Sorry folks, when I reread my post I realized several things that I typed had a different tone than I meant.

First, I used the word "you" in the generic sense as in "we" (I did not mean anyone personally).

Second, I don't want it to seem that I support tobbaco. The picture idea is a great one!

Third, the "crimes" I commented on would be failure to act when others are in need. As an example: Prior to my diagnosis, I hardly gave a minute of my time to cancer reasearch or fundraising. It was something that happened to others.

The other comments are to remind myself that I must have better priorities. In the US we spend a huge amounts on things that have little effect on improving humanity. Collectively we in the US should be ashamed at what we are willing to spend our time and money on when compared to what we could be doing.

I try to present data as accurately as I can, without bias. It is a fact that only 20% of the population smokes here. The SF Bay Area is one of the most expensive and desireable places on earth to live (rivaled by Boston and Munich). We have Stanford Univ., UC Berkeley, UCSF (7th highest ranked (teaching/medical school/research)hospital in US and numerous State U's. This is a major research and development center because of close proximity to all of the universities. We also have Lawrence Berkeley and Livermore Labs, not to mention Sandia. Out of the 16,000 registered medical device manufacturers, 10,000 of them are in California with the majority in the SF Bay area. Then there's always Silicon Valley. Did you receive radiation? You were probably treated on a Varian or Siemens linear accelerator which are both manufactured here in the Bay Area.
Bias? The stuff about intelligent population I read in a report someplace (and I am not saying that we don't have our fair share of rude people, village idiots and Neanderthals) - Where is Hannibal Lector when you need him? He only eats the "free range rude").

Obviously something they are doing in California IS working to get people to quit smoking. I commend the Canadians for being ahead of us in their aggressiveness to eliminate smoking.

As far as the Canadian data I listed, contact CNN, I didn't make it up (the source was the Candian Cancer Society).

It all boils down to this, which many have re-iterated in this string - People who are addicted will go to any length to satisfy that addiction. They will do this in spite of knowing the consequences of their actions.

And as far as how we spend money. We are a market driven society (one of the by products of a free society) and as a result we have companies spending more money on Viagra and Minoxodil research than on basic cancer research (not that I agree with this).

So once again, let's get out of the problem and into the solution - how do you get people weaned off of tobacco products?

The solution is automatic; they wean themselves when they contract a terminal illness related to their use of tobbacco.

An interesting observation: does the same market driven economy insist on millions to be spent researching and developing expensive new machines to blast carcinomas when the same amount might have been spent on stopping people from ingesting or inhaling carcinogens to begin with?

From my chair, it seems people are only willing to spend large amounts when it has a potential to save their personal hide. (what is the average cost per RAD treatment). So it will be difficult to get them to change their bad habits until they have become life threatening. Much less try to change someone else's bad habits.

Further, from an economic standpoint, the industry that offers treatment options probably is not interested in preventing the behavior that causes cancer occurances and ultimately provides their economic life blood. (It would not be in the best interest of their stockholders)

(please reference my comment on crimes against humanity)

:rolleyes:

PS. I believe we can have success against this cancer by teaching early detection. Due to human nature (and my observations of tobbacco users) we will have a much harder if not impossible time getting them to stop their bad habits.

What you all fail to mention is the incestuous relationship between government and big tobacco. The government has no desire to regulate tobacco (It has been attempted many times by surgeon generals and the FDA, and has always been over ruled by congress and the senate.) It is big business that rules the roost in the US, be it oil, tobacco, or whatever. Tobacco causes billions of dollars in medical costs each year, including the lost product of those individuals with diseases related to its treatment. I won't even go into the cost in lives and emotional suffering. If the government subsidized real nicotine replacement alternatives (people are addicted to nicotine not tobacco) like they do tobacco, things would change overnight. Current nicotine replacement products have been forced to have lower levels than tobacco, because people can become addicted to nicotine in patch, inhaler, and other forms. How ironic that our government will regulate this but not the higher nicotine content and carcinogen containing tobacco. Nicotine is more addictive than heroin. In the end for both our government, our representatives in it, and the tobacco companies, it is all about $$$, not about people.

"The love of money is the root of all evil"

Nothing like government to make a bad thing worse.

hi,

i can't spell, but here goes anyway.

the lary-jecto-me group in this area goes out and talks to groups, especially high school kids. the guys tell me that the students really pay attention during the presentation/discussion.

does it reduce smoking? who knows. but they think it is an effecive way to help folks make intellegent choices.

cu,
larryb

How `bout we put my picture up on posters, it scared my whole family away..........Just my face might be a scare a smoker........sounds like I`m joking but I`m not.........if it saves a life it`s worth it.......packer

HI

Hope you don't mind me resserecting this topic.
In the UK the campaigns about the links with smoking and cancer are heavy and shocking.
On all the cigarrette packets in big black bold letters you get messages like 'Smoking will kill you' 'Smoking gives you cancer' and on top of that the adverts on the tv showing real lung cancer victims not being able to breathe properly etc, are horrifying. There was an advert where a bunch of smokers were sitting around a table puffing away and real fat from a lung of a smoker was shown oozing out their cigarrettes. These adverts are on the television all the time and are hard hitting. There is nothing nice about them they are to the point. Its also in magazines, on billboards and still people in the UK smoke! Nearly everyone you see is smoking. Lung cancer is the biggest disease related threat to young women in the UK at the moment and still people smoke. Its unbelievable.
Smoking is a drug so incredibly adictive and so difficult to break the habit but you would think with these very frank hard hitting campaigns, people would think twice before lighting up a cigarrette.

Just saw an anti-smoking advert on a Phillipine station. Guy siting in a room puts a cigarette in his mouth, lights up, you hear a gunshot, and see his brains splatter on the wall behing him.

Pretty shocking, pretty graphic. Narration was in Tagolog so I don't know what it said, but I got the idea.

I wonder how many actors turned down that part!