Let's think the unthinkable - smoking

In the 1970s, I spent a great couple of weeks in Bristol learning about "Operational Research". This was the original name of what is now called "Applied Statistics" - using statistics to solve a specific "here and now" problem. The course lecturer had formerly worked on the great technological white elephant that was Concorde.He explained that he watched the Concorde project abandon financial commonsense as delays, overruns, modifications all added to the bill. That's the trouble with big numbers. They start to reach a size where we loose our grip on reality. Once you start talking "billions", then £0.05 billion seems like petty cash.

But it isn't. It's fifty million quid!

Our lecturer explained that he kept his sanity by converting all these overspends into Mars Bars. He knew the volume of a Mars Bar and how much it cost. It was fairly simple arithmetic to represent the "latest cost overrun on the Concorde undercarriage system" into enough Mars Bars to fill three aircraft hangars - floor to ceiling .. wall to wall! You may think he was potty but it kept his cost accounting feet firmly rooted on the ground instead of in project-financial fairyland. I have taken advantage of his wisdom ever since. It helps me to ensure that cost projections, financial forecasts, etc. can all stand up to real world scrutiny.

Which leads me to the NHS expenditure on helping people to stop smoking. Why are we forking out MILLIONS of pounds for smoking cessation treatments? People smoking a packet of fags a day are spending £42 a week on the habit. They could afford to buy any of the various OTC patches and potions for a fraction of that. I've checked on Amazon and patches vary in price from £1.05 each up to £1.75 or in cigarette terms that's between six and eight ciggies a day. If they do give up, then they will reap the financial benefit for the rest of their lives.

By this point, any "health professional" reading this will have marshalled the forces of righteous indignation to attach me as an inhumane and illogical idiot (which may be true but that's not the point). Helping people to stop smoking saves the taxpayer money. You've all see the headlines. Smoking costs the NHS £1.5bn, £3bn, £5bn a year (what's a few billion matter here?). Don't believe me? Just click on this link to Google and see what numbers pop up for "smoking costs NHS". Read the headlines for yourself.

Increased likelihood of coronary heart disease, lung, throat and mouth cancers, respiratory disease, etc.etc. are all consquences of smoking. However, there are also savings to the NHS and the taxpayer.

• The excise duty on cigarettes is vast: excise duty in 2010 is estimated at £8.8bn and VAT is a further £1,7bn. (Tobacco Manufacturers' Association). That's ten percent of the total NHS budget of £103.8bn
• The biggest cost to the NHS is in treating the effects of getting old. If smokers (on average) die sooner, then whilst they still incur the costs of their chronic conditions but save on the costs of elderly care.

If the NHS wants to have a financial debate about smoking, then perhaps it should consider encouraging us to smoke. It looks as though there's a net gain in terms of revenue and expenditure here! Even if I'm wrong, about the big picture, I still don't see why we should be subsidising people who want to stop smoking any more than we should subsidise people who want to stop biting their nails or sucking their teeth.

The NHS is running out of cash. We have more important things to do than this.

(for the record: I use to smoke - sixty-a-day in fact. So did my son. He now runs marathons and I get my exercise watching him occasionally).