The proposition that the state should regulate directly the "upstream" causes of health/disease is advocated by 'the social production of disease' school 1 and is opposed by those concerned that pursuing public health with such means will lead to excessive state regulation of private interests. Ticklish regulatory issues are also raised by the so-called new public health in which individuals are held to be primarily responsible for their own health. In the latter regulatory regime, responsibility shifts from the state (e.g. to regulate noxious industries) to the individual (e.g. to take responsibility in avoiding the products of noxious industry.) The regulation of smoking falls very much within this paradigm. Current controversy over eating behaviors, resulting obesity, and the impact on the "public's" health are of the same character, as are efforts to hold mothers criminally responsible for ingesting "dangerous" substances during pregnancy (ranging from methamphetamines to alcohol and tobacco). As political scientists look at these issues, health as a value always stands in dynamic tension to other rights and values (e.g. wealth, liberty, rectitude, etc.) What societies negotiate at any given moment is the relative authority to be given one value weighed against another. The ultimate policy questions become how much authority will health values and those who espouse and affect them have in society, and at the opportunity cost of what else (3)?