May 13, 2014 12 - 1:30 PM EDT
Unlucky Strike: Private Health and the Science, Law and Politics of Smoking
(University of Buckingham Press, 2014)
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Smoking is risky for smokers, but is it bad for the rest of us? Science says no. Those who die from smoking tend to die close to retirement age. Lifetime medical costs for smokers are less than for nonsmokers. The risk to others of secondhand smoke is impossible to measure and is probably negligible. In short, smokers are not a public cost. So why are they over‐taxed, dissed, and discriminated against in so many ways? A good question, examined at length in Unlucky Strike by John Staddon, author of more than 200 scientific papers, with original illustrations by the renowned artist David Hockney.