We are immersed in statistical risks, or what is the same thing, surrounded by ominous odds. We can die electrocuted by an electrical appliance (the statistical probability is surprisingly high) nell'autostrada crushed by a truck, killed by a wrong treatment or an infection acquired in a hospital, overwhelmed by the shock caused by the bite of a bee hit by a meteorite in free fall, trampled by a deer on the run, and many other causes of death, each of which has a statistical probability that can be calculated.
To avoid all the risks you should put into hibernation in a vault, and even so ... It seems that the innate risk of death and life, and that the only solution is to live with a great deal of danger, taking special precautions only when the statistical risk is particularly high.
The case is in tobacco? Even if we take for good data prohibitionists (and does not are) we must conclude that it is not particularly high: the next time ask the anti-smoking propaganda that the risk calculations, at least not in years, but the possibility that the event will occur in a particular individual. You will see what a surprise. Obviously, a sensible person would say "it depends", and would do the calculation for fringes of age and health conditions. If you are older than sixty years, and his cardio-respiratory disorders and higher risk, if you are under sixty, and a reasonably good health, your risk is very low, for example.
Of course all these distinctions are far less effective than the words "Smoking Kills" on cigarette packets. If the propagandists antibacco had an obligation to write on the package of cigarettes, not only contraindications, but also the limitations, conditionals, disputes about the data and their credibility to serve rather than a sheet. It would not have the nice effect that these propagandists want to achieve: to scare people to death.
