But what makes the cigarette so unique is that, unlike alcohol, it is hazardous when used as intended. One does not need to abuse cigarettes to assume extraordinary risks of disease and death. The unprecedented annual carnage caused by cigarettes, making them the leading cause of premature, preventable death in 1991, and the fact that they are the only legal product on the market which is hazardous when used as intended, places cigarettes in a special category for special attention. It's a legal product, like toothpaste and laundry detergent. There is no reason for legislative action to reduce the consumption of this product.
Cigarettes are a legal product.
All but the most anti-smoking advocates agree that they should remain legal. Of course, if this product were introduced today, our society would reject it. We don't tolerate a food additive that causes cancer when a rodent drowns in it. Cigarettes, primarily introduced into this nation during and after WWI, already had a grip on an addicted constituency and an economic stranglehold on the nation when, in the early 1950s, the epidemiological evidence of cigarettes' spectacular hazards became clear. They are a privileged product, one which has enjoyed legal invulnerability for the manufacturer in the causation of death and disability.