Dude...stop trying to rationalize it. Like Palantas said...the numbers are NOT EVEN CLOSE. The American Cancer Society makes that quite clear.
"How does smoking cause illness and death?
About half of all Americans who keep smoking will die because of the habit. Each year about 443,600 people in the United States die from illnesses related to tobacco use. Smoking cigarettes kills more Americans than alcohol, car accidents, suicide, AIDS, homicide, and illegal drugs combined.
Cancer caused by smoking
Cigarette smoking accounts for at least 30% of all cancer deaths. It is linked with an increased risk of the following cancers:
- lung
- larynx (voice box)
- oral cavity (mouth, tongue, and lips)
- pharynx (throat)
- esophagus (tube connecting the throat to the stomach)
- stomach
- pancreas
- cervix
- kidney
- bladder
- acute myeloid leukemia
Smoking is responsible for almost 9 out of 10 lung cancer deaths. Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in both men and women, and is one of the hardest cancers to treat. Lung cancer is a disease that can often be prevented. Some religious groups that promote non-smoking as part of their religion, such as Mormons and Seventh-day Adventists, have much lower rates of lung cancer and other smoking-related cancers.
Other health problems caused by smoking
As serious as cancer is, it accounts for less than half of the deaths related to smoking each year. Smoking is a major cause of heart disease, aneurysms, bronchitis, emphysema, and stroke.
Using tobacco can damage a woman's reproductive health and hurt babies. Tobacco use is linked with reduced fertility and a higher risk of miscarriage, early delivery (premature birth), and stillbirth. It is also a cause of low birth-weight in infants. It has been linked to sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), too.
Smoking can make pneumonia and asthma worse. It has been linked to other health problems, too, including gum disease, cataracts, bone thinning, hip fractures, and peptic ulcers. Some studies have also linked smoking to macular degeneration, an eye disease that can cause blindness.
Smoking can cause or worsen poor blood flow in the arms and legs (peripheral vascular disease or PVD.) Surgery to improve the blood flow often doesn't work in people who keep smoking. Because of this, many surgeons who work on blood vessels (vascular surgeons) won't do certain surgeries on patients with PVD unless they stop smoking.
Some studies have found that male smokers may be more likely to be sexually impotent (have erectile dysfunction).
The smoke from cigarettes (called secondhand smoke or environmental tobacco smoke) can also have harmful health effects on those exposed to it. Adults and children can have health problems from breathing secondhand smoke. (See our documents, Secondhand Smoke and Women and Smoking.)
Effects of smoking on how long you live and your quality of life
Based on data collected from 1995 to 1999, the CDC estimated that adult male smokers lost an average of 13.2 years of life and female smokers lost 14.5 years of life because of smoking."
.........now let's look at some statistics from Mothers Against Drunk Driving. This radical abolition organization says that drunk driving resulted in 11,733 deaths in 2008, and that binge drinking by college students accounted for 1700 deaths in the same year. So let's say that all binge drinking comes to about 10,000 a year (which is super generous). That comes to 20,733 deaths a year. Now let's do something ridiculous...let's DOUBLE that number just for the hell of it. We'll pretend it's 42,000, which would never, ever happen. Now look at the tobacco-related death stat from above...443,600. That's right. Doubling the yearly alcohol deaths still doesnt even make them 1/10 of tobacco related deaths. Now lets say smoking is only halfof those tobacco-related deaths (which would also never happen, it's way more). Drinking STILL doesn't even account for 1/5 as many deaths.
So you see, even when you balloon the statistics as much as possible, you just can't win. Smoking is worse.
Elephant_Couple
So it seems every single person against the idea that smoking is worse completely ignored this post so I'm quoting it for those continuing the argument. This post is pretty well written and neatly proves you wrong. It has the necessary, statistical data with links. Nice job, Elephant_Couple.
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