asked the Minister for Health if in view of the recent well-substantiated findings confirming the belief that there is a direct relationship between cigarette smoking and the causation of cancer of the lung he will take steps to ensure that tobacco companies will draw the attention of the public in all newspaper and television advertising as well as on the packets containing the carcinogenic cigarettes to the danger of contracting cancer of the lung by smoking their products.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Lung Cancer.
11.
I have no power under existing legislation to take steps on the lines suggested in the Deputy's question, nor do I think that circumstances warrant such action. Evidence pointing towards a cause and effect relationship between cigarette smoking and lung cancer has been widely publicised in recent years and I think that each person, in deciding whether or not to continue to smoke or to become a smoker, is in a position to know that such evidence exists and that he can get information about it. My Department has publicity material available on this which has been widely distributed and is freely available to any enquirer.
Surely the Minister will agree that the campaign which he has initiated is in no way a serious counter to the thousands of pounds being spent by the tobacco companies to convince the public that cigarette smoking is safe, and indeed harmless.
So it is.
I do not know what else we can do. The Deputy may wish to order other men's lives according to his own views of how a man should live, but that is not my approach. I think a man should be able to live as a free man and determine whether or nor he will smoke.
Is it not a fact that cigarette smoking has been widely accepted as a drug? If the Minister takes up that attitude, there are people who would like to have free access to the use of morphia, cocaine and opium. Does the Minister think they should be given access to them?
I think the Deputy exaggerates the situation. After all, he should bear in mind what happened in America when they introduced Prohibition. Are we going to have that apply to cigarette smoking?
Is it not true that, according to the statistics produced by the Minister's Department, there has been a significant increase in the incidence of lung cancer over the last seven years in Ireland?
That may be so, but I am not entitled to order any man's life; I must let a man live his life as he wishes.
Is it not the Minister's practice in the case of dangerous poisons to direct that the character and description of the poison be carried on the label? Why will he not use the same power in this regard?
Because cigarette smoking is not, as far as I can see, a social evil. It may operate to the detriment of a person's life but it is not a social evil, and that is all we are concerned about.
It is O.K. for the Minister for Finance, anyway.