Should we ban smoking?

Smoking tobacco is the most expensive social burden in the UK, costing the government roughly £65 billion per year. It also indirectly accounts for up to 20% of deaths in the UK, as it is the main causing factor of lung cancer and smoker's illnesses, such as chronic bronchitis and emphysema. Despite 65% of regular smokers dying from some form of respiratory disease, 20% of the English adult population still smoke; causing huge strains on both a personal and national scale, which raises the question: should we ban smoking?

The reasons for the ban of smoking are pretty simple if you think about it: increased life expectancy, quality of life and a less-stressed NHS. On average, the life expectancy of a smoker is roughly 5-10 years lower than a non-smoker, and in addition to this the DALYs (disability-adjusted life years) of smokers can add up to around 15 years- about 1/5 the average life. Furthermore, 1/3 of cigarettes in Britain are smoked by people with mental illnesses, seriously worsening their physical health, in addition to their mental issues. 

COPDs (Chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases) are found in around 58% of smokers, and this includes diseases such as chronic bronchitis, emphysema and lung cancer; the former two of which cause permanent and irreversible lung damage. Emphysema is a condition in which the phagocytes in the blood move to the inflamed lung tissue when smoking and release the enzyme elastase (in order to reduce swelling), which then digests the walls of alveoli- therefore reducing their surface area, meaning that gas exchange happens less efficiently and so people who have this often have to have a constant flow of oxygen going into their blood stream (often an oxygen tube) so that their body has enough oxygen to function. 

In addition to this, countries where tobacco is farmed are extremely poor, and often the average worker on tobacco farms is a child. This is the case in Malawi, where almost all of the workers have gained a nicotine addiction from handling the tobacco leaves every day, but they are often forced to carry on as, for many, this is their only source of income (this often results in nicotine poisoning). Furthermore, there are also many environmental impacts which tobacco farming has, including deforestation, of which 26% is due to tobacco farming in Malawi. 

In conclusion, there are simply no advantages of smoking tobacco - apart from the social factor of thinking its 'cool'-, so why not just ban it? Well, its not as simple as that.

Many people argue that every human being has the right to do what they want with their own body- which I partially agree with, as I think that one's body is truly one's own; however, I think that if one is harming themselves or the people around them this belief is partially compromised. This belief is applicable to not only smoking but a huge range of other medical issues and diseases, such as obesity, substance abuse and alcoholism, and, such as with many other ethical issues surrounding medicine, there is no prefect solution to this problem.

As with any other damaging burden, the government and the NHS are trying to persuade people to stop and try to live a healthy lifestyle, however I don't think that there will ever be a complete ban on smoking due to the belief that everyone can do what they want with their body; but, I do think that this raises questions such as: why is prostitution illegal if everyone can do what they want with their own body?

In a nutshell, theoretically a ban on smoking would do more good than bad, as it would improve millions of lives across the UK, but due to ethical issues it is simply not feasible in the real world that we live in.