High Time He Went
Posted: Mon Dec 22, 2014 8:00 pm
smackaholic wrote:
anyway, i'd like to thank joe for smoking a few million packs of lucky strike to give us that fabulous voice. too bad it caught up to him.
And how you use them.Moving Sale wrote:Depends on the numbers you use.
Which isn't the same as the chances of dying from lung cancer. Emphysema and other illnesses are included in that 1.1%.Some say 480,000 people die from smoking every year. About 42 million people smoke. That's a 1.1% chance of dying from smoking every year.
Irrespective of what the actual percentage is, the chances of getting lung cancer (which isn't the same as dying from it) are 13 to 23 times greater (depending on gender) for smokers than for non-smokers, according to the American Cancer Society; other sources of data may report different results. To me, that's a more meaningful statistic than the 1% or whatever it actually is.Use different numbers, get different results.
13 to 23 times is a big swing and a 20 times greater chance is still zero if you start from zero, which I know we don't in this case. My point was that different numbers get you to different places and dims saying it's all a 'grift' is stupid.Smackie Chan wrote:
Irrespective of what the actual percentage is, the chances of getting lung cancer (which isn't the same as dying from it) are 13 to 23 times greater (depending on gender) for smokers than for non-smokers, according to the American Cancer Society; other sources of data may report different results. To me, that's a more meaningful statistic than the 1% or whatever it actually is.
That was pretty much my point as well. Look, we'll all die of something, and in many cases lifestyle will have fuckall to do with cause of death. If I can minimize my chances of dying from lung cancer, which I'd consider a well below average way to go, and a means toward that end is to not start smoking or quit if I did, the stats saying my chances of getting lung cancer greatly increase if I smoke might serve as motivation to stay away from tobacco. Of course, that guarantees nothing - I may die of something more hideous that has nothing to do with any choices I make. I've never found a good reason to start smoking (and frankly haven't looked for any), even if there were no health risks. The fact that there are serious health risks just made it easier not to take it up.Moving Sale wrote:13 to 23 times is a big swing and a 20 times greater chance is still zero if you start from zero, which I know we don't in this case. My point was that different numbers get you to different places and dims saying it's all a 'grift' is stupid.Smackie Chan wrote:
Irrespective of what the actual percentage is, the chances of getting lung cancer (which isn't the same as dying from it) are 13 to 23 times greater (depending on gender) for smokers than for non-smokers, according to the American Cancer Society; other sources of data may report different results. To me, that's a more meaningful statistic than the 1% or whatever it actually is.