The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune.

I WRITE this letter as a wake up call and a warning to all Bahamians, young and old, Black and White, rich and poor, FNM, PLP, or DNA.

You see them, on the bus stop, in restaurants and bars, and downtown: Smokers. Users of tobacco, puffing away on their cigarettes and Backwoods and little “beadies”. Smokers, polluting the air with their second hand smoke, either unaware or uncaring of the negative effect their habit has on anyone and everyone in their vicinity. Smokers, spending their hard earned money on cigarettes, either buying them in singles or as a whole pack eager to quench their insatiable hunger and thirst for nicotine. Smokers.

The Bahamas has a major smoking problem, a problem that is getting worse by the day, a problem that was brought to this country by our massively sized neighbour to the north, the United States of America.

For decades, we Bahamians have been brainwashed and manipulated by Big Tobacco into believing that smoking was a “ fad”, that it was the “cool” and “hip” thing to do, that smoking makes you a macho man (Marlboro Man), or that smoking somehow makes you sexually appealing, hence the usage of highly attractive women in cigarette ads. Smoking has become so prevalent in this country that we now have our own tobacco industry, where we manufacture, promote, and sell our very own cigarettes and other tobacco products, all for the almighty dollar, believing that having a tobacco industry in the Bahamas would stimulate our economy.

If you are reading this, please heed this warning: if you smoke, quit. If you don’t smoke, don’t start. Ever. Smoking will not make you macho. It will not turn you into a “real man”. It will not make you sexually appealing. It will do you absolutely no favours whatsoever. What it will do, with absolute certainty, is kill you. Smoking will kill you, slowly, painfully, and horribly. You probably know this already. You’ve probably heard over and over again, ad nauseum, how smoking gives you cancer, and how it’s one of the leading causes of preventable death. But, until you’ve seen with your own eyes what cancer does to the human body, you simply do not know just how dangerous smoking really is.

Let me tell you about cancer: It’s not a disease, like, say, influenza or cholera. Oh no, dear reader, it’s much more than that. Cancer is a creature, a parasite, a living thing. It’s alive. And like all living things, it feeds. And like all parasites, it needs a host to feed off of. That host is you. Once cancer forms inside of you, it grows, feeding off of you, robbing your body of all of it’s nutrients.

You go from being a strapping, healthy and strong individual to nothing more than skin and bones, your body incapacitated and helpless, an empty and immobile husk of your former self. You suffer. You find yourself praying for death as your body destroys itself, slowly, painfully, horribly. And all because you chose to be a sheep and follow the crowd by giving in to smoking. And while you’re slowly dying, Big Tobacco grows richer and more powerful, literally cashing in on sickness, misery and death.

In today’s world, there seems to be endless talk about terrorism; Islamic extremism has become the hot button topic on every media outlet, with everyone in constant fear of the next terrorist attack. Everyone is fearful of terrorist groups such as ISIS and Al Qaeda, but the biggest “terrorist group” doesn’t quote the Quran or worships Allah or speaks Arabic and wears robes, sandals, burqas or hijabs. The real terrorists wears business suits and ties and wingtip shoes and carries a briefcase.

The real terrorists speaks  English and worships Benjamin Franklin’s printed green face. The real terrorist is Big Tobacco, who kills millions of people year after year and thousands of people every day, a feat ISIS and Al Qaeda can only dream of accomplishing. And now, these literal death merchants have come to our shores. I cry shame on the government(s) of the Bahamas and the Ministry/Minister of Health for allowing an actual tobacco industry to exist in this country. Clearly, money matters more to the people in charge than the health of their citizens

CANCER PATIENT’S SON

Nassau,

March 22, 2017.