To wonder if people were actually healthier when everyone smoked

I kind of get what you’re saying- when I smoked I was a lot fitter and thinner. Once I stopped smoking I seemed to transfer to comfort eating, and since then (over two decades) I’ve gradually gained five stones. Neither situations are great for my health!

But I live, apparently, in the town with the most smokers in the U.K., and I’ve been on their heart/lung ward with my mother, and it’s a scary place.

My weight didn't change when I gave up smoking but I have always ate a lot and been thin.

Haven't got the will to read the thread, but back in the day when more people smoked and we were all thin, there also wasn't a Costa or a Starbucks on every corner selling calorie-laden enormous coffees and various high-calorie snacks/cakes etc., or Deliveroo bringing a bacon sandwich whenever someone fancies one. I think this culture of excess on demand has more to with expanding waistlines than not smoking.

Oh right, so you're pissed?

A friend who is a surgeon said it is absolutely the worst thing you can do to your body.

"I think maybe you're dismissing too quickly the fact that hardly anyone was obese when smoking was commonplace"

I think maybe you're dismissing too quickly the fact that hardly anyone was obese when hat wearing was commonplace.

Do you see how silly your argument is?

Plenty of obese people who smoke. It really does not make/keep you thin.

Smoker’s lungs vs non-smoker’s lungs.

Tell me which one looks healthy, @Fragmentedbrain.

I was anxious as fuck when I was a smoker! And 20 years after quitting I’m only about 3 kg heavier, so it hasn’t turned me obese.

You're complaining that 'people rarely think about health' while harking back to a time when more people inhaled highly carcinogenic substances? 🤔

You do realise smoking kills more people than obesity, right?

All I can say is that's one heck of an apt user name you have.

(And on next week's show: Asbestos - It Wasn't All Bad.)

Is it half term again?

I was watching a documentary from 1979 about the darts player Eric Bristow recently (odd I know, but Richard Osman recommended it on his podcast as a period piece showing a time that’s completely changed in his lifetime so I went off down a YouTube rabbit hole and watched it) and smoking was completely commonplace. Eric and his opponents were competing in tournaments, fag in one hand, darts in the other, there was a cloud of smoke hanging over the venue, everyone in the audience, young and old, all smoking. Then the documentary showed him going to meet and greets in working men’s clubs, a long table set ready for punters, a row of ashtrays every few feet down the middle of the table. He was lying on the bed talking to his manager, fag in hand or sitting on the train, puffing away. The documentary was supposed to be about his rise to fame and his talent, but the smoking mesmerised me. Do have a look OP because what was unmistakable was that everyone looked pasty and ill, everyone looked old (including Bristow who was only in his late teens when it was filmed) everywhere looked brown or beige and smelly and there were plenty of obese people around too. No wish to return to that. Oh and Eric died aged 60, heart disease.

I think @Fragmentedbrainraises important issues even if they are not neccessarily right on every point. Every single public health intervention has positive and unforeseen negative consequences. Sure the health benefits of everyone not smoking outweigh the negative, but maybe there are some negative? The ban on smoking indoors meant people didn’t go to pubs as much and drank (and smoked) more at home instead. It doesn’t meant it was the wrong thing to do but that there were other consequences. The promotion of breastfeeding as a public health good means more babies are admitted with dehydration and jaundice - but those downsides are arguably outweighed by other health benefits. Personally I think there needs to be much more recognition that everything has negative consequences as well as beneficial ones.

They have better eating habits...cultures etc

Ridiculous.

Don't be an idiot!!!

Science 101. Correlation does not prove causation.

When everyone smoked (I assume you refer to the 1920s. when upper class ladies were presented with jewellery encrusted cigarette holders for their 21sts) the world was different - no climate change, no pesticides, and most importantly - no hormones we all take voluntarily (those who take the pill and use HRT and similar) and involuntarily - all of us drink the water from the system into which hormone users pee. No central heating and no overeating, everyone a skinny legend and no ladies with size 40 shoes and a size 14 dress - it was a different and a very healthy universe!!!!

What is a GLP?

I agree. I gave up smoking many years ago and have been much better, no cough for a start. I was always getting upper respiratory infections, now I don't. My risk of stroke or coronary has reduced, veins and arteries repair fairly soon after smoking stops. I can't predict about lung cancer, that could still happen but one hopes it won't until I am very old and probably won't even know. I do know I am not exacerbating it.

However smoking was social, the smoking areas at work were useful, you'd meet people from other departments and useful contacts were made. There was also a camaraderie amongst smokers.

I think we have gone too anti-smoking here and hope it doesn't ever get to the stage where people can't smoke in their own homes or gardens, nevertheless it is a very unhealthy habit.

Still no cure for stupid I see.