Tobacco Prohibition

By: Jireh Abraham

Cigarette, besides guns or bombs, are the deadliest artifacts in human civilization. Because of the cigarette is addiction causing, smokers are usually found themselves unable to quit it. many scientist have prove that cigarettes kill six million people each year, which is more than from AIDS and traffic accidents combined. And also there are some evidence proved that each cigarette a person has smoked could cause 11 minute of lifetime reduced. The only way to avoid these problems, the government and people should be cooperated as to stop it’s influence by banned the manufactory and market sales of cigarettes. Because it is nothing else important than the achievement of international cigarettes prohibition; as if we want to save lives and improve health. 

However, some argue that as long as the cigarettes only harms the one who chose to use it, the government should let them make their own decessions just like alcohol. But at first, cigarettes is not similar to alcohol, cigarettes give dangers through secondhand smoke, for example children might get harm or been misguide when adult smoke indoor with them nearby, or the new born child may become oaf if pregnant women smoke cigarettes during their pregnancy. At second, alcohol would only cause addiction when people become alcoholic, and it’s dangers too health are always be limited and predictable.

On the other hand, even though the cigarettes is harmful to health, but what is unquestionable is the market size of it. The tobacco industry is the one of the most valuable economic in the world. There are over thousands of different sizes of tobacco manufacture enterprise based on all over the world, which also means there are over millions or even billions of employees working from different country right now, for 24 hours, and all over the world in different positions. Once the cigarettes market has been banned, these people will also lose their job in the same time, this unemployment may become the biggest problem to every country in fact. Therefore, if the international prohibition of cigarettes are define as able to succeed, the government should take action according to the balance of employment, and process as slowly as possible as in order to maintain the unemployment rate.

The other argument is ban on cigarettes might result in the same kind as the Prohibition in US. Which is like the effort to ban alcohol, prohibiting the sale or use of cigarettes would brings a lot of money and opportunities for the organized crime, and also might fuel corruption in law-enforcement agencies, while little doing to reduce smoking. But that may be a false comparison. Because after all, many smokers would actually like to see cigarettes banned because they want to quit.