Smoking causes 100,000 premature deaths a year in Britain. Nine out of ten deaths from lung cancer are caused by smoking. Nearly a quarter of heart diseases are caused by smoking, and also less obvious things are caused by smoking. Smokers may enjoy food less because cigarettes change the way your food tastes, teeth will be discolored from tar and fingers may be stained yellow. Also a great deal of smoker complain of ‘smokers cough’. This is due to our bodies way of trying to get rid of the tar that has settled in the bronchial tubes, by producing extra mucus to clean the lungs. So if smoking is proved to cause all these health hazards and repulsive things then why do people, including the young, smoke?
Tobacco first arrived in the 16th century, and many Europeans started to smoke as they believed tobacco contained medicine, which was good for their health. Today it is well known that the opposite is true and the reason so many people may hate smoking but cant give up is because cigarettes contain a chemical called nicotine. Nicotine gives a person many good feelings, these feelings you get are what draw you back for another cigarette. Nicotine causes rapid relief of adrenaline which feels good and it’s effects are:
- Rapid heartbeat
- Increased blood pressure
- Rapid, shallow breathing
It also makes you eat less and some people find this a good thing but it is definitely not. It causes you to think that you have no sugar unlike the weight loss caused by exercising, this makes you have high cholesterol and damages arteries this causes heart attacks. Nicotine is why its tremendously hard to give up smoking.
So just because smoking is so addictive and smokers cant give up why should non-smokers suffer? Some people think of cigarette smoke as their worst enemy as it kills friends and family each day, so why should people suffer walking into a pub or restaurant being intoxicated with smoke. They shouldn’t. Some people may have the braveness and will to give up and then people are encouraging them to start again by smoking in front of them. This leads to the main point of this essay. Should smoking be banned in public places?
As many people have died from passive smoking alone more and more people are calling for a ban of smoking in all public places. To a certain extent these people have succeeded as smoking is now banned in places such as cinemas, public transport and shops. Many restaurants have non-smoking areas but still, smoke can drift. And what is the point in not inhaling smoke in one place and then going and inhaling it in another.
Some places such as Ireland have totally banned smoking in public places and it has worked very well. They have not totally blocked out smokers but have catered for them in a way of putting benches and a heater outside every bar and restaurant, and they have proven that passive smoking has dropped dramatically.
If smoking was banned in public places we would have to provide facilities for smokers too. As much as some people may hate smoking it is exceedingly difficult to give up. Even though 11 million strong willed people have give up smoking in the UK many young people are trying it for the first time this second.
We are encouraged to cut down on junk food and it is too be much less available and alcohol should be soon too but why not cigarettes. The NHS spends billions each year on diseases caused by smoking. But if our country cant come to face facts and do this grand deed of banning smoking in public places then the least they can do is educate our children and gear them away from smoking as this is where the risk begins. Stopping smoking or helping and encouraging our children not to smoke is vital. There are many organizations available to help smokers but above all we must remember that we are the ones to make a difference by stressing to our younger generation that smoking is a killer, and can only ever be described as SUICIDE.
