AIBU to wonder the future of smoking

[GloGirl]

I come from a 'smokey' family and know lots of people who've smoked - tried to quit, quit entirely, or never stopped. Happy to say I quit a few years back and will never take it up again now, my lungs wouldn't let me.

I remember having an argument with someone a couple of years ago that in our lifetime (So another 50 years) we will see the banning of smoking entirely in the UK. I think the governments have done a great job banning smoking in work environments, raising the prices etc and I can see the effects of those policies reducing smokers.

I just wondered what you saw the future of smoking to be now? Would it ever be banned? Are there any more measures to take which could reduce the future further?

I'm from a smokey lot!

Pretty much everyone I know has switched to tobacco now. I spend around a tenner on baccy a week, much cheaper than the best part of a tenner a day on tailer-made.

I'm glad fewer youngsters are taking it up. I started at age ten after swearing I wouldn't get addicted, would just have the odd one.... 🙄 🙄 🙄 Obviously that turned out great.

I do need to quit, I know.

@Holymolymackerel that's incredibly sad ! I think the older generation smoked a lot more as it was a form of socialization back then and I suppose it is a serious addiction no different to drugs really. I'm glad young people don't smoke like that anymore

I don’t think they’ll ban it, but I do think it will become so old fashioned that very few do it. I notice a lot more people vaping than smoking these days, maybe 10:1 ratio. Of the smokers, they tend to be older. A lot more rolling their own. Outside pubs there’s often only a few smokers now whereas ten years ago virtually everyone would be out there! My dd is 14 and she says virtually no one smokes at school, some use vapes in the toilets; when I invigilated exams in the summer, I genuinely didn’t smell smoke on a single student, as I passed by them.

I’m thrilled it’s becoming unfashionable and uncool to smoke. I did smoke for years and now thankfully I’ve quit, but it’s the thought of people knowing I smoke that puts me off, and the price! Not the health risks unfortunately.

Cigarettes now cost around $40 per pack in Australia which is about £22.18. People are still smoking, I’m sorry to say. Yes they contribute more to their health costs, but they’re still smoking....

Just 40$$??? That’s incredible? How does that compare in terms of income (as in, is that a similar proportion of income to uk costs, or are they actually twice as expensive??) I have often wondered just how expensive they need to be to make people stop. I suppose the high price tag at least prevents young people from starting?

I'm having a fag as I read this thread. I started when I was 17 at work. And it was about 3 quid for 20. As I got older and continued smoking I kept saying I'd quit when it got to a fiver a pack.

I did quit for 4 years because my ex made me quit. But started again through work again. Now it's 8 quid a pack and I'm still not thinking about quitting.

Who doesn't like a 20 deck of b+h when they're smashed?

Grand I bought 20 Marlboro for my friend a few months ago and they were £12!! I wonder if I would have paid that if I hadn’t stopped? It was £8.50 for silver b&h when I last bought them but I was only buying on special occasions. I couldn’t afford that every day or every other day even.
Do you find people are still as generous, crashing out cigarettes outside the pub, or are the prices making people more stingy?

My father was a 30 a day man, no matter what they cost, no matter how tight the family budget was (although to be fair he didn't spend anything else on himself) he'd pay whatever it cost to buy those 30 fags. Luckily it never got to the stage where it was a choice eating or smoking, but I know which one would have won out. Thankfully he quit last year.

Like a large portion of long term smokers he was an addict and those in the grip of an addiction don't make rational economic decisions. You could charge £100 a pack and there would be a portion of smokers who would do whatever it took to get that £100 to buy them.

As for the issue of a ban?

I get slightly annoyed when people suggest it or think it will happen, as they clearly haven't thought the consequences through. 15% of the adult population still smoke, if it were banned tomorrow or even if we succeeded in getting the proportion of smokers down to 5% of the overall population and someone ie. smugglers and criminal gangs would step into the void to supply the unmet need, police are already waging a pointless 'war on drugs' they can't win, adding tabacco to the mix would have incredibly damaging consequences for law and order.

I have certainly had more people asking me or DP for a fag since they done away with 10pks. I always say no to randoms asking me. A workmate that I know I can ask them if I need to then of course I'll share.

I wish I'd never started, or even tried. I was a social smoker for many years, or more accurately a weekend smoker because I was out socialising all weekend. I can remember when you could smoke in pubs and clubs (just) and the habit increases when working in a nightclub and partying after. But the 'quiet' days I didn't smoke at all Mon to Thurs Eve - no smoking Thurs Eve to sun eve - smoker.
I gave up whilst pregnant, but started when DD was 3 months old and PND hit. I've given up since then more times than I can count, the best I ever was was 2 a day for about 18 months. I'm on one pack every 3 days, which with stress and a dip in mental health increases to a pack a day. Which is a vicious cycle, because of the amount I spend. I don't even try to justify it - it's expensive and bad for me. I know this.
What upsets me though is the fact that if you're addicted to just about anything else, you're seen as ill - that addiction is an illness - you've only to look at some of the things said on MN on smoking threads to see that smoking isn't included in that for the most part - but it's still an addictive substance (nicotine)

I think it will die out, the increase in price has cut me down (except as described above) I've also cared for several people who have died from smoking related diseases and I'm fully aware of the risks, but I'll still light up and I think many smokers are like me in that respect. I will continue to try and stop, hopefully one day I shall succeed. And I hope the trend of youth resisting smoking and declining numbers of smokers continues. I don't think a ban would work. I can see it becoming like cannabis if it were, more or less 'allowed' when you have personal use amounts, a caution or help to stop but then you'd have underground 'dealers' who may get harsher penalties. The problem with banning it as well is the price won't be regulated and may well fall again and this will make them more financially viable to many.

I don’t know a single person who smokes and smoking just isn’t even on the radar of my teens and his friends. I think one or two of them vape but cigarettes just don’t occur to them and they haven’t got the means to steal any off parents as none of the parents smoke at all so I think it will certainly die out in some parts of society

I don’t know a single person who smokes and smoking just isn’t even on the radar of my teens and his friends. I think one or two of them vape but cigarettes just don’t occur to them

That's probably because there's a strong association with social class and smoking.

I noticed a change over my 36 years as a hospital doctor. I anaesthetised a weekly bronchoscopy list, to diagnose lung cancer in smokers.
When I started, the patients were over 90% male, and from all social classes.
Then it became 50% women, with noticeably more working class patients.
By the time I retired, it was 75% women and virtually totally working class.
Middle class men listened to the health education message and quit. Women and the poor- not so much.
The vast majority of the patients were dead within one year of diagnosis.
I still feel sad and angry when I see people smoking, especially if they have children with them.
Oh, and the arguments about losing tax revenue from decreased smoking don’t take account of the fact that ex smokers will spend their fag money on other consumer goods, paying VAT.
Also the greatly reduced NHS costs from fewer smoking induced strokes, heart attacks, COPD, multiple cancers including kidney, mouth and bladder as well as lung, amputations from peripheral vascular disease and smoking induced vascular dementia.
And the reduction in fires caused by carelessly discarded cigarettes and matches.
Stopping smoking is a win win for the individual, the NHS, the environment, the treasury and the balance of payments (given that tobacco all has to be imported).
I long for the day when it’s gone for good, and my colleagues never have to tell another poor nicotine addict that they will not see another Xmas.

It should be banned it’s vile, I grew up in a smoking household and I’m a parent down because of it.

@Babdoc my dad was dead within a year of being diagnosed. He was diognosed jan given the all clear in August dead by February.

I was addicted. Started age 12 and was on 30 a day by the time I was 32. I tried vaping in 2013 and didn't have any success
Tried again two years ago - I vaped solidly for 24hrs and thought right, I can't smoke now I've done the worst bit
In the last two years I've had one drag on a cigarette, which reassured me I wasn't missing anything!
I still vape, and it's a LOT cheaper

I started smoking at 13. The smoking ban came in when I was 16/17. I continued to smoke until 2015 when I fell pregnant and I started vaping. Once I had DD, my first night out I smoked. I only smoked when I had a drink. Then I went back to work and only smoked at work. I was averaging a pack a week and vaping the rest of the time. I fell pregnant again in February and haven't had a cigarette since that second line appeared. I do however still vape and probably will for the foreseeable. My mental health is incredibly fragile and for me it's always been a coping mechanism. A way to give myself a time out.

Given the cost, I'm not sure I'll ever buy cigarettes again, however I may pinch one off a friend every now and again as the temptation is huge.

It should be banned it’s vile, I grew up in a smoking household and I’m a parent down because of it

Awful I know, but really do you think it would have stopped an addict from smoking, they'll risk their own lives, the lives of their families, I don't think trivial matter like illegality would make a difference. Pretty much every pub round by me has people hawking knock off fags, can you imagine what sort of epidemic that would be if the sale of cigarettes was prohibited?

@EmperorTomatoRetchup I suppose you have a point. But I do think it’s time to try to phase it out for future generations. I don’t know how though.

Apparently people with MH issues are 2.5 times more likely to smoke.

Sorry I wasn't getting at you, I too grew up in a smoking household though my mother quit before my father, they didn't care if they smelt, they didn't care if the house stunk, they didn't care that my sister and I begged them to stop or that we were short of breath, they didn't care that it took a massive chunk out of the family budget every week or perhaps more accurately none of this was enough to make them stop. I honestly don't think that the prospect of buying fags from a dodgy bloke in a pub carpark rather than a newsagents across the street would have made an iota of difference to them.

@Thighofrelief

I can well believe that. Off the top of my head I know 5 smokers, 4 of us have diagnosed mental health problems, either ongoing or in the recent past. One I don't know her well enough that she would tell me IYSWIM.
If I took 5 of my non smoking friends, I can think of one with the same. Of course I wouldn't necessarily know if they did.

When my DD is playing up and I'm starting to get frustrated with her then I pop her in her play cot and go have a fag.

I think committed smoking is a more complex issue than it appears. It's a signpost for poor self esteem and less than optimal childhoods.