If you have diabetes then that's absolutely not true as smoking any amount raises hemogloblin A1C in the blood which leads to circulation blockages and other problems.

@ Putin: "So people get their 'taste for cigarettes' after a cigarette or two? How many cigarettes do you think new smokers are already smoking by the time they begin purchasing them themselves?"

According to the literature, yes. To quote Professor Michael Russell, writing in 1990:

"Over 90% of teenagers who smoke 3-4 cigarettes are trapped into a career of regular smoking which typically lasts for some 30-40 years"
(Quoted in Brigham, Janet: "Dying to Quit: Why We Smoke and How To Stop", Washington DC (1998).)

A slightly more recent study by Professor Joseph DiFranza (Massachusetts Medical School) confirmed this, finding "adolescents were showing symptoms of addition (e.g. craving) within a few weeks of their first cigarette"
(DiFranza et al: "Initial symptoms of nicotine dependence in adolescents", Journal of Tobacco Control (April 2000).)

So, yes, the literature supports the view that young people get a taste for cigarettes after smoking just a few cigarettes, actually, Putin.

@Draugnar: "our government"

Please look at the first 2 letters in the thread title.

I admit it was hidden well though, so I understand the confusion.

Just as I developed an immediate hatred for the taste of tobacco the first time I tried it, I can definitely see people getting hooked in the first few times.

@steephie - The thread has progressed and morphed beyond the original OP.

Fascinating.

I would love to see a study on brand loyalty and smoking.

And my point, steephie, was that it didn't work over here, so what makes you think it would work over there?

@ Putin: It is fascinating, isn't it?

Do you now accept that my argument that many young people get addicted *before* they become regular purchasers of cigarettes may actually be right? If you do, on that basis, do you now see my point that banning 10-packs will not be an effective way to stop those young people from taking up smoking?

It's possible, although it sort of undermines everybody's reaction earlier to poor Rainbow when he said that all smokers are addicted. People owe him an apology.

Also the statement by this gentleman seems highly suspect, in light of your evidence:

"Sorry, Rainbow Candy, but you're mistaken. About once or twice a month, I'll smoke 4-5 cigarettes in a single evening, and then not smoke again for at least two weeks - despite having purchased a 10-pack and therefore still having cigarettes close at hand. If I was addicted, I would smoke them."

No, we don't. Saying people only smoke tobacco because they are addicted to nicotine is demonstrably wrong. Saying most smokers started by bumming cigarettes off others is not an absolute statement. Also, Jamie's use of the phrase "got addicted" is arguable, but I'll let it go because eI do believe most cigarette smokers do so out of a form of addiction, whether I be nicotine or habitual from hanging with friends and wanting to "fit in".

Jamie's evidence is clear. If the studies he cited are not bs, then people become addicted within a couple of weeks of smoking their first cigarette. So the notion of the non-addicted 'casual smoker' appears to be a myth as according to Jamie, nobody who purchases cigarettes for themselves is not addicted.

That wasn't what Rainbow said. He said people smoke *tobacco*, not cigarettes.

@Draugnar: well, I genuinely understand the confusion this time, but I was bringing it back to the OP a bit I suppose. And I mean, what makes you think I care about American cigarette-laws? :)

As for your question: for the same reason illegal guns don't really work on any reasonably sized scale over here either. For the same reason our "war on drugs" is going fine.

Because we have better control apparently, or less organized crime, or both. Unlike in the USA perhaps, it would actually be a big hassle to get the cigarettes, and you'd be damn sure not to smoke in 'borderline' public, so you don't have to go through cigarette-smoke when you get out of school.
Really, I know many people who smoke and I'm fairly certain many of them would stop if they couldn't get it easily, nor legally.

I don't care too much though, but I would support banning cigarettes I think.

Cigars have nicotine. This is a distinction without a difference.

It's not about American laws, it's about America's experience with total bans on individual choices applying to Europe as well. Experience is experience and the EU should learn from our failed experiment in banning alcohol that banning a product simply does not work.

Except it wasn't a failed experiment at all. Production and consumption declined.

@Putin - so does pipe tobacco. But the study was only juveniles and cigarettes. It would have found a very different result (can't prove it, but feel it in my gut) if you surveyed adult pipe and cigar smokers as well as non-smokers who have tried a pipe or cigar. I doubt you would find many addicted to smoking cigars or pipes in general (some, but not at the recorded level of cigarettes which have added nicotine in them to make them more addictive).

"Except it wasn't a failed experiment at all. Production and consumption declined. "

I say bull. Recorded production and consumption declined. But people don't report when they are breaking the law.

Public drunkenness, people going to the hospital for liver disease, arrests for domestic violence, people checking into facilities for alcohol problems, what about these? Do they also go unreported?

Sure, they get reported. But alcohol consumption does not equate to alcoholism. All that says is fewer people were getting drunk, not fewer people were drinking.

And even if I accept a reduction in consumption, it still failed. The stated goal was the end of drinking. Period. It didn't end drinking. It just made drinkers into scofflaws.

Works for me as a result.

That's an absurd standard. Might as well repeal laws against murder. Murder didn't end. Your argument is purely speculative. The data disagree with you, so you cannot simply say it did not work.

The ban on chocolate cigarettes was very effective though.

Didn't work so well for cigars though (although I think you meant candy cigarettes which I remember as a kid and they actually weren't that good. Pixie sticks - ground up sweet tarts in a straw - were much better).

http://www.godiva.com/milk-chocolate-cigars/74126.html

And Putin your right. We should just ban everything and make everyone into an outlaw. Let's just ban breathing or drinking water.

A little more research show there were actual chocolate ones, so my apologies. I just remember the nasty candy ones when I was a kid.

I think you're on to something here Draugnar. You can actually die from drinking too much water. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_intoxication

Yeah, I was certain there used to be chocolate cigarettes as they were a common treat during the Dutch Sinterklaas holiday when I was a kid.