Sir, – I wish to respond to aletter from Forest Ireland (November 17th).
Ireland is not a nanny state, as stated in the letter. On the contrary, it is an international leader in the fight against tobacco and nicotine addiction. Progressive legislation has been central to our success in reducing smoking prevalence by some 10 per cent in the past decade.
Tobacco is an addictive dangerous product that kills one in two of those who use it. This is not a normal product.
Regrettably, close to 6,000 of our citizens die annually because of smoking, and our health service spends well over a billion euro annually treating tobacco-related disease.
The only beneficiary from these dreadful statistics is the immensely profitable tobacco industry, which sponsors Forest UK, which is now linked to Forest Ireland. – Yours, etc,
Dr PATRICK DOORLEY,
Chairman,
ASH Ireland,
50 Ringsend Road,
Dublin 4.