[TelmoMenezes]

Zero (cigarettes are highly addictive).

My point is that reality limits how much safer you could make a product. Would it be nice for cigarette or alcoholic beverages to be safer? Yes. Is it possible? Apparently not.

Either tobacco becomes a controlled substance (I am deeply opposed to this given the catastrophic social consequences of prohibition in general), or adults behave like adults, understand the risks, decide for themselves and accept the consequences. Maybe it's because I'm European, but anything else sounds like insanity to me.

By the way, I am not being judgemental in any way. I am an ex-smoker and I drink socially. If people want to smoke (without polluting the environment of others who don't) it's their right, and I completely understand. I used to love it too.

[ghurtado]

> Either tobacco becomes a controlled substance

What on earth are you talking about? Tobacco is already a controlled substance in more ways than nearly anything that you can buy at a store (including guns).

[TelmoMenezes]

I meant prohibited, of course. I think that is fairly obvious from the context of my post. Sorry for the lack of rigor.

Where I live it is almost impossible to buy a gun. On the other hand, I can go downstairs and buy a pack of cigarettes with the same ease that I could buy bubble gum. No questions asked, no ID needed, no records.