re: It blows my mind that people still smoke cigarettes in 2017

I was replying to your post where you were talking about higher insurance premiums because of smokers. My response is that fatty foods and sodas are causally linked with obesity, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, heart disease, heart attacks and strokes. All of these conditions are likely more responsible for the rise in healthcare costs than smoking.

If you think people shouldn't smoke because of externality costs, the same logic can be applied to fast food, candy, sodas, sports drinks and a host of other unhealthy items. You would call that protecting the public health, I'd call it fascism.