Friday, January 9, 2009

Smoking Still Takes a Heavy Toll in China

The Medscape report, Smoking Still Takes a Heavy Toll in China, based an article in the January 8, 2009 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, is no surprising. Too many stupid Chinese men still believe smoking paints for them an image of maturity and masculinity, while ignoring the great health risk, and oblivious to the fact that smoking actually is linked to impotence. Smokers are costly. Indeed they're mostly using their own money, but all. For those heavily using tax payers' money to treat their smoking related diseases, they'd better die sooner to relieve the society of unnecessary financial burden and create cleaner air to others.

Some quotes of the article:

"They estimate that in 2005, 673 000 deaths were attributable to smoking in China..., the majority of which (538,200) were among men." "The prevalence of tobacco smoking has been continuously high in adult men (around 60%)." "[S]ome of those in government are beginning to understand that revenue gained from tobacco taxation is far less than the healthcare costs associated with smoking."