Should Cigarettes Be Outlawed?

I read a post written by Tony Newman from The Huffington Post called "Will Cigarettes Be Illegal In The Future?" In the post, Tony Newman talks about the effects of cigarette smoking, and how cigarettes have affected smokers and non-smokers. He does support the ban on smoking in public places, but doesn't believe banning cigarettes overall will make anything better. He states, "We should celebrate our success curbing cigarette smoking and continue to encourage people to cut back or give up cigarettes, but let's not get carried away and think that criminalizing smoking or making cigarettes illegal is the answer." Newman also believes that outlawing cigarette smoking would not only cost more taxpayer dollars, but also more lives to be taken. Just like any other drugs, he thinks crime rates will go up because "Instead of buying your cigarettes in a legally sanctioned place, you would have to hit the streets to pick up your fix. The cigarette trade would provide big revenue to "drug dealers," just as illegal drugs do today. There would be shootouts in the streets and killings over the right to sell the illicit substance."

Although Newman makes a great and powerful statement about the ban on cigarettes, I still believe it should be outlawed. Yes, cigarettes is a well-established drug, but he needs to realize that cigarettes kill more Americans each year than alcohol, car accidents, suicide, AIDS, homicide, and illegal drugs combined according to the American Cancer Society. I agree that crime rates will go up because addicted smokers will go and seek for them illegally, but I don't believe the crime will cause as many deaths as cancer does. Cigarettes are not only affecting smokers themselves, but when in public, it affects all the people around them due to second-hand smoke. Smokers have no rights to release carcinogenic toxins into the air that is for everyone to breathe. I still believe cigarettes should be outlawed, it has been proven to cause cancer and also it affects not only the smoker, but everyone that is around that cigarette being smoked.