spiked-health | Article | The stigma of smoking

spiked-health | Article | The stigma of smoking: "In the era of evidence-based policy, it is worth noting that there is little evidence to suggest that more coercive anti-smoking policies are likely to be successful. The shift from the approach of providing public information on the dangers of smoking in the 1970s and 80s, to the bans and proscriptions - and the promotion of medicalised 'smoking cessation' therapies, such as nicotine replacement - that have become increasingly prevalent since the 1990s, has produced diminishing returns.The debate on the smoking ban revealed the childlike character of political discourse"