference a whole lot more.
The government should be doing everything it can to encourage smoking. Think of all the extra tax revenue that smokers generate. Also if they snuff it before retirement, they are less of a burden on the public purse.
As perverse as it sounds, Richard is correct. I do not understand what this obsession with prolonging people's lives is nowadays. Where will it end? Can't they see that it is just futile AND unsustainable?
When I was a kid, most of us spent most of our time in the company of smokers, but somehow we didn't all get asthma or diseases of the middle ear.
Precisely. I can remember the clouds of smoke in my maternal grandparents house; my paternal grandfather smoked a pipe! I do not have any respiratory problems whatsoever.
I happen to think that the problems are caused by all the synthetic chemicals in the environment.
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