Biden moves to restrict nicotine levels in tobacco products

Biden administration moves to restrict nicotine levels in tobacco products

I don't smoke and I fully support efforts to protect public health. Dr. C Everette Koop made a difference many years ago.

If someone wants to smoke in a way that does not inflict damage on another person, should government interfere?

Keep in mind that tax dollars are used to buy products that cause far more harm than tobacco.

Do you support this? Why?

 

While I do not use tobacco and this would not impact me personally, I oppose any government efforts to dictate the legal behavior of its citizens. Additionally, I suspect lower nicotine levels would just result in people smoking more cigarettes to get the same level of nicotine, which in the long run would undoubtedly be less healthy for the individual.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

 

This is a slippery one.

Massive amounts of tax dollars are spent on healthcare for people who make stupid life choices so from that angle, I get it. If this helps lower healthcare costs in the long term, then I get the reasoning behind it. I don't have a problem with gov't being more responsible with my tax dollars. In fact, it's the number 1 thing I'd like to see more of from our federal gov't.

However, I'd rather gov't not get involved at all and those who have smoked for 40 years foot their own healthcare bills related to their habit. But that won't happen.

 

I say if someone is moronic enough to smoke cigarettes then the govt should leave the level of tobacco as is.

 

While this is a common theme pushed by the left that at first glance seems to make sense, it is utter B.S., and not fully thought out.

The vast majority of healthcare dollars are spent in the last few years of life. If smoking takes ten years off of a person's life, while it perhaps hastens the spending for those last few years of life, in the long run, it costs the government less because that person died at a younger age. An earlier death saves money in terms of Medicare and Social Security spending.

 

It’s a way to increase tax revenue from smokers and make people who do smoke, smoke more. I’m against this.

 

This is just going to lead to more chain smoking.

They reduce the nicotine levels, but each cigarette has the same amount of carcinogens in it still. So to get the same nic fix, you have to smoke 2 rather than 1 cigarette every time. Anyone who has EVER met a smoker knows that they WILL smoke that 2nd cigarette.

This is so ****ing stupid, if I didn't know Biden stamped his name to the policy I'd be looking around for it.

 

Soooooo it would be even less if they had to pay for it themselves due to their habit.

My point stands.

 

Why is it people on both sides insist on adding to the gov, and not making it smaller? This is a stupid idea, so was the soda tax, we're turning into the UK with a tax on everything. Are people not burdened enough financially as it is?

On another note Darwin's job is a lot harder when we save every dumbass from themselves.

 

LOL....my reply wasnt about your trifling desire for them to pay their own health bills. It was about the oft-claimed notion that smoking increases the cost to the government.

Playing your game though...Since we are just making up nonsensical caveats that would never happen....It would be even less if we also made them pay 50% of their income to a healthcare fund on TOP of paying for their own healthcare. Using your logic, my "point" tops yours.

 

You haven't actually made a point and never at any time countered anything I said.

My entire point/argument was for the gov't to be more responsible with tax dollars, period. If it ends up saving money, do it, if not, don't. I made that clear in my original post and you ignored it because you felt you needed to rant. Hope you feel better.

 

Tobacco smoking is way beyond the appropriate role of federal government. All of this nonsense has to go. We can't afford it. Please white house, what you need to see to is defending the nation, dealing and treating with other nations, maintaining a stable currency and resolving interstate disputes. Those are the appropriate roles and you don't do any of them very well.

 

Will they regulate the fat in a Big Mac… alcohol content…. All ice cream low fat? Maybe they will regulate ammo as a health issue, oh wait, they already have… Give them an inch they’ll take a mile.

 

Why have any restrictions on any drugs?

And if you think this does not affect you you are very very much mistaken. The sheer cost of chronic health diseases caused by tobacco affects everyone



public campaigns plus massive restrictions on where you can smoke

 

Awww! Did the big nasty government mans stop you from buying any narcotic you want whenever you want it? Why can’t you get as much meth as you want legally? Why stop there? Why not do away with road rules and laws about violence and in fact throw out all laws and regulations about everything!

There are places in the world that have this sort of “freedom”

Don’t think you would like living there though

 

Sorry are you advocating “kill a granny” week here?

 

Far less people smoke than 30 yrs ago (its down to 12% from 45% in 1950s) . I don't know if this will result in more people quitting (I think most people switch to milder cigs and eventually quit), then it might save some lives. Currently tobacco use costs nearly $300 billion a year in healthcare, and that's a big coin.

 

Yeesh. You said that it increases the cost to the government or certainly made reference to it doing so. I clearly countered that claim. You can try to argue with what I said, but you most certainly cannot say that I did not counter what you said. You are taking this WAY too personally. It truly is not about you, because you are not the first person to assert that tobacco increases costs to the government. You merely parroted that mindset, and it is that mindset that I responded to.

If your position is that you are not taking a stand and you only want what saves money that is perfectly fine, BECAUSE MY REPLY WAS NOT ABOUT YOU. It was about the notion that tobacco increases costs to the government.

Understand now?

 

I have advocated nothing. I have merely pointed out that the notion that a person smoking increases overall costs to the government, is not as clear-cut as most people assume. It can legitimately be argued that it actually decreases overall costs by them living a shorter length of time, thus drastically lowering the costs to Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security.

 

True, but the US government subsidizes products more harmful, so claiming this is in the interest of public health is not credible. Why does tobacco get restricted while big pharma and food giants get subsidies? (BTW, tobacco companies also own food giants.

 

No it is not because COPD kicks in around 50-60 yrs old often taking the person out of the workforce

 

What “substances” and why are you not advocating for their regulation?

 

One can fabricate many scenarios that favor one side or the other in that debate. Such a tactic actually proves nothing. A 60 year old leaving the workforce is certainly more than made up for by a person with Dementia that lives in a nursing home until they are 95 at which point they have serious cardiac issues and remain in intensive care for a 60 day stint, only to recover to then have a stroke 3 months later that once again puts them in for an extended stay ect etc, all the while they continue to cash Social Security checks for probably 30 years more than the 60 yr old that left the workforce with COPD and then died 10 years later, and they hit Medicaid for a decade's worth of Nursing Home care.

I am not saying that a person dying younger is a good thing, but if you are going to break it down to simple dollars and cents, dying younger costs far less and puts less burden on the system, or at minimum one can make a strong and legitimate argument that it is. Just mentioning a 60 year old with COPD leaving the workforce most certainly is NOT the last word on the subject.

 

the first thing i thought was "now they will just smoke more" or maybe the black market in british cigarettes.

i like the approach of broadcasting an honest appraisal of the danger, limiting advertising and the smoking problem is only a generation away from being over. only took about 50 years. hell, pipes and snuff are virtually gone.

 

I oppose all tobacco control efforts including sin taxes, bans, age restrictions more prohibitive than 18, advertising bans, plain packaging, and now nicotine level regulations.

Smoking indoors should be up to the property owner on private property including businesses.

Tobacco should be legal to cultivate.