On the first July in 2007 the government decided to ban smoking in England. This meant that it is illegal to smoke in practically all public places. The purpose of this ban was to eliminate second hand smoking. Second hand smoking also known as passive smoking and has been proven more dangerous than smoking its self. Even as little as 30 minutes can reduce the blood flow in a non smoker’s heart. Diseases like lung cancer, heart disease and stroke kill about 11,000 non smokers in the UK due to the smokers around them. I strongly believe that public should be discussing this issue as lives are being lost.
The smoking ban has a big effect on the government as they receive 77% of the money for every pack of cigarettes sold. This may be the reason behind the government only decided to just having a ban in only public places. The British Medical Association has produced a piece titled ‘behind the smokescreen: the myths and the facts’ which supports the smokings ban. It states the ‘facts’ and ‘myths’ about different aspects of smoking e.g. Public opinion, enforcement and health and science.
This source can definitely be trusted as the British Medical Association is a well known registered national association. This source can easily be labelled as biased as it gives only 1 view point e.g. ‘Myth’: a smoking ban in enclosed public places in an unwanted infringement of the individual’s freedom of choice’. These statements boldly display the fact that the BMA are strongly for the smoking ban, dismissing some sources which claim ‘risk of passive smoking greatly exaggerated’.
Antony Worrall Thompson, on the other hand, thinks different. The representative from FOREST (Freedom Organisation for the Right to Enjoy Smoking Tobacco) stated in September 2001’it strikes me as barking mad that on the one hand we want to relax the licensing laws but on the other hand we want to tell the smoker that he/she is not allowed to relax with a cigarette to go with their drink’. Because Thompson is a well known representative of FOREST in Britain this source can only be trusted. In this Source Thompson, openly proclaims this be wilderness as to why the government decided to introduce the smoking ban so this source is undoubtedly biased.
Personally I believe the government did right to introduce the smoking ban in the UK. This ban will help lower the number of people suffering from illnesses due to passive smoking and hopefully also reduce the number of deaths each year. I am sure there are many people, out there who have different opinion to me. These people most likely would be smokers. I say this because the smoking ban now holds problems for them, as they cannot smoke wherever they wish whenever they want to.
I think this issue will continue to be vigorously debated about many years from now. We cannot really predict if the government will ever totally ban smoking in the UK because there are so many contrasting opinions on this issue at the moment. Even though it is proven that around 11,000 non smokers are dying each year due to passive smoking, the government still allows smokers to light up in the presence of a non smoker by not introducing a total ban. Smoking ban also saved about 40,000 lives, the number of young people using tobacco is increasing the Government should focus on children and youngsters from tobacco industry marketing while parents and carers can do much more to protect children from exposure to second hand smoke.
Tobacco is one of the most widely-used recreational drugs in the world; mainly in the form of cigarettes, but also in cigars and pipes, and in combination with cannabis and marijuana in ‘joints’. Although most countries put age restrictions on its use, over a billion adults smoke tobacco legally almost every day, and supplying this demand is big business. As well as having serious health consequences for smokers themselves, the pollution of other people’s atmospheres with cigarette smoke also makes this an environmental issue. Attitudes have changed rapidly over the past twenty years. In the developing world, public opinion has shifted against smoking. By the 1990s, the sheer weight of evidence had forced major tobacco companies to admit that their products are both harmful and addictive. Many governments have substantially increased taxes on tobacco in order to stop smoking.