Walgreens' "Million Hearts" HealthWashing Ploy

Let's not pretend that policy development is always innocent in its inception. It is derived to obtain a result that is often driven by agendas. We only need to look at the regulatory environment for GMO's, petroleum exploration

The use of selective data in meta-analysis and the pseudo-science of statistical analysis detailing likelihoods instead of scientific evidence can be used to distract the public attention from just about any likely contributor to disease, including nuclear bomb tests (2,050 between 1954-1998 - Brookings Institution), industrial contamination, dietary shifts away from traditional diets, etc. As well, with over 600 additives and an unknown amount of pathogens in the average cigarette, one might want to consider the adulterants in their investigations instead of the scapegoat.
There has yet to be a single study that has proven a causal link between cancer and smoking. Only biased meta-analysis and statistical re-interpretation.

For example, in his pioneering studies in the 1950s and 60s, Professor Sir Richard Doll reckoned that about 160 in 100,000 smokers developed lung cancer as opposed to 7 in 100,000 nonsmokers; so you have about a 24 times greater risk if you smoke. This can also be expressed as '2,400%'. This is an estimated risk shown as a percentage and is often used in policy decisions and propaganda. The reality remains that no study has shown a causal link between cancers and smoking.

In fact, the opposite is true. There are several health benefits to smoking backed up with peer-reviewed studies demonstrating causal links between the health benefits and tobacco. Google smoking or tobacco and health benefits, eg. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_benefits_of_smoking

We are talking about a plant that has been consumed for thousands of years but the health concerns only seemed to have arisen in parallel with industrialization.

Of course, unless you want to prove more about how unhealthy smoking is, you'll probably have difficulty in finding funding to provide independent scientific analysis of tobacco. And yet the results keep trickling in.

Another interesting avenue for investigation is the change to tobacco farming and cigarette production practices. Good quality tobacco goes to export markets and expensive cigar production. Cigarettes in North America are actually composed of blends of local tobacco and tobacco grown in countries with poor environmental regulations (usually African) where pesticides, fertilizers, anti-fungals and organic pathogens are a matter of course. After the whole leaf tobacco goes to manufacturing low quality cigars and pipe tobacco, remnants are ground up and mixed with chemical additives and liquids to make a slurry, which is then poured onto a forming fabric similar to how paper is made. These sheets are then shredded and stuffed into cigarette tubes. That can't be good and would certainly add to risk.

And don't get me started on the second hand smoke myth that really ramped up smoking bans. It would be easier for me to point out the efforts of others. http://www.smokershistory.com/etsheart.html for starters.

In fact, an interesting analysis of the lies behind smoking and health policy can be found at the news aggregator and analysis site Signs of the Times: http://www.sott.net/articles/show/231973-Smoke-Lies-and-the-Nanny-State

The disproportionate response to smoking when compared to other potential polluters (cars, for example) makes me wonder what the driver behind the movement is. In this era of corporate contamination of governments, I can only imagine the agenda is to draw our attention away from the industrial polluters so they can continue poisoning us without blame or obstruction.

I don't deny there are risks associated with smoking as there are with alcohol use and milk drinking. But I think the convenient scapegoat of smoking as the blame for cancers is naive at best and dangerous at worst. We cannot live in a risk free environment, which is precisely what the nanny state expends incredible amounts of energy trying to achieve. As adults, we should be able to govern ourselves in how we assess risk and in our actions, provided those actions don't impede on the rights on others in a significant way. I smoke organic, whole leaf tobacco. Since switching from traditional cigarettes, my lungs have cleared up and my rheumatoid arthritis and fibromyalgia has almost disappeared. At 45, my blood pressure is almost like that of a teenager. In fact, my doctor couldn't find any evidence of my smoking she often sees and hears in her smoking patients.

Another interesting thought is that if smoking is so deadly and anti-smoking measures have now been in place for a few decades, why do we only see the constant rise in diseases attributed to smoking, be they in smokers or non-smokers alike? Would we not expect to see a decline in such disease?

There's so much I could add but I fear I've already taken more than enough space. Anyone interested in serious research on this topic can find all of the information they need through searching Google Scholar and Pub Med.