Mad fags

It's been a while since I have had the desire to light up a gasper. Probably five years or more. I used to enjoy a few fags when out for a beer on a Friday night, but the desire to have a social fag went around the same time I stopped going out for a social beer on Friday night. Now, when I have a beer, I am thankful that all the filthy smokers are stuck outside on the footpath and I can enjoy my beer without getting second hand smoke up my nose. I never thought about the consequences of banning smoking in pubs, but now that the ban is in force, I love the idea of getting out of bed on Saturday morning and not stinking like an ashtray.

All that aside, the smoking bans can be taken a bit far. I found that quitting smoking was dead easy. I just stopped buying cigarettes one day and stopped smoking a few days later when my last packet ran out. That was it. No cravings. No shakes. No nothing. Although for the next few years, I felt the need to bum a smoke or two when consuming too much beer, but even that went away eventually. I don't get this whole "quiting is hard" business. Maybe it is for some people. Maybe I just didn't smoke enough. I find the idea of going with coffee for a day to be much more distressing than going without nicotine.

From The spectator:

A recent inquest recorded the death of Genevieve Butler, a woman in her twenties who threw herself from the fourth-floor internal walkway of the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital. I have followed this terrible case because Genevieve’s parents are friends of ours. It raises many issues about the mishandling of mental health care too large to be discussed in a note here, but one smaller point should be made. When Genevieve, who was in a psychotic state, jumped, she was being taken outside to smoke, in accordance with the no-smoking policy which is now law. A great many mental patients like to smoke. If they are not allowed to do so, they become much more anxious and desperate. If they go outside to smoke, they will generally need supervision. This involves greater risk and is a waste of nursing time which could be avoided if they could smoke in designated indoor areas. There are other recent cases, I gather — e.g. a fall from a hospital window in west London and a stabbing of a nurse in Essex — where the smoking ban created extreme and avoidable strain. Smoking harms the body, we know, but can we be so absolutist when it comes to the troubles of the mind?