Thursday, June 28, 2007

Smoking

Smoking in buildings used by the public is about to become illegal in England. The Celtic parts of the British Isles have already taken this path, and indeed it was the popularity of this measure in the Republic of Ireland that finally persuaded the government to take the plunge. I will be glad that this is finally to the law. At last we will be able to eat in a restaurant an emerge without clothes and hair smelling foul. However, the punishment for smoking will not approach what happens in Sunni areas of Iraq where Al Qaida punish smokers by cutting off the two 'smoking fingers'.

I have been convinced of the evils of smoking ever since my grandmother took me on her knee and pointed out my cousin who was smoking away. "Look how green he is going" she said, and I'm sure he went as green as Shrek.

Nevertheless, my father smoked, lighting one cigarette with the but of the last one. He died young of a pulmonary embolus while suffering from smoker's polycythemia.

When I attend King's College Hospital we have an X-ray meeting where we review around 50 chest X-rays and chest CTs. The pulmonary radiologist is first class. He tells you straight away whether your patient is a smoker by viewing the state of the lungs on CT. A couple of weeks ago he astonished me by pointing out that the patient smoked cannabis. Only cannabis smoking can produce this degree of emphysema in one so young. Today he made the diagnosis of AIDS in a Nigerian Health Tourist. He had enlarged lymph nodes beneath his chin and nowhere else. "This is a picture pathognomic of HIV infection," he said

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

In California, we have had smoke-free offices, restaurants, public meetings, and bars for years now. The offices where the first to go smoke-free, and I'm guessing that happened about 1986 or so.

It seems so odd now to allow someone to pollute the air that you breathe at the office, or at a restaurant.

The bars were the last to go smoke-free. The howls from the owners, etc., came to naught.

I'm a conservative, and believe the government needs to get off our backs. With this, though, the marketplace wasn't going to work. Oh, I'm going to quit my job because the office won't ban smoking? Stupid.

I support the right of smokers to kill themselves. Just don't pollute my air when you are doing it. (I do draw the line when they try to ban smoking in your own car (!), which is the latest in the liberal legislature of California.

Both my father and mother suffered from COPD. Yet, it was their choice.

Anonymous said...

Smoking is even banned on many popular beaches in Qld Australia.

In fact it is banned in most public areas, except casinos I wonder why?

Terry Hamblin said...

I listened on the radio to Fiona Castle this morning, She is the widow of Roy Castle, the entertainer who, though a non-smoker himself, died of lung cancer. It is said that he contracted it from passive smoking after many years of performing in smoky clubs. She said that for him it was like smoking 17 out of 20 cigarettes lit up around him, and without a filter.