Should the smoking ban be delayed?
I refer to the letter by P.A. Crush (Talkback, January 10).
Your correspondent said: 'Smokers are not 'compelled' by their addiction to continue smoking as Clear the Air suggests.'
Why is it then that so many people try to quit, but cannot. Throwing in a recent statistic, why is it that a smoker needs to try to give up smoking 10 times before managing to quit? Smoking is clearly an addiction, much like crack cocaine, which has in fact been said to be easier to give up than smoking.
In terms of your correspondent's reference to polluting vehicles on the road, most private vehicles do not run on diesel fuel and therefore do not spew out particulate matter (PM-2.5), which can travel directly into our lungs when we breathe, much like tobacco smoke or the smoke that escapes from coal-fired power plants.
This pollution from buses and goods trucks is therefore the most harmful to public health and should be targeted first, before private vehicles, especially given the high number of buses concentrated around the most (roadside) polluted areas.
