Sir Chris Whitty - ‘What an odious man’
Friday, November 4, 2022 at 9:00 England’s Chief Medical Officer has renewed his attack on Big Tobacco.
In a speech reported by the Telegraph:
The cigarette industry should be destroyed for the benefit of public health, Prof Sir Chris Whitty, the UK Government’s Chief Medical Adviser, has said.
It’s not the first time Whitty has raged against the tobacco industry but this time it seemed to strike a nerve, on Twitter at least.
Even though it was quite late when we tweeted his comment - with a link to the Telegraph report - the response far exceeded the usual reaction to a Forest tweet.
The comments too were almost universally hostile to the CMO. For example:
What an odious man.
Zealot who should not be in office.
People like him just make me wanna smoke more and more.
Next it will be alcohol, these people enjoyed their lockdown powers way too much.
He was prepared to destroy society in the interest of Public Health.
Tobacco puritans and nannies who want to define other people's lives.
I enjoy a few beers and I enjoy smoking it's personal choice and yes it might shorten my life but life is about risk. Jumping out of an aircraft next year from 1500ft. Yes I might die if the parachute doesn't open, my choice however.
I wish they'd stop treating us as 5 yr olds. Where does it end? We cant drink? We can't cross the road without government consent? We can't eat meat? Government sanctioned insect food? Only have heat when we're allowed? This isn't living, this is imprisonment!
Also (and more nuanced):
It's a difficult one. As a non smoker I can see that it's immoral to sell goods you know cause harm/death. But I also know people who have smoked moderately into very old age as one of the few 'pleasures' in their life. One man's meat is another man's poison.
More on this and the return of the stop smoking blob later.
Update: Discussed this with Vanessa Feltz and Deborah Arnott of ASH on TalkTV this afternoon. I say discussed. At one point it felt like Deborah was trying to usurp Feltz and take on the presenter’s role. Talk about pushy!
Reader Comments (3)
The sudden sight of Chris Whitty has inspired me to go to the local bookshop this morning and finally order a copy of A State of Fear by Laura Dodsworth, enough is enough.
State of fear: how ministers ‘used covert tactics’ to keep scared public at home
2 April 2021
"Government’s ‘psychological strategies’ to manipulate unwitting public’s behaviour may backfire and lead to long-term damage, experts claim"
"They also claim that “inflated fear levels will be responsible for the ‘collateral’ deaths of many thousands of people with non-Covid illnesses” who are “too frightened to attend hospital”.
"Dated March 22, the paper written by the Scientific Pandemic Influenza Group on Behaviours (SPI-B) stated:
“A substantial number of people still do not feel sufficiently personally threatened; it could be that they are reassured by the low death rate in their demographic group, although levels of concern may be rising … the perceived level of personal threat needs to be increased among those who are complacent, using hard-hitting emotional messaging. To be effective this must also empower people by making clear the actions they can take to reduce the threat.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/04/02/state-fear-ministers-used-covert-tactics-keep-scared-public/
The Secondhand Smoke terror all over again.
In today
"Smoking halved the risk of being infected."
"Only smoking was associated with a decreased risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection....No other factors, neither demographic, clinical, disability, comorbidity, nor treatment was associated with the risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection"
Hat tip Phil and Chris Snowdon
Risk and prognostic factors for SARS-CoV-2 infection in Spanish population with multiple sclerosis during the first five waves
2022 Oct 19
Variables associated with COVID-19 infection
Only smoking was associated with a decreased risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection (OR 0.491; 95% CI 0.275–0.878; p = 0.017). No other factors, neither demographic, clinical, disability, comorbidity, nor treatment was associated with the risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection (Figure 4).
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9626970/
They have known it was a possibilty that the nitric oxide in tobacco smoke might be protective against SARS since 2005.
Nitric Oxide Inhibits the Replication Cycle of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus
https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/jvi.79.3.1966-1969.2005?permanently=true
ASH had been hailing it as a dangerous pollutant in tobacco smoke for years until it was proved to be made by the human body as part of the immune system and considered safe for use with premature babies to help their lungs develop , even in England.
There is no cigarette industry in this country anymore. Former health secretary Andrew Lansley promised to create a climate where tobacco could not trade here and he succeeded in getting the tobacco factories closed down and ensuring thousands of people lost their jobs.
The anti smoker industry is fascism dressed in Nurse Ratchet's uniform. People need to open their eyes to see what is really going on. It's not about health. It is about hate, discrimination, prejudice and abuse of power.