Can the state forbid citizens to smoke?

Answers economist Vadim Novikov

The World Health Organization plans to make a proposal to ban the sale of thin cigarettes. According to WHO experts, the reduced diameter of cigarettes "enhances the attractiveness of tobacco products." Despite the advisory nature of the initiative, many countries, including Russia, can legalize it. In the Russian Federation - if such a decision is made - about 40% of the cigarette market will suffer (such a segment, according to Nielsen, falls on thin cigarettes). Medusa asked the antimonopoly economist Vadim Novikov if the state could forbid its citizens to smoke.

Vadim Novikov

Expert in the field of applied microeconomics, senior researcher at the RANEPA

Of course, in the legislation you can find grounds for the ban on smoking. In particular, the Constitution of the Russian Federation allows you to introduce certain measures aimed at protecting the life and health of people. But, in essence, they will always be arbitrariness, because the line between what is considered an acceptable risk, and what is not, is not determined. There is no principle that would allow cigarettes to ban, but at the same time it would not forbid a bunch of other things. For example, most of our food, probably, would not have been consistent with strict doctors.

WHO care for health is an understandable thing, but the consistent application of such ideas as the ban on the sale of thin cigarettes would turn the whole world into a sanatorium. Just try to imagine that there is nothing more important in your life. A person who would live in this way would rent the most modest housing, bought cheap nutrient food, and spend all the remaining savings on the best doctors in the world. The problem of such a life is that in our understanding it is not normal.

In fact, most people are quite easily sacrificing the duration of life for the sake of its quality and diversity. Of course, health is an important aspect, but it is necessary to remember the value of life, about those things that make it valuable. For example, I do not smoke, but from the point of view of smokers, cigarettes are one of the pleasant things in life. And measures such as a ban on smoking, impoverish life, turning us into patients. But no one wants to be a patient.