Quit Smoking Weapons of Mass Distraction

Since the 1950s when the evidence on smoking causing serious, fatal diseases began consolidating, hundreds of millions of smokers have quit. Overwhelmingly, the great majority quit unassisted without any professional or pharmaceutical help. But from the late 1970s, massive campaigns have urged smokers not to go the cold turkey route and instead take nicotine replacement therapy, prescribed drugs and most recently, to vape. Simon Chapman is a veteran researcher, a global public health advocate and an Australian Skeptic of the Year. In this book he analyses the relentless push to medicalise and commodify quitting and sets out those policies and campaigns which have collectively driven smoking rates down to record low levels.