Smoker Cessation Program

I found a couple today and have to consider whether or not to write two tonight as both of them are really dumb and annoying.  I'm going to go with this one because it has been bothering me for quite some time.


Let me begin with stating that I am not nor have I ever been a smoker.  It isn't a habit that I support but I also think that things have gotten out of hand.  In New York, a portion of the taxes raised from cigarette sales go to a smoking cessation program.  Some of the large settlement that was awarded several states also goes toward this so the money coming from income taxes is really rather insignificant.  So that isn't the biggest problem that I have with the program.  The problem that I have is the
statements made in the commercials.  The latest shows what can only be assumed (confirmed later) is a mother smoking.  She inhales on the cigarette then it cuts to a child inhaling on medication for his asthma.  They show this a few times then state that second hand smoke causes asthma.  They state this as a fact as if it was going to happen to everyone exposed to second hand smoke.  That to me is something that they can't really prove.  Perhaps it increases the likelihood of the onset of asthma.  To prove my point, if their statement is correct it would mean that I would have 6 cousins with asthma and my mother and her siblings would also have asthma.  They don't so I have just proven their statement wrong.  In fact if all but one of them had asthma I would have disproved their statement.


And this is the problem with most of these advertisements.  They make a statement that not only can't be proven as fact but it can easily be proven to be false.  They are really just hoping that no one will speak against their statement.  There is nothing like lying to prove a point.  How will they respond when someone has seen these as a child then found that they are false statements in the future?


The problem with any medical research is that they don't know what would happen without the experiment.  Someone may get cancer whether they smoke or not, my grandfathers are perfect examples.  One of them smoked from the time that he was 12 (according to him) until he died from colon cancer in his early 70's.  No sign of lung cancer.  So that disproves the statement that smoking causes cancer.  The correct statement is that it increases the odds, not that it will happen.