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Published online 23 July 2008 | Nature | doi:10.1038/news.2008.980
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Gates and Bloomberg team up to tackle tobacco epidemic
Philanthropists pledge half a billion dollars to fight tobacco use in developing countries.
New York city mayor Michael Bloomberg and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates announced today that they will commit half a billion dollars to fight tobacco use in developing countries.
The ‘tobacco epidemic’ now kills 5.
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A large-dose recreational pharmaceutical arising from massive agricultural inputs cannot be trivially ended? 192,000 hectares of Afghani poppy fields in 2007 were invisible to multi-$billion/year US War on Drugs' aerial and satellite surveillance. Perhaps they were accidentally catalogued as bean fields. Let them smoke. Push alcohol, marijuana, opiates, hallucinogens, tranquilizers, uppers, downers, anti-depressants... Ritalin and Aderall for their kids... and statins to purge cholesterol from their brains. No contraception! "we know what it takes to save millions of lives" How are eight billion humans better than seven billion?
What a waste of money, how patronizing and how naive! If they really want to save people (on this already overcrowded planet that is) they should invest in tuberculosis or HIV/AIDS research or set up programs for clean drinking water, better hygene etc etc etc. Only THAT will eventually lead to an increased standard of living and will therefore reduce smoking. There is a well known reciprocal connection between standard of living and nicotine intake, you see.
If the tobacco companies are responsible for billions of dollars spent on healthcare due to their product, I say let the tobacco giants pay the healthcare bill! And they can pay for the cessation products also.. oh, that's right... didn't they say nicotine wasn't addictive.. stupid me!